Alleluia! Christ is risen!
Mar. 29th, 2005 08:43 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
yrieithydd`Favourite quote this Easter: The cross was the victory won. The resurrection was the victory endorsed, proclaimed and demonstrated. (John Stott)'
That was the response I had from an evangelical friend to my text of 'Alleluia! Christ is risen!'. On one level, I was amused because he was one of the two people to whom I sent that message where I was doubtful about getting the 'right' response.* On another I just went 'no, no, no' (and showed it to a friend (who coincidentally knows the person concerned) who agreed with me). On a third level, I thought 'that demonstrates exactly what I mean about evangelicals downplaying the Resurrection and reducing it to no more than a rubber stamp.
Having lived through the events of that week from Palm Sunday to Easter Day once again, this time against a very odd week, this quote just missed the point so spectacularly. As Mark said, 'thousands were crucified'. It is the risenness which changes the disciples sadness and fear to joy. Cleopas and friend trudge to Emmaus and run rejoicing back to Jerusalem after their encounter with the Risen Christ.
It is not possible to separate the crucifixion from the resurrection, one needs both for the event to be. Without the resurrection there would have been no victory.
Christ the Lord is risen today; Alleluia!
Sons of men and angels say: Alleluia!
Raise your joys and triumphs high; Alleluia!
Sing, ye heavens; thou earth, reply: Alleluia!
Love's redeeming work is done;
Fought the fight, the battle won:
Lo, our Sun's eclipse is o'er,
Lo, he sets in blood no more.
Vain the stone, the watch, the seal;
Christ has burst the gates of hell;
Death in vain forbids his rise;
Christ has opened Paradise.
Lives again our glorious King;
Where, O death is now thy sting?
Dying once, he all doth save,**
Where's thy victory, boasting grave?
Soar we now where Chrsit hath led,
Follwoing our exalted Head;
Made like him, like him we rise;
Ours the cross, the grave, the skies:
King of Glory! Soul of bliss!
Everlasting life is this,
Thee to know, thy power to prove,
Thus to sing, and thus to love:
Hail the Lord of earth and heaven!
praise to thee by both be given:
thee we greet triumphant now;
hail, the Resurrestion thou!
(Charles Wesley 1707--88)
**AMNS, HP gives Once he died our souls to save. Without the Companion to Hymns and Psalms I don't know which is the original so I went with the one I prefer. The next line in AMNS is Where thy victory, O grave?. I'm trying to put together an earlier version from AMNS and HP and my memory of the Companion! Thus I've guessed which way round the last two verses of each book would come!
*As yet I've not had a response from the other.
That was the response I had from an evangelical friend to my text of 'Alleluia! Christ is risen!'. On one level, I was amused because he was one of the two people to whom I sent that message where I was doubtful about getting the 'right' response.* On another I just went 'no, no, no' (and showed it to a friend (who coincidentally knows the person concerned) who agreed with me). On a third level, I thought 'that demonstrates exactly what I mean about evangelicals downplaying the Resurrection and reducing it to no more than a rubber stamp.
Having lived through the events of that week from Palm Sunday to Easter Day once again, this time against a very odd week, this quote just missed the point so spectacularly. As Mark said, 'thousands were crucified'. It is the risenness which changes the disciples sadness and fear to joy. Cleopas and friend trudge to Emmaus and run rejoicing back to Jerusalem after their encounter with the Risen Christ.
It is not possible to separate the crucifixion from the resurrection, one needs both for the event to be. Without the resurrection there would have been no victory.
Christ the Lord is risen today; Alleluia!
Sons of men and angels say: Alleluia!
Raise your joys and triumphs high; Alleluia!
Sing, ye heavens; thou earth, reply: Alleluia!
Love's redeeming work is done;
Fought the fight, the battle won:
Lo, our Sun's eclipse is o'er,
Lo, he sets in blood no more.
Vain the stone, the watch, the seal;
Christ has burst the gates of hell;
Death in vain forbids his rise;
Christ has opened Paradise.
Lives again our glorious King;
Where, O death is now thy sting?
Dying once, he all doth save,**
Where's thy victory, boasting grave?
Soar we now where Chrsit hath led,
Follwoing our exalted Head;
Made like him, like him we rise;
Ours the cross, the grave, the skies:
King of Glory! Soul of bliss!
Everlasting life is this,
Thee to know, thy power to prove,
Thus to sing, and thus to love:
Hail the Lord of earth and heaven!
praise to thee by both be given:
thee we greet triumphant now;
hail, the Resurrestion thou!
(Charles Wesley 1707--88)
**AMNS, HP gives Once he died our souls to save. Without the Companion to Hymns and Psalms I don't know which is the original so I went with the one I prefer. The next line in AMNS is Where thy victory, O grave?. I'm trying to put together an earlier version from AMNS and HP and my memory of the Companion! Thus I've guessed which way round the last two verses of each book would come!
*As yet I've not had a response from the other.
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Date: 2005-03-29 11:51 pm (UTC)I'd love to hear John Stott tell the disciples on Holy Saturday that the Cross was the victory. The Resurrection is surely the very point of the story, the thing which edges it out of the realms of comfortable tragedy and into a divinely-inspired narrative. Without it, Christianity would be nothing but a death cult (indeed, some forms of both Evangelical and Catholic belief are worryingly close to that). No doubt Stott believes in the Crucifixion as 'victory' because of PSA leanings?
I guess it depends to a great extent upon where you think Jesus went after his death too. I've heard people argue 'from Scripture' that he went to Heaven and that he went to Hell. I don't suppose we're going to find out who's right any time soon...
One final random musing: I was reading in Williams' book about Resurrection that the Eucharist was never meant to be a symbol merely of Christ's death but also of his rising. Interesting, that. Sadly my brain's packed up for the night, so I'll bid you adieu and head off to bed...