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Lenten devotions 2008

MARCH 22 - WE WAIT TONIGHT
By Anna Hade, a senior peace, justice and conflict studies major from Lancaster, Pa.

SCRIPTURE: John 20:1-18 (NRSV)
Scroll down for complete Scripture.

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DEVOTIONAL: I am not very good at waiting. Many of us are not. Our culture tells us that we need everything right now. But I am a member of a community that is waiting. We are waiting for Jesus. Over two thousand years ago the disciples were waiting to see what happened next. Their world had been turned upside down, their leader killed.

Today is the day between Good Friday and Easter, my favorite day of the whole liturgical year. Tonight Christians will participate in Easter vigil services all over the world. Vigils are about waiting. We wait with the disciples to see what comes next. Jesus spoke of resurrection and coming again in his life but did the disciples remember that during those long three days? We know that Jesus will come again and each year at Easter we wait, as sure as the sun will rise in the morning. Tonight marks the transition from Lent to Easter, from the pain and sorrow of death to the joy and healing of resurrection.

We are a community in waiting. We are waiting for God’s Kingdom to be realized on Earth. Waiting is hard. It is easy to become discouraged or bored while waiting. Which is why we find ways to not just wait but to prepare. But we know that we will one day see Jesus again just as Mary saw Jesus on the first Easter morning.

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SCRIPTURE: John 20:1-18 (NRSV)
Early on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene came to the tomb and saw that the stone had been removed from the tomb. So she ran and went to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one whom Jesus loved, and said to them, ‘They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we do not know where they have laid him.’ Then Peter and the other disciple set out and went towards the tomb. The two were running together, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first. He bent down to look in and saw the linen wrappings lying there, but he did not go in. Then Simon Peter came, following him, and went into the tomb. He saw the linen wrappings lying there, and the cloth that had been on Jesus’ head, not lying with the linen wrappings but rolled up in a place by itself. Then the other disciple, who reached the tomb first, also went in, and he saw and believed; for as yet they did not understand the scripture, that he must rise from the dead. Then the disciples returned to their homes.

But Mary stood weeping outside the tomb. As she wept, she bent over to look into the tomb; and she saw two angels in white, sitting where the body of Jesus had been lying, one at the head and the other at the feet. They said to her, ‘Woman, why are you weeping?’ She said to them, ‘They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him.’ When she had said this, she turned round and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not know that it was Jesus. Jesus said to her, ‘Woman, why are you weeping? For whom are you looking?’ Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him, ‘Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away.’ Jesus said to her, ‘Mary!’ She turned and said to him in Hebrew, ‘Rabbouni!’ (which means Teacher). Jesus said to her, ‘Do not hold on to me, because I have not yet ascended to the Father. But go to my brothers and say to them, “I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.” ’ Mary Magdalene went and announced to the disciples, ‘I have seen the Lord’; and she told them that he had said these things to her.
Posted at 08:04 #