1 Corinthians 15:1-11

Easter - Year B

"I am what I am." "Now we are witnesses to everything Jesus did/was/is"

That seems to be the rest of the story.

We are scared and yet, somehow, we witness to G*D's forgiveness as exampled by Jesus. This is an appropriate contemporary response to the Good Friday of long ago. Enough of this witness in church or society will lead you to the same place. We claim this, none-the-less, to be a worthy endeavor.

For what you are -- if not a witness of and for forgiving love?

Amen. Alleluia!

http://www.kairoscomotion.org/lectionary/2003/april2003.html

 

 

G*D shows no partiality . . . in appearing to all.

There is a popular presumption that Jesus' appearances were to a limited number and occurred immediately after Easter. In these passages we find out that those who considered themselves witness of Jesus noted his appearance. It happened with Mary Magdalene, the Emmaus wanderers, the Twelve, more than 500, and later with Saul/Paul. That is a variety of settings, numbers of people, and timings.

Listen again to there being no partiality. As the star of old appeared in the sky, some got it and some didn't. As Jesus lived and taught and wondered/miracled, some got it and some didn't. It would not at all be surprising for Jesus to appear to many (including Peter at the tomb?), some got it and some didn't.

The difference may not be Jesus' appearance, but, like Thomas, our not being ready to acknowledge an appearance that would shift our focus one more time.

Even at this late date, G*D's partiality is not compromised. Easter appearances still are made, even on a Tuesday prior to Easter. Did you notice the "crack in the cosmic egg" just widened a bit. An interview of Joseph Chilton Pearce (author of said crack) casts some light on what is caught and what passes by. Are you keeping your metaphoric education alive?

http://www.kairoscomotion.org/lectionary/2006/april2006.html

 

 

"By the grace of God I am what I am." By extension I am what have been and will be. This is no whitewashing of past betrayals and killings, of present betrayals and dislocations, or ability to withstand coming temptations to betray and do away with.

A significant question is what movement is going on with this am-ness of mine? Is it showing that I haven't learned anything from the past, that I have stopped learning in the present so my future will be stuck right here? Is it turning G*D's steadfast love into vanity, vanity, all is vanity?

On this Good Friday we recognize am-ness, all the sordid joy of it. We are with Christ on a cross, we are with all those who die this day from hunger and violence. We are with Christ on a cross, we are with all those who live non-violence in the face of violence. We are with the soldiers poking dead bodies, we are with our friend Fred Brancel and the others who went to prison yesterday for crossing the line at the School of the Assassins to protest the training of those who create and poke at dead bodies. We are with those who betray and run and those who stand afar and witness. We are with a cry so deep it tears open every barrier that has kept sacred and secular apart. We are with so many different am-nesses.

May we help support one another to not have our am-ness be in vain.

http://www.kairoscomotion.org/lectionary/2006/april2006.html

 

 

There is no Easter earthquake in Mark. "When they looked up, they saw that the stone, which was very large, had already been rolled back."

As you look back at your own life-journey (not always "spiritual") can you identify those times when your eye had been downcast, but, when you did, accidentally or hopefully, look up, it was obvious the dragon's maw no longer awaited you?

These are important markers, individually and communally, when we are then able to enter the tomb we so feared or were resigned to.

As in Mark, we may find even these subsequent experiences to be as frightening in their reality as they had been in their expectation. We may yet run afraid, away. But always there is a remembrance of a stone having rolled away and we can regroup to move beyond a next fear.

The ending of Mark is a marker for us in this process. Just how many endings there are to the resurrectional story, no one will ever know. They don't end with the recorded accretion of endings in Mark. We are still adding new endings to this old story. One way or another, fear never has the last word.

What we know as the original ending of Mark begs for completion in our lives. We have hurried (then and then and then) onward through this story that had no beginning and has no end. We have run right up to and past the last word of "afraid" and found ourselves hanging over an existential abyss - How'd we get here? What are we going to do now? Will this be the last word?

Mark's masterpiece has a masterpiece of an ending that tosses the salvation of G*D and Creation right back to us. Are you going to run forever, away, or stand over your nothing left and trust again, build again, live again?

- - -

so a new heaven and new earth
are about to be created

will this creation be a partnership
or a wholly-owned subsidiary

if without remembrance
will it long endure

without labor's seeming vanity
where resurrection's blessing

as came death so comes life
through you and me and us

choose this day
a last fruit - a first

http://kcmlection.blogspot.com/2007_04_01_archive.html

 

How do we get beyond what has been handed on to us? Here the business of tradition keeps alive the sacrificial motif as basic to faith. What else have we come to "believe" because it has simply been around and found ourselves in its midst?

Conversion mania of being more faithful than the faithful is a phenomenon that deepens hearsay into eye-witness reports. You can almost bet that the ever more righteous who show it by being even more righteous than the current most righteous, will devolve the gift of life into reward for themselves. No matter how slyly Paul protests that it is just the grace of god that has enlightened him, his passing on what he had been taught as a good sacrificial Pharisee is not helpful or excusable. In terms of counter-espionage, Paul might be considered a double-agent or mole as well as by his current sobriquet of saint.

Easter pushes us beyond what has been handed on to us. There is a new reality afoot. Follow the clues of Jesus' faithfulness and you will not find a sacrificial utilitarianism, but an obliviousness to sacrifice through radical hospitality with those traditionally left out.

http://kcmlection.blogspot.com/2009_04_01_archive.html

 

 

I am assuming that your behavior was integrous, not hypocritical; steady, not a passing fancy; for good and for good.

Even if you were operating out of a different set of beliefs, it is a grace that we can participate in the building up of a new community. Some have come out of seeing a horrific death and blessed resurrection. Others have come out of following a life well-lived and willingness to accept consequences.

Whichever path has brought you near to one another, remember that G*D is so gracious and generous to each of us for life and death have an eternal relationship. One does not trump the other. May you have G*D-given energy to speak your larger truths and entrust yourself to a vision worthy of pulling you and all into a better future.

http://kcmlection.blogspot.com/2012/04/1-corinthians-151-11.html