"Jesus is on the loose!"

                                                            Resurrection -- Paul Granlund 

 I heard this past week from someone who had been part of my congregation in Halifax, nearly 20 years ago. When I met her she told me that she'd left church behind in her early teens and for years didn't identify as a Christian . 

After the death of her first husband in his forties she met a man from the States who rented her summer home, and began to woo her with quiet determination -- from St. Louis! . He was someone with a deep faith and began worshiping with us when he came to Canada, without expectation that she join him. She eventually did, she renewed her Christian faith, and I had the pleasure of presiding at their wedding.

This year she shared  her story with her congregation, when invited to do so by the minister. She lives in Colorado now, and will stay despite her husband's death last year. She reminded me that during the first Easter service she attended in Halifax I spoke of  a colleague who had a group of children come to the front for the children's time on Easter morning. Considerable effort had been made to create a tomb with a stone which had been rolled away. When she asked the kids what this meant, one of them shouted, joyfully, "Jesus is on the loose!"

While "Christ is Risen" might have been the response this pastor was looking for, what better way to declare that Jesus, the Christ, is unfettered by the grave and actively present in our world? And what a powerful message now, in a time when so many of us are feeling anything but "on the loose." Here in Ontario we are in yet another lock-down, although it is suspiciously not a real lock-down. because of the resurgence of the coronavirus. 

Today many congregations are worshiping virtually on what would normally be the best attended service of the year. Some are experiencing a second Easter without in-person worship and which have never reopened since the first quarantine order in March 2020. Others, have attendance restrictions and congregants are cautioned not to sing -- on Easter! This is tough. 

What does our future hold? Yes, we are feeling more hopeful as vaccinations roll out across the country, but variants of the virus are scary, and our healthcare system is feeling the strain.Will worship ever be "normal" again? 

From the first Easter morning Christians have had no guarantees. And most of us have lived through sorrow and doubt along the way So why don't we declare that "Jesus is on the loose!"  today, even as we may  struggle with being "entombed" physically, psychologically, even spiritually. 

Whatever your experiences of uncertainty or loss or fear, Christ is no longer in the grave, and I encourage you to live with resurrection hope.