Sermon for The Resurrection of Our Lord, April 5, 2026.
Christ is risen, He is risen indeed, Alleluia!
Every time the Holy Spirit gathers us to this altar, every single Sunday, we observe a little Easter. Every Divine Service brings us the Good News of Jesus Christ crucified for our sins and resurrected from the dead. It doesn’t matter whether we’re in Lent or Christmas or any given Sunday in the long Trinity season; every single Divine Service is a celebration of Easter. It’s a celebration of the good news that God took on human flesh, died on the cross in your place, and on the third day was raised from the grave.
The Apostle Paul wrote that, because of Christ’s resurrection, we too will be resurrected from the dead. Look at our Epistle reading, specifically 1 Corinthians 15:51-55.
“Behold! I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed,in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed. For this perishable body must put on the imperishable, and this mortal body must put on immortality. When the perishable puts on the imperishable, and the mortal puts on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is written:
‘Death is swallowed up in victory.’
‘O death, where is your victory?
O death, where is your sting?’”
When we read 1 Corinthians 1:20-25, we see that preaching the Gospel of Christ’s death and resurrection—that He is risen, He is risen indeed, alleluia!—has always been the Christian way. And we learn that there has always been pressure for it not to be. Paul asks:
“Where is the one who is wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, it pleased God through the folly of what we preach to save those who believe. For Jews demand signs and Greeks seek wisdom, [and now here it is] but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles, but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men.”
Where do we see the foolishness and weakness of God? On the cross. Jesus’ death looks foolish. His crucifixion is God at His weakest. Dying. Dead.
Every single week, we’re gathered by the Holy Spirit to proclaim in word, song, prayer, and Sacrament, the truth of Easter: the resurrection of our crucified Christ. Every last bit of our liturgy all year long expresses the glorious refrain, “He is risen! He is risen indeed, Alleluia!
St. Paul repeats himself in 1 Corinthians 2:2, saying, “And I, when I came to you, brothers, I did not come proclaiming to you the testimony of God with lofty speech or wisdom. For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified.”
This is the Christian way. “With the heart one believes [that Christ is risen, He is risen indeed, alleluia! ] and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved.” (Romans 10:10)
Now, let me ask you, Christian, does knowing that we celebrate Easter every time we’re gathered in worship diminish today’s resurrection celebration? Does the fact that you hear your pastor preach Christ and Him crucified for the forgiveness of your sins every single Sunday make the Good News of Christ’s resurrection any less special? Does the fact that no matter what day of the year it is, when you come to church, you’re celebrating Easter’s resurrection message reduce the special, amazing, glorious, and historic truth of today, the truth that Christ, He is risen: He is risen indeed, Alleluia!
The right answer is no. No, it doesn’t make it any less special.
If anything, the continual repetition builds it up. The repetition, just like with this morning’s joyous resurrection responsory, emphasizes the special work of God; it reinforces it. Hearing the Easter message, that Christ is risen, He is risen indeed, Alleluia!,as often as possible, is an aid to us in times of distress and great need. It grounds us in the truth. Hearing the Gospel proclaimed more often is better than hearing it less often because the message firmly planted in our hearts and constantly nourished keeps us from being alarmed when malady arrives—just as we heard in our Gospel lesson. Look at Mark 16:6. The words of the young man sitting on the right side of the tomb as he speaks to the first Christian altar guild: What does He say to the ladies in this pericope? “Do not be alarmed. You seek Jesus of Nazareth who was crucified. He has risen; he is not here. See the place where they laid him.”
Do not be alarmed. Christ was crucified and resurrected. He is risen! He is risen indeed, alleluia!
So now, let’s apply the obvious truth, that we don’t want less Easter (that’s absurd), but more of it; that we don’t want to hear the Good News of Christ’s crucifixion and resurrection less often, but as Christians, we desire to hear the Gospel more and more, to be strengthened more and more in the face of sin, death, and the devil; let’s apply this truth to the fruit of the Christ’s crucifixion—Jesus’ crucified Body and Blood given and shed on Good Friday; let’s apply it to this sacred meal that Christ instituted on Maundy Thursday: the Lord’s Supper, the Holy Sacrament that we celebrate as our Lord says to, in remembrance of Him. In remembrance of His crucifixion for us. The giving of His Body. The shedding of His Blood. The very meal He instituted, establishing His New Testament of grace and mercy, which we are blessed to live in. The sacrament wherein He gives to each of us—to you—what He went to the cross to win on our behalf: forgiveness of sins, life imperishable/immortal, victory over death and the devil.
I’ve been told that some of you dear saints, beloved children of God, don’t understand why we celebrate the Lord’s Supper every week, but would prefer we receive it only twice a month. Holy Week is the perfect time for this to come up. The reason expressed to me for why some of you think we should cut back on partaking of Christ’s Body and Blood weekly is that doing so makes it less special. The error at play here is that somehow we can make the holy things of God more or less special. God makes something special (holy). Not us.
Now, obviously, with everything I have already said in this sermon, we know we can’t hold to the rationale that frequency equates to specialty and still preach the special message of Christ and Him crucified every week. If the number of times we do something that our Lord has commanded us to do affects how special it is, then the proclamation of Christ’s crucifixion and resurrection, the Gospel, which is special beyond everything else, ought to remain so, therefore, we should what? Rarely preach it?
But let’s entertain the idea for a minute. If the frequency of Holy Communion determines how special it is, then we shouldn’t celebrate communion two times a month, but once a month, because if it’s more special the less we receive it, and if we doubled the amount of special going from four weeks a month to two, then if we half the occurrences again, taking it from two to one, the Sacrament becomes twice as special a second time.
But why stop there? Where will this frequency-equates-to-specialty position take us if we carry this wisdom out to its logical conclusion? Well, how about we only take Communion once a year? If less is more, once a year is far more special than once a month. But that still stops short of how far we can take this. We can increase the specialness even more by reducing the frequency yet again. What if we only celebrate the Lord’s Supper once in our lives? Wouldn’t that make the Lord’s Supper as special as it could possibly get?
Thanks be to God, that frequency is not what makes something special. The Lord’s Supper is special because of what it is, the very crucified Body and shed Blood of our resurrected Lord and Savior; the real, true Body and Blood of God incarnate, the Almighty YHWH who took on flesh specifically and especially, to be able to give that flesh to us to eat so that we might live forever with Him; that our perishable bodies might become imperishable, our mortal bodies, immortal. Filled with the imperishable and immortal Body and Blood of our Redeemer who lives.
We partake of Holy Communion every week because it’s a gift from our God Himself to give us strength during our pilgrimage through this crappy, sin-infested world ruled by the forces of evil, forces that want nothing more than to bring us, weak sinners, into the pit of hell with them. We partake of the Eucharist every week for the same reason that we preach the Gospel to distressed sinners every week, because Christ is risen! He is risen indeed, alleluia!
Amen!
Now come, friends. All of you, come, having gained understanding. Come and prepare your perishable and mortal bodies to put on the imperishable and the immortal. Come and taunt death, which has no power over you because it had no power over Jesus. Come to the Altar of our Lord and receive the most special meal you will ever eat. The one that you are blessed to receive from God each and every week.
Amen!
Tyrel Bramwell 
Leave a comment