Rev’d Mark B. Stirdivant, Good Shepherd Lutheran Church, Yucaipa, California
✝ sdg ✝

Christ is Risen! He is risen indeed! Alleluia!

This is the Day that the Lord has made! Let us rejoice and be glad in it! Today is the day of great celebration! Today is the day of completion. The two great festivals of the Church’s year go hand-in-hand as they both commemorate Jesus Christ, who He is and what He has done. Christmas celebrates our Lord’s coming to this sinful world in human flesh. Easter rejoices that Christ’s crucified flesh is alive and will never die again! Because of today, the Apostle Paul can be so bold as to wag his finger and talk to two of our most fearful enemies as though they were nothing but squashed insects. For he says, O Death, where is thy sting? O Grave, where is thy victory? Thanks be to God, who has given us the Victory in our Lord Jesus Christ! You could almost imagine him dropping the pen on the table for a moment here and raising his arms high like he’s the first runner to cross the finish line. Yeah! We won! That kind of boldness is also yours, courtesy of Easter Day.

There is another boldness that God bestows upon you, thanks to our Lord’s Easter triumph. That boldness is none other than the privilege to call upon your heavenly Father in prayer. The Resurrection makes that possible, too. Every part of the holy prayer that Jesus taught to His disciples, the prayer that we are blessed to say every Sunday, indeed, every day of our lives, all the gifts contained in the Lord’s Prayer become our own directly from the crucified Savior, who is dead no more! All through Lent we turned our attention to every petition of the Lord’s Prayer, so now at Easter we can see the Lord’s gracious answer to each request.

Think about how it begins: Our Father who art in heaven. We have access not to a god of our making or choosing, but to the One true God, the Eternal Father who raised His Son on the third day. Since He fulfilled His unchanging promise to Jesus, whom He gave up for the sins of all people, there’s nothing to keep Him from honoring His promise to you to hear your prayer, that is simultaneously prayed along with Jesus and all who believe in Him. How are you sure of that? You’ve been baptized in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. I know that my Redeemer lives, says Job. Surely the same living Redeemer who restored Job from all his misery and pain can listen to you when you pray.

Then there’s Hallowed be Thy name. Easter proclaims the mighty name of the Lord in no uncertain way. Because Jesus triumphed in His saving mission, He urges you to call upon His name in every trouble, pray, praise and give thanks. Sinners such as you and I are warned in the commandments not to take the name of the Lord our God in vain. But if we’re told not to misuse His name, then there must be a proper way to use it and keep it holy. The power of the Resurrection is granted to you to hear and believe the Word of God that is taught in its truth and purity, and then to lead a holy life according to it. Without this power, you were lost in sin, but because of Christ’s forgiveness setting you free and continuing to work in your life, God’s name is kept holy for you also.

When you say, Thy Kingdom Come, then rejoice especially on this Holy Day because the promised Holy Spirit comes straight to you from the comforting breath of the Risen Savior! All Jesus had to say there in the garden that early morning was “Mary,” and the weeping woman exulted and embraced her Teacher. When He likewise lifts up His countenance upon you and gives you peace, then you can know for certain that you will never be left forsaken. He lives to wipe away your tears and calm your troubled heart. You have the Holy Spirit, the Comforter, as the guarantee of membership in His heavenly kingdom, the kingdom that has come among us now and will endure to all eternity.

During Lent, we recalled how difficult it is sometimes to pray in all truth and honesty, Thy Will be done on earth as it is in heaven. It often seems like such an impossible task for a sinful Christian to live up to, when you get down to it. Our selfish will so frequently each day gets in the way of allowing God’s will to take over. The world around us entices our weakness by what only looks good and sometimes it frightens us to look at the blowing wind and pounding waves rather than our glorious risen Redeemer right in front of us, walking on the water. What about in your life? Where have you let your will take over in thought, word or deed, instead of making your will subordinate to God’s? Those ten commandments teach you your Father’s perfect will, but they also condemn you for rejecting Him and His way. Sin and death was all your lot until you got to this Day, because the Savior you witnessed on Good Friday suffering and dying for you, is on the third day risen and breathing the breath of life back into you, His perfectly renewed creation! In your forgiveness on this Day, God’s Will is most certainly done, even here on our sinful earth, when you hear the absolution from the Lord’s servant, the pastor.

Most of the time, when we think of asking for something in prayer, we are likely thinking of something that falls within the Catechism’s category of Daily Bread. And when the Lord’s Prayer turns to, Give Us this Day our Daily Bread, you can think of Easter as well! Jesus Christ, who is risen today, is indeed the Son of God who has always granted you your Daily Bread, even when you weren’t praying for it! He has granted you the support and needs of your body because He has granted you physical life. You are not a wandering soul trapped in a body. There are a lot of versions of ignorant human religion that is built on that very shaky foundation. No, God the Holy Trinity created you unique, body and soul and He will provide out of His richness every blessing that you have today at hand. He will also at the last day raise up your sin-destroyed body (think again of Job’s words, 19:26). You will be changed incorruptible, and the body you once knew with all its warts will be rather like unto His glorious Body, the Body in which He appeared to the women and the Apostles. It is this Body that serves you as the highest and most important Daily Bread, the Body and Blood of the Lord’s Supper, which is also the greatest seal of His promise to the whole of you, that is, body and soul.

Forgive us our Trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. Even if we had to do without some of those items of Daily Bread from time to time, we couldn’t live a day or even a moment of our lives without Forgiveness. We heard from the Apostle Paul again in his “Resurrection Chapter,” 1 Corinthians chapter 15, “If Christ be not raised, your faith is vain, ye are yet in your sins. …If for this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable. But now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the firstfruits of them that slept.” Because we daily sin much and daily deserve only punishment, our prayer, including the Lord’s Prayer, would have been simply impossible for us without the assurance that our Heavenly Father would grant all He gives to us solely by grace. But what is even more of an Easter miracle is that now we have the ability to perform our own impossible task, and that is to forgive our neighbor who trespasses against us. Peace with God, won for us by our Savior Jesus Christ, also brings us peace with one another.

Soon, the euphoria of Easter’s jubilation will fade. The lilies will start drooping. The eggs will crack and the chocolate bunnies will get to their work of putting on those pounds. Honestly, even worse attacks than these will come your way sooner rather than later, and you are going to feel that all this talk of triumph has been just empty talk. Maybe sitting here (whether you are a regular church-goer or not) still isn’t exactly what you feel like doing every Sunday morning, possibly because you just don’t see the Lord living up to what you thought He promised you. I’ve been there, too, and we pastors have to be here and tell you differently! What is there for you when you don’t “feel” Easter anymore? You have the real promise granted to you in the petition, Lead us not into Temptation. See, you are not alone, there’s an “us” in that prayer, just like in “Our Father.” While some days you simply have to take it on faith that God actually tempts no one, you can certainly rely on the Word of the Resurrected Lord that He will guard and keep you from the temptation that you do face.

Finally, as the sum of all, you pray Deliver us from Evil. Though the Evil One, Satan, has been crushed in the head by the cross and his dominion over you is demolished, you’re still going to need rescue from every evil of body and soul, possessions and reputation, property and honor. If Jesus’ glorious return does not happen to take place before your death, you will have to face your own end on this earth. And whether it’s sudden or painful and drawn-out, what better way to go than with the Living Lord Christ standing by your side? And that’s Who you have, in the flesh, not only here as you worship Him, but He’s constantly with you, breathing into you His Comforter, the Holy Spirit. Every time you go to sleep, think of this: whether you wake to the natural light of a new day, or to the brilliant light of heavenly Paradise, the blessing is all the same, all because Jesus Christ rose from the dead, ahead of you!

What a gift and treasure is here in the prayer that He taught His disciples, and that He has granted also to you! It is too much to believe, and yet by a faith that has been planted in your heart by the Holy Spirit, you can believe it! And that God-given faith is ready to claim even more blessings than these whenever you pray. Why in the Lord’s name does somebody neglect prayer? We all do it. And we’re still not saving any time, either! But with God’s Word showering us today with joyous news of Easter victory, we can see that proclamation in a new way, with renewed eyes of faith, brimming over with our Father’s love and grace and forgiveness. You are bold once again before the Lord, with not a self-centered confidence but Christ-centered, because as a child of God, washed clean in baptismal water every day, you can live and pray the Lord’s Prayer, and all prayer for that matter, knowing year-round that there is in Him the Easter answer. The kingdom, power and glory belong to Him alone!

Christ is Risen! He is Risen Indeed! Alleluia!

In the Name of the Father and of the ✝ Son and of the Holy Spirit.

Readings:
Is. 65:17–25 I create new heavens and a new earth…the wolf and the lamb shall feed together
Psalm 16 You will not leave my soul in Sheol, Nor will You allow Your Holy One to see corruption
1 Cor. 15:19–26 The last enemy that will be destroyed is death.
Luke 24:1–12 The women at the tomb