Resurrection Morning
April 4, 2021
Opening
Open our hearts Resurrected One to all the places within us and around us longing for life.
Reflection
This last week and year we have known so much grief.
In this pandemic time with so many lives having been lost,
we have been touched by death in a pervasive way.
It has hung over us like a fog that hovers and clings to us.
Jesus entered that deep place of grief and death for us,
to bring us to today, to speak life and healing
into all the grieving and broken places within us.
He emerges from the tomb to offer life and hope
and Divine Companionship in ways we couldn’t imagine.
Hear the Good News.
Invitation
Scripture: Mark 16:1-8
Saturday evening, when the Sabbath ended, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome went out and purchased burial spices so they could anoint Jesus’ body. Very early on Sunday morning, just at sunrise, they went to the tomb. On the way they were asking each other, “Who will roll away the stone for us from the entrance to the tomb?” But as they arrived, they looked up and saw that the stone, which was very large, had already been rolled aside. When they entered the tomb, they saw a young man clothed in a white robe sitting on the right side. The women were shocked, but the angel said, “Don’t be alarmed. You are looking for Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He isn’t here! He is risen from the dead! Look, this is where they laid his body. Now go and tell his disciples, including Peter, that Jesus is going ahead of you to Galilee. You will see him there, just as he told you before he died.” The women fled from the tomb, trembling and bewildered, and they said nothing to anyone because they were too frightened.
Prayer of Response
Dear Resurrected One,
Thank You for the light that shatters the darkness
and permeates every corner where death and loss are found.
Thank you for the gift of life that is a resurrected one
and not a resuscitated one,
a life that is new and moves us beyond everything we have known.
For although this world still knows dark and broken places,
the life we know in you is like the sun’s beams
breaking through the clouds and shining its light as a healing balm within.
You shed your loving, healing, light into every space and place.
Thank you for your love that did not and does not stop.
Your love and light reach to us covering us
in a beautiful display that will not let us go.
May we be healed by it.
Grant us strength and hope through this unfathomable gift.
And shine that healing and permeating light
through us into the world around us.
Glory. Hallelujah, Amen.
Rev. Eva Sullivan-Knoff,
Founder and Executive Director