The Dean


The Easter element of life
Very often people say to me “Oh it’s ok vicar. I’m a ‘born again Christian.’ I know what they mean, but it comes out as a sort of placard saying “I’ve got a superior faith and so I’m a better Christian than some of the others!” All Christians, worth the name, are ‘born again’ because of our faithful acceptance of the Word of God and the Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. So says St Peter in his first letter chapter 1 v.23. I have great sympathy with new Christians (and renewed Christians) who are excited by their new faith, whose lives have been changed by an event or moment of inspiration which can only be described as from God and they feel truly ‘born again.’ Compared to other Christians who are ‘old stagers’ in the faith this new manifestation can easily be seen as superior and more genuine because of its lustre, shine and enthusiasm. The fact is that all Christians should understand themselves as the ‘Easter People’ and therefore ‘born again.’ Easter is the celebration not just of an event over 2,000 years ago, but that life is full of little ‘births’, ‘deaths’ and ‘resurrections’. In Jesus, raised from the dead, God is showing us an element of life in his created order which is easily overlooked. It is like the air we breathe. We cannot see it, and of course for small children it is not an easily comprehensible part of their world until they are taught its reality and the fact that they depend upon it for their very existence. So it is with the Resurrection. We are born again, once and for all, but we need many reminders of this constant reality in the same way that we have birthdays every year as we grow up both physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually. In John 3:3 Jesus says to Nicodemus, a sophisticated enquirer, “I tell you the truth, no-one can see the kingdom of God unless he is born again.” Nicodemus could not grasp this concept at first until Jesus likens it simply to the breath of the wind surrounding us and sustaining us - the air sustains our physical bodies, the breath of the Spirit of God sustains us spiritually. What happened precisely on that first Easter morning we do not know, apart from the fact that Jesus was raised from the dead. By it God opens our eyes to a dimension of life to which we would otherwise be blind. The whole process of life and death, death and resurrection are the very essence of the creation he has made. Easter Day, and every day for that matter, are for Christians, a celebration of the wonderful and dynamic way things ARE but too often too many choose to ignore. “In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead…an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade.”(1 Peter 1:3) I wish you all a very happy and holy Easter Alan Hayday