Pastor’s Corner

“Christ is risen! He is risen indeed, alleluia!” These are the words we start Easter with. Our entire Easter season is peppered with these words, salted with them so we may never forget. Jesus Christ truly has risen from the dead. Because we have been baptized into Christ, united to Christ through baptism, we will also rise from the dead (Romans 6). It is very right and fitting we shout, “Christ is risen! He is risen indeed, alleluia!” 

We need to say these words. We desperately need to be reminded of the reality of Christ’s resurrection from the dead, because the reality we see around us is so often very different looking. We see our parents die, we see our spouses die, our friends, our family, even our children. We see the cold reality of death staring us in the face all the time. This is why we need the warm reality of the resurrection being shouted into our ears. 

St. Paul understood what Christians like us go through. The church in the city of Thessalonica had Christians who were worried about the resurrection. They saw their loved ones die, just like we do. They saw spouses, friends, and children die as well. Seeing them die was just as hard for them as it is for us. St. Paul wrote to them, and you as well, saying: 

[we do not want you to] grieve as others do who have no hope. For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep . . . For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord. Therefore encourage one another with these words. (1 Thessalonians 4:13-18) 

The reality of death we see around us is hard, it is bitter, it is heartbreaking. But the Easter proclamation “Christ is risen! He is risen indeed, alleluia!” can soften the blow of death, comfort the sadness, and soothe the bitterness of death. We do grieve, but we do not grieve as those without hope. May we shout it out loud and remind ourselves constantly, “Christ is risen! He is risen indeed, alleluia!” 

– Pastor Grimenstein