[Darryl is on sabbatical, so instead of the usual Diary of a Dales Vicar, we have a letter from Elizabeth.]
I think it was the banging that woke me. Like a door being slammed but rather louder. It took a moment to remember why the room was unfamiliar and in that first moment of disorientation the whole place began to shake. Not gently either! As I reached for the bedside light it, and the books lying beside it, fell off the table and the curtains began to sway. For a few terrifying moments I thought that the whole building was falling down! Then I remembered where I was – 10 floors up in a hotel in San Francisco. Which is how I discovered what an earthquake feels like.
I spent the rest of the night in fairly disturbed dozing, wondering what, if anything, I should do/have done and if there was going to be another quake. The following morning was fascinating. My colleagues on that business trip included natives of New York (who’d been as terrified as I was) and we met up for breakfast with local people who’d lived all their lives with earthquakes. For a while there was only one topic of conversation. ‘Where were you?’ ‘How strong was it?’ ‘Was there any major damage?’ For myself, I found I was re-evaluating expressions I’d always thought I understood. ‘Rock-solid’ takes on a whole new meaning when you discover that, under the right conditions, rock can liquefy. ‘Sure foundations’ are not so sure when you find that a whole house can shift off its foundations. For some time I found the world a fragile place, where I still expected the ground to change shape beneath me.
Earthquakes also occur in the Middle East and at least one Gospel writer records what sounds like one happening at the moment of Jesus’ death on the cross. Whatever happened that day the events of the following Sunday must have seemed earth-shattering to the followers of Jesus. They had seen their leader die, put to death by the most efficient executioners of their day, and buried in a borrowed tomb. Still in grief and shock on the Sunday, no wonder they disbelieve the strange tale brought to them by a group of women. A tale of moving stones, of angelic messengers and an empty tomb.
For the next 40 days the truth of that amazing story is brought home to hundreds of men and women as Jesus once again walks and talks with them. They see his wounds, eat breakfast together on a Galilean beach, listen as he speaks (as he has done for the last 3 years) about the kingdom of God.
Then he sends them out to change the world – not by physical force but by their lives and teaching. To remodel and reshape it into that place of justice, peace and freedom for which their master died and rose again. To build a world that reflects the wholeness and healing for all that was so much a mark of Jesus’ own ministry.
One of the most powerful proofs of the resurrection is the change in that group of people. Men and women who spent Friday and Saturday cowering in a locked room become people prepared to die for their beliefs. A motley band that includes Galilean fishermen, a tax collector and a religious zealot become the founding members of a faith that, over 2,000 years later, is still going strong.
To change the shape of the earth was never going to be an easy task. This Easter we may well see Trump continuing to attempt to change the politics of the Middle East by force, Ukraine will still be occupied and under attack and the people of Gaza will still be struggling for the basic necessities of food, water and shelter. Nearer to home, families depend on Food Banks and rural households are being hit hard by the increases in oil prices. Everywhere there is still a huge need for the message of that first Easter. A message of hope in the face of despair, of the ultimate victory of love over hate, life over death. Resurrection lies at the heart of the Christian faith because resurrection changes everything.
Earth shattering? World changing anyway. It could be so if we could only recapture something of the hope and the determination of those first Christians. If we would only step out and do our bit of Kingdom building here in Upper Nidderdale.
May you know the joy and the hope of Easter.
With my love and prayers,
Canon Elizabeth