At the Easter Vigil, we hear Mark 16:1-7, the announcement of Jesus’ resurrection.
The Sabbath, the day of rest, was over and a new day had begun. We can imagine the astonishment of these three women followers of Jesus when they found the heavy stone rolled back from the tomb and the body of Jesus gone. Instead there was a “young man”, an angelic messenger, telling them that Jesus had been raised from the dead.
It was truly a new day in a new world. Perhaps the two Marys and Salome did not recognize this immediately. The verse following our reading says that they were too frightened to tell anyone. But later in chapter 16 of Mark, they are said to have informed Peter and the other disciples, just as the young man asked them to. And Jesus himself would appear to them all--more than once.
Today there are over two billion followers of Jesus, more than two billion people who believe that Jesus rose to new life on that first Easter day and that he lives with us even now.
But do we really believe it? Do we live as new creations? Do we imitate Jesus in loving one another, caring for one another, healing one another, recognizing the humanity, even of those we call enemies? Or is it the “same old, same old”? Has anything really changed in the last two thousand years?
Sometimes it seems like Jesus showed us what it meant to be fully human and then went back to heaven and stayed there. The old ways of living resumed. But it doesn’t have to be this way. Jesus is with us! Each day can be a new Easter! So let us help one another to live this good news and never stop living it. May every new day bring us closer to being the people God wants us to be—Easter people, people just like Jesus.