Christ is risen!

Now what?

When the resurrection of Jesus from the dead becomes reality for us, when we receive it and believe it, we move into a time of significant transformation and change. The mystery and miracle of the resurrection take hold in our own lives: in body, mind, and spirit. Jesus’s resurrection, when seen, believed, and trusted, becomes our resurrection. God’s power in the resurrection act of salvation is engendered in us now. We become vessels, signs, witnesses. We become ones who are also resurrected. Christ’s risen life becomes ours. We move from believing it to becoming it.

“Behold what you are; become what you receive.” Saint Augustine wrote these words about the moment in the eucharist when the bread and wine were lifted and offered to the community (Sermon 242, in “Augustine on the Nature of the Sacrament of the Eucharist”).

In communion with the Risen Christ, we are affirmed as Christ and become Christ. We are united, resurrected, and made new. We move from believing to becoming.

Today, and over the next remaining six days of Easter, practice becoming Christ resurrected. Let the mystery of death transformed into life find its home in you. Choose life with prayerful and intentional surrender and holy yes. Offer yourself to the Holy One as an instrument of grace, love, and resurrection such that the living Christ is present in all that you are, and all that you do: your work, conversations, encounters, rest, and leisure. Engage the world, your community, family, neighbor, and enemy with an open and intentional heart that is resurrected. Embrace and love all that is tender, frail, and fragile. The risen life does not displace us from the world but roots us to live fully in the world now, as hope, as life, as beloved.

Let life in. Let resurrection undo that which is dead. Share the mystery and miracle of being raised in the same measure of generosity that God has shared with you and the world. Become what you believe.

Prayer: Holy One, thank you for your generous boundless love revealed in the Risen Christ. Teach me that in receiving this great gift, I am one with You, restored and raised, compelled to share it with the world. Amen. Alleluia.

*The more accurate translation is: “Be what you see, receive what you are.”

Source: Augustine, Sermon 242, in “Augustine on the Nature of the Sacrament of the Eucharist”, translated from Latin to English. earlychurchpublishing.com.

Image: Photo by Aaron Burden on Unsplash