Starting All Over Again

A Reflection for Easter Sunday Thomas E Wilson, Guest Preacher April 20, 2025 St. Luke/ St Anne, Roper, & Grace, Plymouth, NC Starting All Over Again Isaiah 65:17-25 Psalm 118:1-2, 14-24 Acts 10:34-43 John 20:1-18 The day after I graduated from college, I got married to my then girlfriend. I was not a success as a husband. When my daughter went off to college, my wife and I got a divorce. In 1989 I got married to Pat. She also had been married before. Both of us, who had failed in marriage, both of us were damaged goods: yet we decided that we would take a chance and start all over again in being married people. The odds were against us, but both of us learned from our mistakes and entered into the best 34 years of our lives. She died a couple years ago, and I am still in mourning. Part of the reason I keep showing up here is that there is an empty part of me and I need to fill up my time. Sharing the good news of God is one of the ways I can spend energy. I have not allowed myself to even think about any romance and starting over with that part of my life. However, one of the real problems with being a Preacher is that you have to be faithful to the lessons from which the spoken message of a Sermon is to take place. The Message I hear in these lessons is about urging people to start all over again. In the Hebrew Testament lesson for today, the prophet Issiah is dictating words of welcome to the people coming back from Exile. He is saying that while the exile was a result of the arrogance the people practiced, a new day is coming when the relationship between God and God’s people will be renewed. Issiah says he heard God give the promise to start all over again, God’s very self, will change to make it better for God’s people and the impossible will happen. Before they call I will answer, while they are yet speaking I will hear. The wolf and the lamb shall feed together, the lion shall eat straw like the ox; but the serpent-- its food shall be dust! They shall not hurt or destroy on all my holy mountain, says the Lord. So, option number one is to pick up the pieces and with God’s help, start all over again The Psalm for today gives the message that the past is shattered but we are free to build a whole new foundation. Go back to before the beginning, and start all over again. 22 The same stone which the builders rejected * has become the chief cornerstone. 23 This is the Lord's doing, * and it is marvelous in our eyes. 24 On this day the Lord has acted; * we will rejoice and be glad in it. So, option number two is to take the wreckage of the past and paste as much as you can together to create a new place in this world.With God’s help we are able to start all over again. In the Acts lesson, Peter says “for as all die in Adam, so all will be made alive in Christ.” He is telling the people that the Death and Resurrection of Jesus means that we can start over with God; sins are forgiven. There is no need to hold on to the past; the death and resurrection of Jesus means that the past is dead and the present calls us to live deeply in faith in a new way of living. So, option number three; it is not a matter of starting over on the same old path, but to start with that new pattern of living in this world. In the Gospel lesson from John we get the story that Mary comes to the tomb to anoint the dead body of Jesue. Except the stone has been rolled away and it looks as if the body has been stolen, Except it isn’t a plundering job. There is a clue: the face cloth that was placed on Jesus' face is still in the cave. If it was left by a grave robber, it would have been tossed on the floor of the cave. But the face cloth had been rolled up and set reverently to one side. It was not discarded, but it was given reverence. It is a sign that the body was not stolen, but the body has been changed. Jesus does not return to the old life but rather, he shows us a new dimension of what life is all about. So option four is we, like Jesus, are to die to the old life we are used to living, and be raised to a new life that connects to mysteries whose dimensions are those that are beyond our imagination. Four ways of starting over again in life. The more we read in scripture the more we are exposed to hope. If we did a full Bible study, we could find even more ways to start over. The problem for me is that I don’t want to stop mourning, I want to still hold on to the past, because I do not want to leave her behind. I still find meaning in the fact that I was loved, way beyond reason. I know my shortcomings only too well and yet she loved me. When I was a child I learned the song; “Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so. Yes, Jesus loves me. Yes, Jesus loves me . Yes, Jesus loves you. The Bible tells me so.” I have to keep remembering that truth. Just a suggestion, but you might want to sing that song quietly to yourself before you go to bed at night, or when you are brushing your teeth in the morning. I am 78 years old, and have not grown out of needing to sing that song. It is a way of starting over again. If we sing the song to ourselves at night; we can start to expect dreams that tell us how we are loved by God. If we sing it to ourselves in the morning; we set ourselves up to share an act, or disposition, of love with our neighbors. We have more love showered upon us than we know what to do with. That is where I am right now; instead of feeling so empty because the object of my love is gone from my sight; I am aware I was loved beyond my imagination and beyond my ability to earn it. It was grace. In thanksgiving for all of that love given to me; it is only right that now I am free to do acts of love in return for what I have been given. Starting All Over Again There are times we want to just swallow, and feel all sorts of sorry for ourselves, fitting all our feelings in bookshelves, so that in our memories, we can wallow.. But we are not made to live in a past, wanting to cling to with all our heart, not allowing a present to take its part, so that we might have futures to last. The futures with dreams which spawn hopes; this’ll be the day it all begins, this’ll be an hour, when prayer wins, as we’re to live into a brighter dawn. The past is where the gift was given; but today’s when the hurt’s forgiven.