It is a hope given by God in Jesus Christ, a new dimension of life promised, all of it quite beyond human understanding
Perhaps it is a mark of the true Easter people that we question and wonder because the hope on offer is not in our giftHenriette Nanette “Jetty” Paerl, the first artist to perform at the inaugural Eurovision Song Contest in 1956, was born in the Netherlands of Jewish ancestry. Early in the second World War, however, she fled to England to escape the Nazis where she continued a singing career on a Dutch language radio service, broadcasting to occupied Netherlands.
That is not unlike what happened to Mary on the first Easter Day. She goes to the burial place of Jesus to anoint his dead body, but the tomb is empty. She assumes that the body has been taken away “and I know not where they have laid him”. Then she sees a figure she presumes to be a gardener until Jesus speaks.
Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, the Russian author who spent many years in the gulag in Siberia, bears witness to the power of the cross. Like other prisoners, his days were filled with back-breaking labour. He saw no reason to continue living and decided to give up. He stopped working and sat down expecting that this would provoke a brutal response from the guards, possibly even his death. But as he waited, he felt a presence. He lifted his eyes and saw a skinny old prisoner squat next to him.
The Easter hope we celebrate is difficult to hold on to at times but perhaps it is a mark of the true Easter people that we question and wonder because the hope on offer is not in our gift. . But according to former Archbishop of York John Sentamu we must hold on and try to spread this news because “there is nothing more needed by humanity today than the recovery of a sense of beyondness – that dimension of life and love which assures us that God is truly in control”.
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