Sixth Sunday After Epiphany Year A

Choose life or death, blessings or curses. Make a choice. Every day we have many opportunities to make the only choice that really maters, which is do we choose to turn toward God and toward love or do we turn away from God and away from love. 

Sixth Sunday After Epiphany Year A

Transcribed from a sermon given on

Feb 13, 2011

At St. Barnabas Episcopal Church

By Rev. Valerie Ann Hart

Matthew 5:21-37

Deuteronomy 30:15-20

Wasn’t it a beautiful day yesterday? It was the most perfect weather I have ever known. It was so nice that I went down to the beach and everybody, everybody, was on the beach. There must have been a million dogs, all running around having a good time and there was this one poodle, I’ve never seen such a big poodle. It was the size of a horse.

Now, most of you figured that the poodle was maybe this big, certainly not the size of a horse. And everybody knows that there were probably about 65 dogs not a million dogs. And not everybody could possibly have been on the beach because you are part of everybody and you weren’t there. So you knew that. You knew that I was exaggerating. It’s a figure of speech called hyperbola. It is commonly used in rhetoric in order to get people’s attention and interest and to make a point. We all know it. We all use it. Who doesn’t, when they are in the middle of a fight or debate, happen to say, “You never do the dishes!” You don’t say 95 percent of the time you don’t do the dishes; you say you never do the dishes. And of course the response is, “But I always take out the garbage.” It’s not, “I take out the garbage 95% of the time.” We use hyperbola all the time. It makes our speech and our conversations more interesting.

We as Americans and 21^st century people have gotten very much into facts, and getting it precise and correct. But it doesn’t make for an interesting speech. Just think about Al Gore.

We expect some exaggeration, some hyperbola. In the middle east it is even more expected than it is in our society. You always exaggerate. No one would have a meal with a friend and leave and say, “That was one of the better meals that I have had.” You would have to say “That was the best meal that I have ever had.” And if you didn’t exaggerate you could insult the other person.

Jesus was a great speaker. One of the things we can be sure of is that he wasn’t boring to listen to, otherwise he wouldn’t have had crowds coming out to listen. So he used all the various tricks of a rhetorician. He used humor, although the way we read scripture we don’t necessarily recognize the humor that is there. And he used hyperbola, which he certainly used in this particular passage.

We have to think about this Gospel passage in context. It’s a continuation of what we have been reading each Sunday and takes place within the sermon on the mount. He has shared the beatitudes, which are a whole new way of saying who are blessed by God. In the line just before this passage that was left out Jesus says, “And your righteousness must exceed the righteousness of the Pharisees.” So he has just said that you have to be more righteous than the Pharisees, and then now he is describing what that righteousness would look like.

There are a lot of people who say they take the Bible literally word for word, but they are not all blind. And my guess is that most of them at some point have had their eye lead them astray. But they didn’t follow the bible literally and pluck out their eyes. And we don’t have very many people who are missing a hand that they chopped off because they did something wrong with a hand. Everyone know that Jesus didn’t mean that literally. He was using hyperbola. He was using exaggeration.

He was reacting to the Pharisaic mind set, which was to try to follow all of God’s commandments literally. But there are a lot of commandments in scripture and then there were a lot of other rules and regulations that had accrued over time. Following them became quite a difficult process. The lawyers to tried to interpret exactly what it meant. So, for example, one of the ten commandments is remember the Sabbath and keep it holy. It was generally agreed upon that you should not work on the Sabbath, but what did it mean to not work on the Sabbath? Well you weren’t supposed to cook, but you could take food out and put it on the table. You weren’t supposed to load your donkey down, but what about taking water to your donkey? Well a donkey that would go an entire day without water would not be healthy, so you were allowed to water and feed your animals even though that really is sort of work.

So there was a whole process of trying to figure out exactly what these laws meant and how are you going got follow each and every one of them. Its sort of like today trying to figure out the tax code. It is so complicated, and there are so many different situations, that you have to hire somebody to figure out how to follow it. So the Pharisees claimed that the were superior because they followed all the laws and rules. Jesus is saying if you are going to be prove your righteousness by your own behavior, you must be more righteous than the Pharisees This is what you really need to do. You can’t use an excuse like divorce to say it is okay to be with another woman. You can’t say that just because you didn’t murder someone if you have hate in your heart that you are not sinning. He used this to make the point that God’s law is not about getting the details right, but about getting the heart and essence of it right.

Today we are celebrating a baptism and we will be sharing something called the Baptismal Covenant. The Baptismal Covenant is the essence of what Episcopalians decided was the most important essence of what it means to be a Christian. I’d like us to take a look at that right now.

It is in your bulletin, and it starts on page four. I am going to be talking about the ones that are on the top of page 5. I am going to start with the last two.

The last one says, Will you strive for justice and peace among all people and respect the dignity of every human being.” Well if you respect the dignity of every human being you are not liable to murder them. And if you respect the dignity of every human being you are not liable to swear and use nasty language about them. And if you respect the dignity of every human being you are not likely to commit adultery because you are not respecting the person you are with or with their spouse.

The one before that is, “Will you seek and serve Christ in all persons, loving your neighbor as yourself.” These statements are positive and not negative. They are not “Thou shalt nots.” These are things you are supposed to do, and if you really do them, if you really love your neighbor as yourself, you are not going to hurt other people. You are not going to steal from them. You are not going to lie to them. And if you are striving for justice you are not going to swindle people. You are not going to be concerned primarily for your own good.

So you can look at those last two as the foundation of how do we live a good life - not specifics, not a whole list of laws. The thing I like best about our baptismal covenant is the top one on page 5. And it says, “Will you persevere in resisting evil and and whenever you fall into sin repent and return to the Lord?” It doesn’t say if you fall into sin, it says whenever you fall into sin. We know we can’t follow every law. We know that there will be times when we will be attracted to someone we shouldn’t be attracted to. We know there will be times when we will say or do things that will hurt another person or hurt ourselves. But we have the gift through Christ to know that we will be forgiven if we repent and return to the Lord.

In the first reading today, God says to God’s people, choose life or death, blessings or curses. Make a choice. Every day we have many opportunities to make the only choice that really maters, which is do we choose to turn toward God and toward love or do we turn away from God and away from love. That’s what repentance means. It is to turn around.

In the early centuries of the church, when someone would come for baptism they would quite literally turn around. They would start the service facing to the west which represented that which is not of God and at some point during the service they would physically turn around to face the east which represented God and light and new hope.

Each day, each moment of each day, we make a choice. We choose life, God and love or we choose what leads to death which is that which is not of love and not of God. So one aspect of our baptism is that choice. That choice to turn to God.

Today we are having the privilege of witnessing and participating in the baptism of Savannah Grace. And even though she is too young to choose, she will be growing into that. Her parents and her God parents will be making those vows for her, so I would like to ask the baptismal party to come forward.

Baptism of our Lord - First Sunday after Epiphany A

"I truly understand that God shows no partiality." These were powerful history changing words from Peter that still are radical today.

Baptism of our Lord

First Sunday after Epiphany A

Transcribed from a sermon given on

January 9, 2011

By Rev. Valerie Ann Hart

At St. Barnabas Episcopal Church

Acts 10:34-43

Matthew 3:13-17

Today is the first Sunday after the Epiphany. Epiphany can also be translated as manifestation. It is the making known. We think of an epiphany of a new idea as an opening, as something becoming known to us. So the Epiphany is sometimes described as the Manifestation of Christ to the Gentiles. The manifestation of God, the god described in Isaiah -  the servant of the light, manifested to the gentiles, to the ones who aren’t Jewish.

In the Eastern Orthodox tradition, Epiphany is a more important celebration than Christmas. That manifestation of Christ, Christ becoming known, is considered even more important than the date of his birth. And in the East there are three aspects to the Epiphany. Most of us, when we think of Epiphany we think of the Magi, the wise ones who saw the star in the East and came and worshiped the Lord. But that is just one aspect of the Epiphany. The second manifestation was through his baptism. And the third manifestation of Christ was at the wedding in Cana when he changed water into wine.

What we celebrate today is the baptism of Jesus; we remember it and we celebrate it. We have as our gospel reading the story of Jesus’ baptism and the reading from Acts that is really a story of a baptism as well. That segment of Acts that was read today is the middle of a story, so I am going to tell you the rest of that story.

It is about Cornelius. Cornelius was a centurion. A centurion was a roman soldier who was an officer who had a hundred people who served under him. Cornelius is described in Acts as being a very caring and good man who is very interested in the Jewish religion, who supported the synagogue, who was very beloved, but he never officially became Jewish. He was a gentile. Now it is understandable why he never became Jewish because for a man to convert to Judaism he had to be circumcised. During the time of the Romans there were universal baths that everybody shared together. Even the sporting events were often done naked. So if someone were to become circumcised it would not have been private affair, it would have been a public thing, and it could have effected his authority as a military officer.

So he had not become Jewish, and this is important because at that time Jewish people did not go into or socialize in the homes of non Jewish people; especially they didn’t eat together because the Jews had very clear traditions of what was acceptable food and what was not acceptable food. And the food that they ate had to be prepared in a certain way. So if they were to eat with gentiles they were liable to eat food that was considered ritually unclean. So this is the context of this story of Cornelius.

One time Cornelius was praying and he had a vision. His vision was that he was to send to Japa, which was a town about two days walk away, to get a man named Peter to teach him about God. So he sent several of his officers to go and get Peter. Just when they were about to arrive in Japa, Peter, the follower of Christ, the leader of the church, who was in Japa was praying and he had a vision. He had been praying in the upper room or on the roof of the house, and he had this vision that there was this hug sheet, like a sail, and it was being lowered out of heaven, and on it there were all kinds of animals, including snakes and things that crawled on the ground. There were ritually clean animals and unclean animals. Then he heard a voice that said, “Peter, kill and eat.” And he responded with, “No, I can’t do that. I have always followed the dietary laws. I can’t eat these things, they are unclean.” And he heard the voice a second time, “Peter, kill and eat.” “I can’t do that.” And then a third time the voice comes to him and at that point Peter realized that he was being told that the dietary restrictions were no longer relevant. Just at that moment the people from Cornelius arrived at the door, and they invited Peter to come with them. Now having just had this vision, he didn’t delay in going with these gentiles.

When they got to Cornelius’ house he went inside and Cornelius brought together his family and friends to hear what Peter had to say. That is when we get to the passage read today. The first thing that Peter says is, “I truly understand that God shows no partiality.” I truly understand that God shows no partiality - that is a radical statement. It is a radical statement today, to say that there are not restrictions to God’s love. That it doesn’t matter, that God shows no partiality based on ethnic background, based on where you were born, based on your social status, based on anything. God shows no partiality. It is radical today but it was certainly much more radical back then. Back then it was very tribal and to the people of Israel it mattered if you were a descendant of Abraham. It mattered if you were part of the tribe. It mattered if you ate the right foods. It mattered whether you were a Jew or a gentile. But Peter said, “I truly understand that God shows no partiality.” Powerful statement.

Then he goes on to tell the story of Christ and how he healed, and how he was crucified and died, and how he rose again. The next thing that it says after what we read today, the next thing it says is that Cornelius and the people who were gathered there were filled with the Holy Spirit, and they began speaking in tongues. They knew they were filled with the Holy Spirit because they were speaking in different languages. There are lots of different ways the Holy Spirit can manifest and that is one of them. When Peter saw that these people gathered there, these gentiles who were gathered had been touched by the Holy Spirit he said to the others who were with him, “What is to keep us from baptizing them.” And they were all baptized. And it is the first time that non Jews were baptized. Before that everyone had to first become a Jew, agree to all the rules and restrictions of Jewishness, and be circumcised, but here that boundary was broken and this was the beginning of the mission to the gentiles. It is a powerful and important moment in the history of Christianity. Where Christians stepped outside of the mind set of smallness and limit and realized that God knows no. It is interesting that in this case Cornelius and his friends experienced the Holy Spirit before their baptisms. It brings up all kinds of questions about the meaning of baptism, but we are not going to go there today.

In the Gospel reading we hear of Jesus being baptized in the River Jordan, and as he comes out he experiences the Holy Spirit coming upon him like a dove. Now clearly there wasn’t a bird that landed on his head. It was like a dove. It was a simile. It was trying to express this experience of the Holy Spirit coming upon him. The description that is used in the Gospels of a dove is something that people of that time would be used to as a simile, as a description of the Holy Spirit. It is something that people of that culture could relate to.

But let’s try another image. We live in a very different time. We understand electricity, that there is this energy that you can’t see that goes and moves through wires and then makes things work. We have a new movie Tron that takes place inside a computer (Tron 2 I guess) and there is light zooming around. We have these images of energy and we understand it. It makes sense to us because of our culture. So I’d like you to just use your imagination, and if you are not real visual and don’t want to be imaginative, just think about the things I said earlier in the sermon and tune out.

If you have seen some of the really old movies about Jesus the character or actor that plays Jesus is sometimes just fuzzy. Or sometimes in the old back and white ones they make it so there is sort of a little bit of glow around him. Now we have much better special effects and if I were going to do a movie about Jesus I imagine it like this: As Jesus comes up out of his baptism suddenly there is a shower or a waterfall of light that comes down over him. Like drops, tiny droplets of light just flowing all over him and into him and filling him.  And as he gets out of the water these little droplets of light come off him like water dripping off someone after a shower. Then as he walks through the world he would look like a man but every now and then this little bit of light would just drip off of him. When he would touch somebody maybe a drop of light would be on the shoulder and when did a healing maybe a whole bunch of light would go into that other person. It wouldn’t be that he would glow all the time, but there would just be these little drops of light as he walked along, you know, just like water falling off of him. Can you imagine that? Can you see Christ that way? As the Holy Spirit coming into him as light and just kind of going out of him as droplets into the world.

With the baptism of Jesus the understanding of baptism changed. Baptism was an ancient rite that goes back to prehistory as a rite of going and washing to prepare for spiritual events or to wash away sins. It was a common thing to go into the water. What changed with Jesus is the coming of the Holy Spirit as part of baptism. Now baptism, as we understand it, is not a symbol of washing away sins, rather we see it as a sacrament. A sacrament is an outward and visible sign of an inward and spiritual grace. At a baptism not only is the water put on a person, but the Holy Spirit it comes upon that person. So if you have been baptized think of that light coming into you, and washing you, and filling you and transforming you and then coming through you to other people. Imagine yourself filled with the Holy Spirit.

Most of us have had some moment in our lives when we knew there was something special happening, when we experienced the Holy Spirit. Maybe subtly, maybe in the sun set, maybe at a time where you felt energy and healing, maybe at a church service or a communion or at a celebration of some sort. Maybe someone once said something to you that transformed you and you felt the Spirit’s presence. The Holy Spirit is an energy that can come into us like light. Like light that fills us. And like light that can flow out of us so that if we are filled with the Holy Spirit today and we go out of church and we smile at someone in the grocery store that is a little bit of light going to them. Like a droplet that we give. That is what we are to be as Christians. We are to conduits for the Holy Spirit we are to let the Holy Spirit come into us, fill us, transform us and then go out and give it to the world. That is who we are and that is who we are to be. Inviting the Holy Spirit and sharing the Holy Spirit with others, with everyone, for God shows no partiality.

Third Sunday of Easter C

The Third Sunday of Easter C

Transcribed from a sermon given on

April 18, 2010 at

St. Barnabas Episcopal Church

By the Rev. Valerie Ann Hart

Hallelujah – Christ is risen!

Congregation:  The Lord is risen indeed!  Hallelujah!

Please be seated.  I can’t say that enough; I just love having a chance to say that during Easter season.  It’s been two weeks now since Easter – since we celebrated the Resurrection – and the readings today look at what it’s like to live as people of the Resurrection.  What is our relationship with Christ now that he’s been raised from the dead? 

The gospel reading from John is the last story in the Gospel of John.  In fact, it’s sort of a postlude, because in John’s Gospel, right before this he explains why he wrote the book and summarizes it. Then this is tacked on at the end.  Some scholars think that it was probably added by John’s followers or that it was something he wrote at another time which was added. 

But it is clearly written by the same author as the writer of John’s Gospel. It uses the same language as the Gospel. And has the detail that you might find from someone who was there at the time it happened – from an eyewitness.  Details like 153 fish, or that Peter put on his clothes.  This feels like something that actually happened. 

Let’s think about what the setting is for this.  A couple of weeks ago – we don’t know exactly how long; a week, two weeks – we’re not sure exactly how long – the disciples had been with Jesus, and there had been the triumphant entry into Jerusalem.  The one who they’d been following was seen as the Messiah there was cheering and great celebration. 

And then they had that last poignant dinner with Jesus. During dinner Jesus looked at Peter and said, “You will betray me three times.”  To which Peter, being the person he is consistently in the gospels, said, “No, not me!”  And yet later that night, when Jesus was arrested and was being tried, three times people came up to Peter and said, “You were part of that crowd, weren’t you?”  He said, “No, I don’t even know the guy.”  And then the cock crowed and Peter realized what he had done.  Imagine how you would feel if you had a friend that you also felt was the most wonderful person that had ever lived; that you saw as being a great teacher; that you were their right-hand man; and then you denied you even knew him.  It must have been terrible for Peter. 

Even when Jesus appeared to the disciples and showed up in the upper room, and they saw that he was alive, that he wasn’t dead, but that he was alive again, there must have been a part of Peter that wondered, “How do I relate to him now, after what I’ve done?  Will he still love me?  Will he still want to be in relationship with me?  What do I say?”  Well, some time has passed, a little bit of time has passed, and they’ve gone from Jerusalem up to Galilee.  The Sea of Tiberius is the Roman name for the Sea of Galilee, and that’s where, before this whole thing started, Peter and John and James and probably some of the other disciples were fishermen.  They basically had gone home, and they didn’t know what to do. 

If any of you have ever had an experience where you’ve had a real peak experience – maybe you went to Cursillo or some other type of retreat, or you were reading a book, or something happened at church that you had some kind of peak experience where you knew God in a whole new way.  And then the next day it’s like, “Okay.  Now what do I do?  Well, I guess I get up and I go to work.  I don’t know what else to do.”  So Peter, not knowing what to do, says, “Let’s go fishing.”  He wasn’t saying, “Let’s go fishing,” like “Let’s take a day off.”  He was saying, “Let’s go back to work.  Let’s go back to the office.”  And sure enough, the others say, “Sure, we’ll go fishing with you.” 

They go out, and all night long they’re fishing and they don’t catch a single fish.  A frustrating time.  Sometimes it feels like that after you’ve had a profound experience of God - you go back to work and it feels kind of empty, like nothing is working quite right.  Or maybe if you’re at a time when you’ve kind of walked away from God and nothing works quite right in your life.  It’s all sort of empty.  Going through the paces – like fishing all night but not catching anything. 

Maybe while he’s having this frustrating experience of not catching any fish, he might be remembering an earlier time - another day when he was fishing all night and hadn’t caught anything.  The day in which Jesus came to him and said, “Put the net out on the other side.”  Then, in the early dawn they make out a figure on the coast, on the beach, on the shoreline.  They can’t tell who it is because there’s not enough light yet.  Then the voice comes, “Children,” which is an interesting way for a stranger to greet you.  “Children, you haven’t caught any fish, have you?”  You can almost hear the humor and the laughter, like, “You’re trying to catch fish without me?” Right?  “You haven’t caught anything, have you?  Throw it in on the starboard side.” 

And they did that, and they got a huge catch – so much they couldn’t even pull it into the boat.  And the disciple that Jesus loved, it clicked for him.  This happened before – that’s got to be Jesus!  Nobody else could do that.  When the disciple Jesus loved says that, Peter goes, “Wow, yeah – it’s Jesus!”  He’s always the one who’s most impetuous so he jumps in and swims over to the shore. 

Now it is a really odd thing for us to think that you’re in a boat and you put on your clothes before jumping into the water.  But this is different.  He was naked; they were working naked.  This is Israel, it was dark, it was hot, they’re messy, so they take their clothes off.  It would be kind of like a group of guys gathered at one of their friends’ house, and they’re putting in a new patio.  And it’s a hot day, and it’s hot, sticky, messy work, and they’ve been drinking a few beers.  They all have taken off their shirts, because - you know – they’re all sweaty. Their shirts are off, and they’re putting down the patio, and all of a sudden the wife says, “Hi, honey.  Your boss just showed up at the front door.”  Well, you know as the guy is running into the house he’s going to grab his shirt and put his shirt on because he doesn’t want to greet his boss shirtless, hot, and sweaty.  That’s what Peter was doing.  He wasn’t about to greet his teacher, his Lord, naked. 

And of course he wasn’t putting on a suit jacket that would be destroyed by the water.  It was all natural fiber, used to being in the water, no big deal.  He’s a fisherman.  So he swims up, and the others pull the boat in.  What he discovers is Jesus has already got a fire going.  He’s already got some fish frying.  He already has some bread baking.  He’s prepared breakfast for them.  Where did he get the fish?  It doesn’t say.  He wants to have a meal with them.  And it probably reminds them of the time when Jesus took a couple of loaves and a few fish and fed 5,000 people.  So they’re going to have a meal together – they’re going to have breakfast together, and Jesus is abundantly providing. 

But it’s interesting – Jesus also says, “Go get a couple of the fish you caught.”  This is going to be a potluck.  The disciples are able to add something as well.  Then they see what a magnificent catch they have, and they share, and they sit, and they eat.  It must have been wonderful for the disciples to have that kind of informal friendship again that they had shared with Jesus during his ministry, to just be with him, and just be in his presence.  To eat with him; to share the bread.  But Peter was probably still feeling bad inside.  He was probably still carrying some guilt.

So Jesus took him aside and said, “Peter, do you love me?”  He says, “Of course I love you.”  “Then feed the babies – take care of the little ones.  Peter, do you really love me?”  “Yes, Lord, of course I love you.”  “Well, then, feed the sheep.  Take care of the older ones.  Peter, do you love me?”  And Peter, he’s getting frustrated being asked a third time,  “Of course I love you.  You know everything.”  “Feed my lambs.  Take care of people.”  And this – this is how Jesus provided reconciliation for Peter.  This is how Jesus let Peter know that he was forgiven and still in relationship and still valued by Christ. The he still wanted him to do the ministry. 

Notice the forgiveness was not, “Okay, Peter, grovel – you really blew it.  I’ll forgive you.”  It was a mercy that was overflowing.  It was a mercy that was expressed in a way so that Peter could feel whole again, and feel in right relationship again.  It was an extraordinary expression of Christ’s love and mercy.  And then he said the same thing he’d said to Peter those years before on the seaside: “Follow me.” 

The other readings today have other expressions of God’s extraordinary mercy and grace.  In that first reading is about Saul, the person who becomes Paul and writes most of the letters that are in the Bible.  He establishes many churches becomes probably the most effective evangelist ever. 

But before that, he had been persecuting the Christians.  He was on his way to arrest people and bind them and bring them back to Jerusalem to stand trial.  You can’t do much worse than that in terms of the church.  He was persecuting Christians.  And Jesus appeared to him – not in fury, not in anger, but in love.  He just asked him a question: “Why are you doing this to me?”  What grace – what amazing mercy and grace that Christ offered Paul the opportunity to change! 

In the Psalm we read today, the psalmist had obviously had a close relationship with God, and then something had happened to it.  Maybe he did some kind of sin; maybe he pulled away.  But in some way, his heart got separated from God.  And then there was forgiveness and reconciliation, and he sings a song of praise for that – for that healing, merciful grace. 

In the reading from the book of Revelation we hear about what happens in heaven.  In heaven, what we get to do is sing.  Now I know for the choir and maybe some of you here, think of the best time you’ve ever had singing.  Maybe you were singing a hymn that just knocked your socks off.  Or maybe it was some contemporary music playing on the radio; Christian music you were singing along with.  Or during the Easter service, where you’re just belting out and you just don’t care whether anybody else is singing. Or maybe nobody’s around, you are just praising God, and you feel this sense of worship and praise and joy just welling up inside of you and being expressed. 

Imagine the best possible moment of expressing your love for God, and doing that for eternity.  That’s the vision of heaven.  So that’s the nature of our relationship after Easter, a knowledge of and expression of thanks for this incredible mercy and love of Christ. 

In just a couple minutes we are going to be baptizing Olivia Ann, and there’ll be a new member of the body of Christ.  One of the things we’ll do at that baptism is I will put oil on her, and I will say, “You are sealed as Christ’s own forever.”  That means she will have a relationship with Christ forever.  She will be surrounded by that love and mercy of Christ forever. 

When she’s learning to walk, Christ will be there every time she falls down.  When she’s learning to talk, Christ will celebrate.  When she gets to be a teenager and she starts to question whether God exists or not, Christ will be right there. And when she gets to a point in her life where, like all of us, she will do or say things that hurt other people or hurt herself, Christ will be there also, forgiving, holding her in his mercy and love.  If she walks away from Christ and wants to pretend that there’s nothing there – if she ends up being an antagonist to the church and is like Saul, and critiquing the church, Christ will be there with her.  Whenever she opens her eyes and welcomes Christ into her life, he will hold her in his arms and welcome her home.  He will be there with her in the good times and bad.  He will hear all her cries and all her joy. His mercy and his love will surround her.  And even when it comes time for her to die, Christ’s love and mercy will be there to hold her and bring her to heaven, where she can join in that wonderful chorus of angels.  And so, Olivia, you have a wonderful future ahead. 

Of course all of us have that love and mercy of Christ surrounding us, and that’s what the Resurrection is all about.  The Resurrection is not about an empty tomb.  The Resurrection is not solely about the fact that some people long ago saw Christ alive.  The Resurrection is the fact that we know Christ is with us, resurrected, present right now in our own lives.