Genesis 17:1-7, 15-16, Mark 8: 31-38                                                   The Rector ©

+Come, Holy Spirit, fill the hearts of your faithful with the fire of your love. Amen.

“Take up your cross,” the Savior said, “if you would my disciple be; take up your cross with willing heart and humbly follow after me.” (Hymn 675, The Hymnal 1982)

Today is the second Sunday of Lent and our lessons focus on God’s covenant with us, and particularly with our ancestor Abraham. Our Gospel lesson focuses on Jesus rebuking Peter for questioning Jesus’ telling of the prediction of his own passion and his telling the disciples to take up their crosses. Instead of focusing on Abraham and Peter, though, I want to talk about the Great Vigil of Easter.  Perhaps that seems to be jumping ahead a little, like jumping past the previews at the movie theater, but I think it’s appropriate for this point in Lent, for the Easter Vigil is also about covenant and about taking up our crosses for Christ. The idea behind the service is for faithful Christians to wait and watch, hopeful and confident that Christ will return at midnight--Or in our case, around 10pm. 

Ok. It’s confession time.  How many of you have no idea what the Great Vigil of Easter is or have never been to the service the night before Easter Sunday? The Easter Vigil service is the first Easter service, and takes place on the night of Holy Saturday. It’s like the Jewish Passover in some ways. Passover is a nighttime feast for Jews and Christians alike, with parallel meaning—liberation and covenant.  We start out in the ancient Jewish manner, bringing in lighted lamps: a homely, everyday action at twilight, with vivid symbolic meaning.

The Easter, or Paschal, candle is lit during this service. The service traditionally begins outside the church, where ministers and some worshippers gather around a fire - a charcoal brazier is common. From this fire people would take light so that light spreads throughout the church and the whole world.  In the ancient tradition, people would take some fire from the new fire home to light their homes and fireplaces. A priest blesses the lamp and lights it outdoors from the first new fire of Easter, and the Deacon sings a blessing with a special Passover melody.

The service begins with words like these:

Brothers and sisters in Christ, on this most holy night, in which our Lord Jesus Christ passed over from death to life, the Church invites her members, dispersed throughout the world, to gather in vigil and prayer.

For this is the Passover of the Lord, in which through word and sacrament we share in his victory over death.   

After readings and prayers, the Paschal candle is lit from the fire using a taper, while a prayer like this is said...

“May the light of Christ, rising in glory, banish all darkness from our hearts and minds.

The lit candle is now a symbol of Christ, risen as the light of the world, and come into the midst of the people.” 

After being lit outside, the candle is carried into the church, where most of the worshippers are waiting in darkness, which symbolizes the darkness of Christ's tomb.

After more prayers and readings the candles held by the congregation are lit from the Paschal candle.

The symbolism of the candle is made very clear by words such as... 

Grant that this Easter candle make our darkness light; for Christ the morning star has risen, never again to set, and is alive and reigns for ever and ever.

The Paschal candle is made of pure white wax and is marked with a cross, an Alpha, and an Omega, the first and last letters of the Greek alphabet. The 4 numbers of the year are marked between the arms. This symbolizes that Christ has, and always will be with humanity, and is with humanity now in covenant and in the power of the resurrection. 

For much of the year many churches stand the paschal candle near the font used for baptisms. Here it provides a reminder that baptism is a symbolic death and rebirth with Christ; just like Christ's death and Resurrection.

While we wait in vigil for the resurrected Lord, we tell the stories of our 'family' history, recalling how God loved and saved God’s people throughout history. How God made covenant with God’s people in the story of salvation history.  Nowhere does the story of salvation history come alive like it does at the Great vigil of Easter.  And so on that night, we hear these incredible stories of salvation history and find our place in that history. Hearing the stories is like sitting around the campfire hearing family stories and remembering our own place in them.

This year we are doing a really exciting Vigil by sharing it with our Presbyterian and Lutheran friends on the Hill.  Capitol Hill Presbyterian and The Lutheran Church of the Reformation are joining us here at Christ Church for the Vigil.  I hope you will come and share in this special time and experience a liturgy like no other. I hope you will come and experience the absolutely unconditional love of God for God’s people throughout history and even to this day for us. Eight pm on April 15 (IRS day on the secular calendar); you can’t forget it.

So that takes me back to today’s lessons, particularly the gospel and taking up our crosses to follow Christ. Jesus was crucified because the religious and political and social establishments -- Jewish and Roman alike -- found him to be a threat. Jesus’ disciples can’t expect anything different, can they, if they are real disciples and not just disciples in name only? Few of us, I hope, will get hung on crosses to die. But many of us may find ourselves looked at strangely sometimes, or shut out of “the best” company, or made to feel disrespected and unwelcome, simply because our values are not the ones “everybody” -- the world -- accepts. Our business as disciples of Jesus is to follow him, not what “everybody” does, or even “the best” or “the leaders.”

Peter eventually understood discipleship and as we know, paid the ultimate cost of that discipleship. Most of us, I hope, will at least come to understand a disciple’s connection to Jesus if we are his disciples; our goal is not to get ahead but to get closer to God, not to be successful but to be faithful, not to gain this world’s approval but God’s. This Eucharistic celebration of ours today claims that we are thankful for the opportunity to do just that. “Take up your cross and follow Christ, nor think till death to lay it down, For only those who bear the cross may hope to wear the glorious crown.” (Hymn 675, The Hymnal 1982).

So come this day to be reminded that we are God’s and God’s covenant with us is forever. That’s what the Easter Vigil says to us, and that is what this feast table says to us always. Come, God is waiting to love you and God’s covenant is forever. Amen.