Episode Transcript
[00:00:12] Speaker A: Welcome to the Blessed Sacrament Homilies podcast, where our mission is to help everyone recognize and experience the presence of God. We hope you are nourished and encouraged by the Word. Thank you for joining us.
[00:00:26] Speaker B: The Lord be with you and with your spirit. A reading from the Holy Gospel according to John. Glory to you, O Lord.
On the first day of the week, Mary of Magdala came to the tomb early in the morning while it was still dark and saw the stone removed from the tomb.
So she ran and went to Simon Peter and to the other disciple whom Jesus loved and told them, they have taken the Lord from the tomb and we do not know where they have put Him.
So Peter and the other disciple went out and came to the tomb.
They both ran, but the other disciple ran faster than Peter and arrived at the tomb first.
He bent down and saw the burial clause there, but did not go in.
When Simon Peter arrived after him, he went into the tomb and saw the burial cloths there and the cloth that had covered his head, not with the burial cloths, but rolled up in a separate place.
Then the other disciple also went in, the one who had arrived at the tomb first.
And he saw, believed, for they did not yet understand the Scripture, that he had to rise from the dead.
The Gospel of the Lord. Praise to you, Lord Jesus Christ. If you were here on Good Friday, you heard me say that I'm going to make a goal of trying to come up with a cliche to begin each homily.
I didn't realize how hard that is, so this will probably be the last time.
But I did come up with one that really does speak of the joy of Easter.
It is always the darkest before the dawn.
And over the last several days we have been entering with Christ into His Passion.
We began a week ago when we entered with him into the Holy City and everyone was singing his praises.
Then we celebrated the Last Supper with Him and recognized that the nourishment of the Eucharist is always meant to call us to serve one another.
Then we entered into His Passion, where even his closest disciples ran away and hid.
And where, like Peter, there are times in our lives where we deny him multiple times.
And on Good Friday, that passion leads us to a pretty dark place.
A place where, without knowing the full story, it could seem like that's the end.
There is nothing good that could ever come of this.
Yet in the midst of that darkness, the light began to shine, and that light burst forth from his tomb.
The darkness led to the brightest, most enduring light the world has ever seen. And will ever see the glory of his resurrection and the promise and hope of eternal life that is offered to us.
But that metaphor, it is always the darkest before the dawn, can also illustrate what our lives can be like, because we can all be in times in our life where it seems like everything has closed in around us, that the darkness is beginning to cover us, and God's grace in the same way that God's grace led to the empty tomb, God's grace can enter into each one of our lives and in the midst of that darkness, bring enduring light.
The joy and glory of the Easter message is not one that is stagnant on one particular day 2,000 years ago, but is always alive in our midst.
Not just in the story of salvation we celebrate in Christ, but also in our world and in our individual lives, where Christ's love pierces the darkness.
