I am a person who will question what people believe or don’t believe. I question the beliefs of people who question the existence of God. I question the intolerance of people who speak for God. I question anyone not wanting to know the mystery of Jesus life and death and rising again. The mystery of death is that we humans do not understand what happens to us when our flesh ceases working. Do we have a soul? Do we get to “see the light?” Is there a heaven in which to revel or a hell in which to languish? I hear people spout off about how they are in commune with God and know exactly what we should be doing with our lives, and then these self-proclaimed experts condemn anyone who does not think as they do.

My father wrote and preached a sermon which explained clearly to me about the evils in this world and how Good Friday and Easter fulfilled the salvation of our souls through the Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the grave. This sermon was given in the middle of World War II when all of the peoples of earth were being affected by the evil of war. Millions were dying because of threats to allied countries and differing opinions about what was right and what was wrong. He did not preach about the enemies of the United States and her allies, but rather spoke to the disorder of war being a precedent to the peace of mind and body that followed. The mystery of Good Friday and Easter relate the same way. One cannot understand what a great gift we have been given in Easter without first knowing and experiencing the suffering and death of Jesus Christ. As we live our lives in this torturous world today, we are still fighting wars. We are still arguing about social issues, such as abortion, taxes, conservative vs. liberal, national and state budget priorities, and a myriad of other minutia which is needed in this life but not in the next.

The mystery of Easter is revealed in that Jesus, whether willingly or unwillingly, fully understood what we fail to comprehend; we cannot live our lives in comfort and ease without true sacrifice and be able to enjoy what we desire and expect after our time on earth is over. We can achieve heaven on earth for immediate gratification or we can sacrifice ourselves to loving each other unconditionally and be grateful for a loving God who opens Heaven to us through the resurrection of His only son. I, for one, will give of myself as God calls me to do. I am not perfect, but God has work for me which may be difficult to endure at times and I willingly or unwillingly must suffer through to the end.

I hope the words of my father have an inspiring effect on you as you read. I have no experience with the time period for which this sermon was directed, but the words still ring true to me in the world in which I currently live. We have much to offer each other and we give so little, such is our fear of failure. Can you imagine what our lives would be like, if Christ failed to hang on the cross that fateful day two thousand years ago?

We speak the wisdom of God in a mystery. I Corinthians 2:7

It is told of Sir Harry Lauder, the actor, that while he was in Melbourne, Australia, and had just sustained the loss of his son, who had fallen at the front, he related the following beautiful incident. “A man came to my dressing room in a New York theater,” he said, “and told of an incident that had recently befallen him. In American towns, any household that had given a son to the war was entitled to place a star on the window pane. Well, a few nights before he came to see me, this man was walking down a street in New York accompanied by a small boy. The lad became very interested in the lighted windows of the houses, and clapped his hands when he saw a star. As they passed house after house he would say, “Oh. Look, Daddy, there’s another house that has given a son to the war. And there’s another. There’s one with two stars. And look. There’s a house with no star at all.”

“At last they came to a break in the houses. Though the gap could be seen the evening star shining brightly in the sky. The little fellow caught his breath. Oh, look, Daddy,’ he cried, “God must have given His Son, for He has a star in His window.”

“He has indeed.” said Sir Harry Lauder, in repeating the story. But it took the clear eyes of a little child to discover that the very stars are repeating the glorious fact, that “God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son – to die – that whosoever believeth in Him, should not perish but have everlasting life.”

Throughout this past week, if we have been faithful in the observance of it, we have watched Jesus, the Christ, the Beloved Son of our salvation, face the sufferings through which He was made perfect, and through which He achieved His final victory. For that victory He did not have to wait for Easter day. He won it on the first Good Friday when His love remained undiminished though evil did its worst against Him, and when through apparent failure and in face of imminent death, His trust in God never failed, and having cried out the Word of Victory – “It is finished.” – He yielded His soul in serene confidence – “Father into thy hands I commend my spirit.” And yet Good Friday could not be the end of the story for although the Victory was won for Christ it would have been lost for the rest of the world. For the world would never have been able to solve the mystery of the cross without the open tomb. The disciples went forth, not proclaiming a Christ crucified, but a Christ crucified and risen. The death and the Victory was the tone of their message. It was the victory over the cross, the conquering of death through the glorious resurrection that portrayed the true character and nature of God, the father who had seemingly allowed Hid beloved Son to go to an undeserved Death. St. Paul wrote, “Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea, rather, that is risen again, who is even at the f=right hand of God.” (Romans 8:34)

Where is that union of perfect power with the perfect goodness which men everywhere have learnt to designate by the name of god? There is power in the world, sure enough, but is it guided by goodness? There is Goodness in the world, sure enough, but is it endowed with power to be effective? These questions are flung in our face by the death of Christ on the cross. The evil of the world at all times and especially in this present day prompt these questions. Nowhere in all history is this problem of evil brought more a head than at the Cross. That seems so unfair, so unlike a loving father.

Yet it is out of the darkness of the Cross that the great light of Easter Sunday breaks forth. Here, god acted and made His action known to those whose hearts were attuned by discipleship. By the Resurrection of Jesus Christ God not only gave us the pledge of a future life, not only declared Jesus Himself to be the Son of God, but in that act He vindicated His Deity and true nature as a Loving and merciful Father.

Therein He gave us that unconquerable hope which should be the mark of every Christian. For there can be no darkness blacker than the darkness of Calvary; yet out of it shines the everlasting light. Here in this act of the Resurrection of Christ, the whole Gospel is certified for the world and for the rationalizing minds of modern men. The Gospel here faces the ugliest facts with complete and unflinching realism, and makes of them the material of its triumphant joy. The Cross was the Devil’s worst; but it is God’s best. By the way Christ bore its pain and by the setting upon His life and the death of the divine seal in the Resurrection, evil is not only overcome, but it is converted into the occasion of the victory of good.

So St. Paul faces the terrors of a hostile world with its persecution, famine, and sword, and declares that “in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us.” So the Lord on the threshold of his passion, and looking forward to what was in store for His disciples, said: “In the world ye have tribulation,” there is no concealing this, no pretense that things are better than they are; “In the world ye have tribulation: but be of good cheer I have overcome the world.”

At no time has the trumpet call of Easter sounded with a clearer note than today. In the world ye have tribulation. Our country men, our friends, our brothers, husbands, sons, are struggling at many places scattered over the earth in conflict for a cause which we know to be in line with the purpose of God. They are fighting foes who are alert, skillful, brave, equipped, and often cruel. So we have to beat the news of heavy losses in territory and in lives often dearer than our own; and we cannot tell how long the period of bad tidings must last. Yet through it all the Christian has no ultimate anxiety. Through pain and sorrow, through failure and death, through loss and defeat, God can bring the good cause to victory for those who trust in Him.

But our share in His Victory always depends on our readiness to share His endurance. We are, as St. Paul says, “Joint heirs with Christ, if we suffer with Him that we may be also glorified together.” We aspire to know the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings. The assurance of the victory of good shall nerve us for the endurance of all that may be involved in the conflict. But we must not expect to have any part in the victory if we shirk our share of the cost.

And so our prayer at this time is not that we may be spared suffering but that we may be made ready to suffer whatever is needed that the cause may triumph. The call of Easter is not to easy assurance of enjoyment in a heaven of selfish happiness; it is to brave endurance in the fellowship of Christ that we may our place with Him in the heaven where love and self-giving are made perfect.

So we set ourselves to lay aside every weight and the sin which so easily besets us that we may run with endurance the race that is set before us – a hard race – looking away from all others to Jesus, the Captain and perfecter of faith, who for the joy that was set before Him, the joy of a world by Him redeemed from the misery of selfishness into the blessedness of love – endured  the cross in scorn of contempt and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God. We here and now devote ourselves to the high calling of God; in token of our dedication and as a pledge of its completeness we pay our homage to Christ crucified and risen, to Jesus King triumphant.

Any peace can come on through struggle. Rest comes only out of work. “He that loseth his life shall find it.” Death is the gateway to life. Calvary precedes the resurrection. Good Friday is the introduction to Easter. These are the working principles of the Christian life. He goes before you and invites you to follow. Are we speaking the wisdom of God in mystery? No doubt we are. But it is good wisdom and a good mystery – for Easter has come again and Christ is risen.

‘O Risen Lord, who didst endure the pain of the cross as the price of the world’s deliverance from the power of evil, for whom God loosed the bands of death, unite us we beseech thee, with thy purpose and thy constancy, that we may both do what thou callest us to do and bear what thou callest us to bear, with sure confidence in thy love and power, who livest and reignest with the Father and the Holy Spirit, God for ever and ever.”

Reverend Norman Stockwell – Easter Day, April 9, 1943 at Shoshone, Jerome, and Gooding, Idaho.