Vigil of Easter

The Vigil of Easter

March 30, 2024

Text: Mark 16:1-8

Alleluia!  Christ is risen!  He is risen, indeed!  Alleluia!

            We’ve been keeping vigil here tonight, in anticipation of this very news.  Keeping vigil.  Keeping watch.  “Watch and pray,” says the Lord, “that you may not enter into temptation” (Matt. 26:41; ESV).  Such should be the disposition of all Christian disciples until we see the risen Lord.  Waiting in faith.  Waiting in hope.  On the lookout.  But not idle.  Doing what, then?  Listening for His voice.  Hearing the Scriptures.  As we have tonight, a vast swath of salvation history, from Creation to Exile, to redemption and fulfillment in Christ.  Praying.  Meditating.  Immersed in the concrete reality of our Baptism into Christ.

            The readings we heard from the Old Testament this evening, are the four always included in the Easter Vigil service: Creation, Flood, the Red Sea, and the Fiery Furnace.  If we really wanted to get serious about our vigiling, there are eight more suggested selections, plus the apocryphal song of the three young men in the furnace following our last reading.  There are two versions of it in our hymnal, hymns 930 and 931, if you want to check them out. 

            What do all the readings have in common (at least those we’ve heard tonight)?  Water.  Well, all except one, the Fiery Furnace.  But this is, after all, a baptismal service, the Vigil.  For the Baptism of infants, yes (we had the Baptism of James Ford only a couple of years ago), but especially of adult converts, and even when there is no Baptism, for all of us to recall and live in our own Baptism into Christ.  In the Early Church, and through much of the Church’s history, the Season of Lent was observed as a time of intense catechesis for baptismal candidates and catechumens.  It all culminated on this night, as, for the first time, the catechumens (the adults, at least) recited the Apostles’ Creed, received Holy Baptism, were clothed in a white robe, anointed with holy oil (Confirmation), prayed the Lord’s Prayer, and joined the congregation for the Lord’s Supper.  This service is all about that.  It’s possible you and I became bored, and shifted nervously during the Service of Readings tonight, but think how those newborn Christians would have hung on every word of the Holy Scriptures, as they were hearing them… maybe for only the second or third time in their life, assuming they heard them during catechesis, or perhaps for the first time, if the catechist only summarized the teaching… hearing them, now, applied to their own life and salvation.  God grant us to hear the Scriptures afresh in this way!

            So, water.  The Spirit, hovering over the waters of Creation, even as He hovers over the waters of New Creation at the font.  The Flood, washing away all sin and evil, but delivering Noah and his family, eight persons in all (1 Peter 3:20) in the floating ark, even as Baptism now saves us and washes us clean, delivering us through the Flood of God’s wrath in the Ark of Holy Church.  The Red Sea, Pharaoh and his host swept away and drowned, while Israel walks across on dry ground, even as we are delivered from our enemies… the devil, the world, and our own sinful nature… in the blood-red Sea of Holy Baptism. 

            And, what about the three young men in the fiery furnace, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego?  This, too, has to do with Baptism.  “I baptize you with water for repentance,” St. John confessed in the wilderness, “but he who is coming after me is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire” (Matt. 3:11).  Though the world throws us into the pit of death, the fire will not harm us.  The Lord Himself will deliver us (who is that fourth Man walking, like a son of the gods, in the midst of the flames?  You know it.  This is no mere angel.  It is the Son of God, Himself, the pre-incarnate Christ!).  The fire, we might say, is that of the Refiner (“he is like a refiner’s fire,” sings Handel, in the words of the Prophet Micah [3:2]).  The fire cleanses, purifies, how?  By burning away the dross, our idols, our unfaith… all that is not Christ.  That necessarily comes with Baptism.  And it is a gift.  Though, it can hurt beyond anything.  Still, our Lord is with us in it, doing His saving work. 

            But what else do all the readings have in common?  God bringing life out of death.  Salvation out of suffering.  Well, the first reading, Creation, is not so much life out of death, but really, same miracle.  Because, in that reading, He brings life out of no life, creatio ex nihilo, creation out of nothing.  No one but God can do that.  We can make things out of other things, and in this way, we reflect God’s image, but only God can make something out of nothing, by mere utterance of His creative Word.  And that same Word delivers Noah, and Israel, and Daniel’s faithful companions out of mortal danger.  That same Word becomes flesh and dwells among us (John 1:14).  It is the Word crying out on the cross, and silenced for our sins.  It is the Word that bursts forth alive from the tomb, and will call us back to life at the time appointed.  In fact, already has called us to life in our Holy Baptism into Him.

            He is the fulfillment of it all, isn’t He?  Cross and Resurrection are writ large over all the Hebrew Scriptures.  But we miss it, apart from the light of Easter Dawn.  We miss it, apart from the Spirit’s enlightening, when we are washed in water and the Word.  That is why the women come to the tomb, expecting to find a corpse.  But an angel has rolled away the stone.  And upon his preaching, the women run away, seized by trembling and astonishment.  Can we believe our eyes and our ears?  Can the angel’s words possibly be true?  If so, the whole world has been turned upside down, not to mention our own lives. 

            That’s right.  All of history hinges on this moment.  And your life, too.  All that came before is fulfilled in this.  All that comes after either rebels against it, or is redeemed by it.  You either rebel against it, or are redeemed by it.  The fact is, it has flooded your life and being in the bloody baptismal water.  It is poured down your throat in the wine of the chalice.  Grace.  Pure grace.  “This is the night when all who believe in Christ are delivered from bondage to sin and are restored to life and immortality.”  For “This is the night when Christ, the Life, arose from the dead.  The seal of the grave is broken and the morning of the new creation breaks forth out of night.  Oh, how wonderful and beyond all telling.”  And yet, we tell it.  Our vigil has been rewarded, and we tell it, in joy; we tell it in faith, and in hope, and in love: Alleluia!  Christ is risen!  He is risen, indeed!  Alleluia!  Life has come forth out of death.  In the Name of the Father, and of the Son X, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.