Second Sunday after Easter 2021
Song: Come on and celebrate
Come on and Celebrate - YouTube
John 20: 19 – 29
Song: Up from the grave he arose
Quarantine Virtual Hymn Sing - Low in the Grave He Lay - YouTube
John 21: 1-14
Song: He lives!
He Lives! (I Serve A Risen Saviour) - YouTube
As we go through our lives, there are often “milestone” events; things which are very important and have a shaping effect on the way we live. These events can be of many varieties, and the importance of an event can vary for different people.
Once the event over, people often talk about “getting back to normal”. The event then remains as a part of their history, something to talk about and perhaps to act as dating references when talking about other things.
Some events have an especially strong impact on people. After such events there is no possibility of going back, everything has changed.
Some years ago I knew a man who had lost his wife. He attempted to do the things that had always had been done, but was unequal to the task. One of the things which his late wife had done was attend to the Christmas cards and presents, but he made a mess of this, to his embarrassment. Later on, in conversation with his sister-in-law, he was talking about this, only for her to say “Well it would have never have happened if Ruby had been alive!” His response was to say “Many things would have been different if Ruby had been alive.” After such an event, there was no “going back to normal”, everything had changed.
Often when people retire they have thoughts of retiring to somewhere that they have lived in the past. Whenever I have such thoughts, I then pause and consider that the town would not be what it was like when I lived there; the people would not be the same as when I lived there, those that are still there would be much older, and many of the others would have moved away. It is not “going back” to when I lived there, or to where I lived. It is not the same place and time.
In the musical West Side Story, there is an exchange between Doc and Action:
Doc : Why, when I was your age...
Action : When you was my age? When my old man was my age, when my brother was my age... You was never my age, none of ya! And the sooner you creeps get hip to that, the sooner you'll dig us!
“You was never my age”, times have changed, the world has moved on. Me as a teenager is not the same as you as a teenager. You don’t know what it is like to be a teenager in the modern world.
Jesus’ life and death was one of those “no going back” events. And yet, the disciples tried to “go back to normal”. They went fishing at Galilee. This was what they knew, what was familiar. Jesus appeared and they realised that they could not just carry on as before. His actions reminded them of the events of his ministry, and how he had changed things.
Jesus came to change the world, there was no going back, only forwards. Jesus came to turn the world upside down, or as an author put it “to comfort the disturbed and to disturb the comfortable.”
The past year has been an event from which there can be no “going back to normal”. We will talking about this year for a long time. The world has changed as a result of the covid19 pandemic.
As a church we need to realise that we cannot just go back to doing everything the same way as we have always done, If we try to, the risen Lord will appear to us and say that we need to find new ways of doing things, we must go forward in His service.
I have decided to follow Jesus.
I Have Decided to Follow Jesus ~ Cedarmont Kids ~ lyric video - YouTube
Prayer:
No comments:
Post a Comment