Liturgical Colour : White

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, as we continue to glorify God and rejoice in His glory, proceeding through this Easter Octave, we should know that this joy that we celebrate now and which we have now, stemmed from the fact that we have been liberated and made free from the enslavement of sin. Once we were a people rejected and without hope, doomed to die a sinner’s death, but now we know that God had given us that hope through which we now can truly rejoice again.

We celebrate because we were once orphans, rejected and unwanted, and because we ourselves had severed the link which connected us to our Father and Creator, God. If we remember the story of the prodigal son which Jesus told to His disciples, we are the prodigal sons who abandoned our Father for the pursuit of worldly goodness and pleasures, and in the process, we fell.

God so loved all of us His children, that like in the story of the prodigal son, He as the Father of all rejoices so much whenever even a single one of His children return to Him and repent from his or her sins. Truly our joy in this Easter is both because we have that great hope of another chance and a new life in God, and also because God and all the angels and saints in heaven laud and glory because of the conversion of a sinner.

Do you know that there is a great rejoicing in heaven over the repentance of even a single sinner? Yes, this is because by the repentance, the sinner who was once forever lost to God and condemned forever, had been rediscovered and made anew to live together with God. In the story of the prodigal son, the father was so happy that his wayward son returned, that despite all that he had done, he welcomed him with much fanfare and rejoicing.

But we have to realise, that changing our ways and repentance are not easy to be done. Challenges from the world and all of Satan’s forces will be great, as they certainly will not easily let us go and be lost from them. This was clearly presented in the Gospel today, which told us about the resurrection of Jesus, but also importantly presented what happened afterwards among the chief priests and the elders, and how they plotted to try to keep the truth hidden from the people.

The chief priests, the elders and the Pharisees all worked to destroy Jesus and His teachings out of their jealousy and inability to resist the temptations of power in the world. They gave in to the persuasions of Satan, telling them to hold tightly to the power and prestige which they have been accorded to in the world. And this jealousy gave rise to all the wicked things which they had committed and done.

For example, from what they have seen in Jesus and all of His works, they, who were the most learned and educated among the people, and as the ones who were most knowledgeable about the Law of God and the teachings of the prophets, and yet because of their pride, they closed their hearts to God and hardened it. And that was why they did the things they had done. They refused to believe that the Lord they condemned to death had triumphed death itself and has risen from the dead.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, this is unrepentant behaviour, and one that we certainly have to avoid. We cannot allow our sins and our human desires, temptation of Satan and many others to come in between us and our salvation in God. Thus, this Easter is a reminder for us, that even as we rejoice and revel in the glory of God’s resurrection from the dead, we still ought to work hard in order to preserve our faith in Him and avoid committing wickedness and sin in our lives.

May Almighty God, the Risen and triumphant Jesus Christ strengthen our faith in us always, empower us to do more good works for the sake of His people, loving one another, and living our faith with sincerity and zeal. God bless us all and have a blessed Easter! Amen.