Keep Easter Weird

Weird / adjective / ˈwird

1 : of strange or extraordinary character : ODD, FANTASTIC

2 : of, relating to, or caused by the supernatural : MAGICAL

Living so close to Austin, it’s not that hard to adopt one of the Texas capital's famous slogans and co-opt it for my own purposes.  Keeping Austin Weird has been, at least for as long as I’ve been in central Texas, a widely accepted way of life for Austinites. It has its’ blessings and its’ curses, but for the most part who can argue with the idea?  Austin is weird. If you’ve never been there, it’s a bizarre mix of eclectic styles, an influx of new people and ideas, and pockets of funkiness that are very difficult to ignore. So this year, when I was thinking about the weirdness of Easter in our churches, I wondered… What if we worked to KEEP EASTER WEIRD?

Hear me out.  Worshipping on Easter Sunday was absolutely bizarre.  I stood in front of an iPhone on a tripod with sound wires running from the choir loft and hundreds of feet of Ethernet cable connecting my friend Mike’s desktop which sat on top of a commandeered prie-dieu in the middle of the aisle.  Weird.

The people I love weren’t there physically.  My family, my friends, the strangers, the newcomers, and the kiddos hopped up on jelly beans and the peeps that I love to give out were missing. I knew they’d be there online in some form or fashion, but it was so strange to show up to church without the church there.  I thought about the old nursery rhyme with hand motions… “here is the church, here is the steeple.” Without people, it doesn’t work.

I wore my seersucker suit and my white bucs, because I don’t know how to Easter without them, but I was lonely when I let myself into the chilly nave.  I said a prayer that I always say on Sunday mornings before I walk into the early service, but on Easter Sunday this year it had extra meaning. 

O Lord my God, I am not worthy to have you come under my roof; yet you have called your servant to stand in your house, and to serve at your altar. To you and to your service I devote myself, body, soul, and spirit. Fill my memory with the record of your mighty works; enlighten my understanding with the light of your Holy Spirit; and may all the desires of my heart and will center in what you would have me do. Make me an instrument of your salvation for the people entrusted to my care, and grant that I may faithfully administer your holy Sacraments, and by my life and teaching set forth your true and living Word. Be always with me in carrying out the duties of my ministry. In prayer, quicken my devotion; in praises, heighten my love and gratitude; in preaching, give me readiness of thought and expression; and grant that, by the clearness and brightness of your holy Word, all the world may be drawn into your blessed kingdom. All this I ask for the sake of your Son our Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.

I’ve never been one to dwell on the “I am not worthy” part, except in the Wayne and Garth way of not being worthy to see Alice Cooper.  However, on this day in the cool sanctuary, resplendent in fresh Easter lilies,I got it. Not being worthy for me means embracing the weirdness of it all- the outward and visible signs of our inward and spiritual faith, the story of our Hope founded in scripture and story, and the saving grace of surrendering to life on life’s terms. Weird, right?

It hit me that the Easter experience is as alive and well for me (and you) as it was for the Marys at the tomb.  I imagined what those love-filled, grief-stricken women felt as they were told by that angel that He wasn’t there.  The bizarreness of leaving the tomb, dropping spices and linen strips along the way, only to be met by a supernatural figure on the path outta there. “Do not be afraid,” He says, “don’t be afraid, and go and tell my people that if they’ll go home to Galilee, they will see me.”  Don’t be afraid!? How about awestruck, wonder-filled, overwhelmed by the glory and goodness of it all? We’re not worthy, indeed.

Go home, Jesus tells them. Go back to where you came from. Return to the source of your existence. Literally, emotionally, spiritually, or metaphorically… go home.  To the rootedness and comfort of just being loved for who you are and who you were created to be. Weirdest Easter message ever! When we are home in ourselves, we are at home with Christ.  Weird, but oh so true.

It’s true because, as we are reminded elsewhere in scripture, the very same power that raised Jesus Christ from the dead, the very same Spirit that moved over the waters of creation, lives and moves in you and me.  That oddly supernatural Grace upon Grace, that extraordinary character of God’s restoring Love is in us- from Galilee to Goliad, Bethsaida to Buda… Christ is Risen and that Risen Christ is for us, with us, and in us- wherever we may be!

There is a weirdness to it all that I don’t know if I’ve ever truly embraced until this, the SECOND WEIRDEST EASTER EVER.  The strange and extraordinary character of what happens to the women at the tomb and disciples thereafter all point to the magical, wonderfully super-natural goodness of it all for me, right here and right now from my little spot in God’s creation.  My hope for all of us this year, in these unusual times, is that we will lean into the weirdness and continue to KEEP EASTER WEIRD! (Alleluia)