Genesis 1:1 – 2:2; Exodus 14:10 – 15:1;
Romans 6:3–11; Matthew 28:1–10
This is the homily given at given at St.
John’s, Huntingdon, Pennsylvania, by Fr. Gene Tucker on Saturday, March 31,
2018.
“STANDING AT THE BORDER BETWEEN EVIL AND GOOD”
The
celebration we are observing on this very holy night of the Great Vigil of
Easter places us in a wonderful and very unique place: We are standing at the
border, the dividing line, between evil and good, between the works of the
devil and the victory of God.
Behind
us - on that first Good Friday - lie the awful deeds of the Sanhedrin, the
ruling council of the Jewish people 2,000 years ago, and their attempts to stir
up the emotions of the crowds who had gathered in Jerusalem for the observance
of the feast of Passover, and the collusion of Pontius Pilate, who, rather than
see justice served where Jesus was concerned, gave in to the demands of the
crowd in order to preserve some semblance of peace and order.
In
front of us - on that first Easter Sunday morning - lies the rising of our Lord
Jesus Christ from the grave, God’s victory over every form of evil, and God’s
victory over our greatest and final enemy, death.
At
each observance of Good Friday, and in every celebration of Easter,
year-by-year, Christians remember the power of evil that was displayed on that
first Good Friday. But we also remember God’s victory over such evil on that
first Easter Sunday morning.
God’s
power is magnified when it is compared to the attempts of evil to overtake
God’s goodness. We see God’s power more clearly when we look behind ourselves
to see the lengths to which the forces of evil will go to claim yet another
victim in its reign of death and destruction.
God’s
victory in raising Jesus from death assures us that He, alone, possesses the
power to guarantee His presence with us whenever we encounter or experience any
form of evil. We are assured, therefore, that as we make our way through this
present life, God will accompany us every step of the way. St. Paul will affirm
this truth as he says in Romans chapter eight: “…in all these things, we are
more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death
nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, now
powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able
to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Romans 8:37 –
39)
So
we may live confidently, knowing that God’s power exceeds the power of every
form of evil.
And
when this life is over, then we may be assured that God will save us from that
eternal death which is separation from Him in eternity. That, dear friends, is
the great Christian hope, a hope that is based on the reality that our Lord
Jesus really and truly rose from the grave on that first Easter morning.
Thanks
be to God!
