Sermon 4/18/21: "A Little Good News" Pr. Michelle Sevig
Pr. Michelle Sevig
Third Sunday of Easter
April 18, 2021
A Little Good News
My go-to music to sing along with while driving in the car or cleaning the house is…Anne Murray. Some of you might be too young to even know who she is, but I love to sing along with her because I know all the words and because she sings in my range (or I suppose, you could say, I sing in hers.) One of my favorites is “A Little Good News.”
First released in 1983, the headlines named may be a little different than today’s, but the refrain, I sing wholeheartedly, wishing we could just get some good news for once.
Just once, how I’d like to see the headline say, not much to print today, can’t find nothing bad to say…we sure could use a little good news today.
Ain’t that the truth? We are inundated with bad news every. single. day. COVID positivity rates are rising, even as more people are being vaccinated. Daunte Wright shot and killed by a police officer, while another police officer is on trial for murdering George Floyd takes place just a few miles away. A young boy, Adam Toledo, shot and killed by police in our city and now the video, showing the horrifying details, is being shown repeatedly. And just three days ago another mass shooting, leaves eight people dead.
We sure could use a little good news today. The headlines we read in the paper or on-line, the memes shared on social media and the constant stream of news shown on our TV’s stir up all kinds of emotions. I have heard from black and brown people their rage and frustration, anxiety and weariness as they continue to bear the burden witnessing one racial incident after another. Wondering if they will be next, if it is safe to drive a car, run in their neighborhood, play in the park. These incidents are not just sad, as I overheard someone say to another in the hospital waiting room a day ago, they are enraging and frightening. But they are not surprising. Black, indigenous and people of color have lived a lifetime scarred by the injustices of racism.
And there are pandemic related feelings too. We have experienced so much loss and change. Whether you’re a student missing out on your senior year, or someone who hasn’t been able to see or hug a family member in more than a year, or someone who misses the daily interaction with colleagues; we long for normal but know that things will never again be what they used to be. Many are overwhelmed, grieving, tired, and worried about the future. We sure could use a little good news today.
The disciples had just heard the good news. Jesus was alive again, the women who had gone to the tomb and told them all about it. And gathered in a small room Jesus greets them saying “Peace Be with You.” What was their reaction to this good news, that he is alive again? They were terrified. Jesus invites them to touch his scars. And then, while they were in their joy they were disbelieving and wondering. Terrified, joyful, disbelieving, wondering—all emotions. Emotions on opposite sides of the Mood Meter chart kids use in school. The disciples were experiencing something very human—they were feeling; they had mixed emotions.
Have you ever said to someone, “Can you believe it?” And the answer is both yes and no. Whatever it is, it’s so amazing, wonderful, unanticipated that you really can’t believe it happened at all? And yet, you know it’s true.
I imagine the disciples, gathered in that room, so overjoyed by Jesus’ presence, standing there with their mouths wide open, seeing Jesus in the flesh and yet scratching their heads in disbelief and curiosity, saying, “I can’t believe it! And yet, I do.”
We live in the intersection of joy and disbelief. Life is messy and unbelievably painful at times, so we search for signs of hope. We want proof that things will get better, change will happen and is happening among us now. We shout the joy of the resurrection, “Alleluia! Christ is Risen” and yet we live in the reality that grief and disbelieving continues.
We sure could use a little good news today and I found some in a reflection by Anne Lammott, a beloved armchair theologian who never gets “too churchy.” Yesterday Lammott posted something she had written after the Pulse nightclub attack in 2016. In it she reflects on the lessons learned and hope revealed after the Sandy Hook school shooting years before. She writes,
“What is true for me is that the shootings at Sandy Hook were the actual end of the world, evil…was made visible. There were no answers that day, the next day, the day after that. But then there was, slowly: healing, truth, resurrection, incredible courage on the part of the families. Today is, and will be, the same. The end of the world; grief; rebirth, new life.
What was helpful right away was that we stuck together in our horror, grief, anxiety and cluelessness. We grieved, we feared, we despaired, and raged, prayed; we reached out for any help at all; and these were good responses. I recommend that we do that today, and tomorrow. Wounds and trauma revealed were healed; eventually.”
Wounds and trauma revealed, were healed; eventually. Jesus showed his wounds, scars that were healed, to the ones who were suffering the greatest because of his death. Those scars were signs of new life, of a real human body, God in the flesh. His body has been through trauma, but he is alive!
Unique to the Christian faith is a God who is wounded and broken. The Holy One shares our grief, our anxiety, our righteous anger and our disbelief that something so awful could be happening. As the body of Christ, we need to talk about our own collective scars and help one another heal. After and appropriate time of being stunned and in despair, we show up and share words and actions of peace.
Anne Lammott says, “Maybe we ask God for help. We do the next right thing. We buy or cook a bunch of food for the local homeless* (people experiencing homelessness.) We return phone calls, library books, smiles. We make eye contact with others, and we go to the market and flirt with old or scary unusual people who seem lonely. This is a blessed sacrament. Father Tom Weston taught me decades ago that in the face of human tragedy, we go around the neighborhood and pick up litter, even though there will be more tomorrow. It is another blessed sacrament. We take the action and the insight will follow: that we are basically powerless, but we are not helpless.”
We shout through muted masks, “Christ is Risen indeed! Alleluia!” While still in our disbelief and wondering we go out to be the good news for others. We hold one another in grief, we speak up when we see systemic oppression, we stand with our neighbors who are hurting. And in sharing our scars with one another, new life springs forth. Resurrection and rebirth are enfleshed within each other’s scars.
We proclaim to one another, “Can you believe it?” Well…no and yes. The good news of Christ’s resurrection and God’s embodied grace is hard to imagine sometimes, and yet it is the best news I’ve heard all day.
