[Invite kids to come and sit in sanctuary] Do you believe in magic? Watch this . . . [Demonstrate the cloth that turns colors] Now, to many people Jesus dying on the cross and rising three days later seems like a bit of magic. A cloth changing colors is magic. Jesus being raised from the dead is not magic; it is at the core of our faith.
The bible is filled with stories that seem like magic . . . Jonah inside a whale, Israelites walking through a sea that was divided, Jesus healing people who were blind or couldn’t walk. Jesus walking on water, Let me show you another magic thing [color book with images and colors that disappear]
We celebrate the resurrection of Jesus. But it’s not some big magic trick, rather it’s an invasion. An invasion on how we look at the world. It’s meant to turn everything upside down.
Presbyterian Pastor Timothy Keller writes in Hope in Times of Fear: The Resurrection and the Meaning of Easter “You see with all of the other great world religions, the founders died peacefully, surrounded by their followers and the knowledge that their movement was growing. In contrast, Jesus died in disgrace, betrayed, denied, and abandoned by everyone, even his Father. Other world religions teach salvation through ascent to God through good works, moral virtue, ritual observances, and transformation of consciousness. In contrast, Christianity is about salvation through God’s descending to us. This is the great difference between Christianity and every other philosophical and religious system.”
But we can’t just use our minds to comprehend the resurrection. It’s not a magic trick to figure out. It’s a mystery that we are invited to become part of. The best way to speak about the Resurrection is not to say, "Jesus rose from the dead" (as if it was a self-generated trick), but to say as St Peter did in the first reading "Jesus was raised from the dead.”
We are invited to have hope. Not a hope for the future but that we have a hope that comes from the future. The hope that when Jesus was raised, the future kingdom of God was brought into the present. A kingdom that seems unbelievable . . . that there could be peace, and justice and equality.
And that belief begins with you. To believe that no matter how hard or awful your life seems, or if you worry that something is missing from your life. Like this book which seems to have everything missing [show blank pages of coloring book], God will raise you up, as St Paul said in the second reading. [show the pages transformed into images and colors]. Not a magic trick, but the reality that God intends for you calm, and goodness, and joy. Believe it.