The Grave is Not Our Home

Brothers and Sisters, on this great and glorious day, on behalf of myself and the parish, I would like to wish you a happy and blessed Feast of the Resurrection of Our Lord. Christ is Risen, Qimleh Maran!

It’s a very weird feeling of not feeling at home. Not feeling like we belong. This can happen when you’re not in the city where you live. You can experience this when you’re not in the right company. [PAUSE] This homesickness is hard to describe. Hard to explain to people. It’s definitely hard to break through. [PAUSE]

We can wonder as Christians who see Jesus, who comes from heaven, lives here on earth for a short thirty-three years, making his home among humanity, away from heaven. We can wonder, he ever feel homesick? [PAUSE] We can wonder, did he ever feel truly at home on this earth which he knew he was never meant to stay forever? [PAUSE]

The gospels we read today show us that Jesus’ life is marked by being in places he shouldn’t ever have been. [SLOW DOWN]

He was born on earth and in a body which could not contain his glorious divinity.

After he was born, fled to Egypt when he should have been in Nazareth.

He was arrested when he should have been praying in the garden with his friends.

He was lifted high on the cross when he should have been on the throne of God in heaven.

He was in the grave when he should have been alive in heaven. [PAUSE]

Jesus shouldn’t have ever been there. [PAUSE] We wonder, why would Jesus enter these places he knows he never fully belonged? [PAUSE] The reality is this: [SLOW DOWN]

Jesus entered all these places he knew he didn’t belong, to bring us out of the life of sin he knew we never belonged. [LONG PAUSE]

St. Paul in his letter to the Romans asks this question: How can we who died to sin still live in it? [PAUSE]

At first, this can be hard to understand. We can ask ourselves, if I was baptized, and I died to sin at my baptism, was I not supposed to sin after?

I myself can say, after our baptisms, whether we were infants or adults, we sinned a lot. [PAUSE] So what does Saint Paul really mean here? [PAUSE]

I believe Saint Paul wants to make a distinction of falling sin and in it. He’s not saying “If you’ve been baptized, you can NEVER sin again. No.” Here, he’s saying, “How can we in it? Are we making this place of sin, our home we are comfortable in?” [PAUSE]intolivinglive

It would be the difference of us falling into a pit and setting up a house into a pit. [PAUSE]

If we fell in, we would scramble to find our way out. We call for help. We are covered in dirt, but we know the pit is not where we belong. [PAUSE]

Living in sin would be, us falling into the pit, getting comfortable. Decorating it making it seem desirable. instead of calling for help, we invite our friends. [PAUSE] We say to everyone, this is my home, this is who I am. And after a while, we forget what the sky looks like.

When a loved one of ours passes away. When the time comes for the funeral, we look at their casket and say: “You shouldn’t be there.” [PAUSE] You should be with us. Yesterday we may have felt that way about Jesus visiting him in his tomb. [PAUSE]

But today, Jesus has a word for us. [PAUSE] He looks at the graves of sin we dwell in, the ones we make our home and says to us, “You shouldn’t be there. This is not your home. You should be home with me.” [PAUSE]

Jesus enters the grave he was in, to take us out of our own.

The graves we’ve made our home: the grave of anger, the grave of unforgiveness, the grave of pride, the grave of gossip, the grave of vanity (caring too much of what other’s think of us), the grave of fear, the grave of dishonesty, the grave of hopelessness

Jesus today, in his resurrection, in his triumphant rising from the grave, he doesn’t simply call us OUT of the grave, [PAUSE] he calls us TO something? He calls us home [PAUSE] and that home is here. This altar. In the Eucharist.

In the Eucharist, the communion, it’s not just the bread and wine, we’re receiving the body, blood soul and divinity of Christ, the risen Lord.

So if you have been living in a grave— [PAUSE] you’re not far from home. You’re invited to come home to the Risen Christ. Amen.