The resurrection doesn’t need us to do anything. But we most certainly need the resurrection. And the resurrection is the most relentless force in creation. And that, my friends, is joyful news. And while that may not do away with our fear, it certainly gives us something beautifully potent to hold in tension with it.
I suspect many of us are crying “hosanna” this day. We want to be saved. We want to leave the confines of our homes, if we are lucky enough to have a roof over our head. We want be able to hug our friends again. We want to meet our new grandchildren. We want to go to the grocery store without the anxiety and fear. We want to get back to our jobs. We want to see where our next paycheck is coming from. We want to get back to normal.
This is the good news of today’s passage and indeed the good news of the entirety of the season of Lent: Jesus isn’t sitting safely on the sidelines while we’re “out there” getting our butts kicked; Jesus is right here in the arena with us.
You see, tough things are ahead. For awhile now, we’ve talked about things. Now, it’s time to do some walking. It’s time for us to go “Into the Woods,” to enter the wilderness.
If you’re human, you have anger. Even the people we see as being particularly genteel had anger. Mr. Rogers got angry. Mother Teresa got angry. Jesus himself got angry.
Because, friends, you are the light of the world, the salt of the earth. Jesus is talking to us, today, to his Church - a Church that should make its home not in the confines of a beautiful building but in the brokenness of the world outside it.