I’ve always felt that Mary Magdalene’s statement in the Gospel of John, “I have seen the Lord!” is more meaningful than our traditional call and response of, “Christ is risen! Christ is risen indeed!” It’s just that Easter and the resurrection is not a third personal confession, it’s a first-person encounter.
To say, “I have seen the Lord!” is to point out resurrection in middle of life:
To name joy where others only see loss;
To love in the world that rewards cruelty;
To still be kind, good, and decent even when the vile and vicious seem louder.
“I have seen the Lord!” is not naïve! It doesn’t ignore the pain. It doesn’t ignore death or injustice, it just refuses to give them the final word! It insists there’s another way to live – a way not driven by power or profit but shaped by grace, mercy, and sacrificial love.
Right now we don’t just need resurrection moments; we need people who can help the rest of us make sense of them. We are crying out for people who can name the heartbreak and also name the hope breaking through it. We need people who can say what you see is not all there is.
So maybe the most powerful sermon you’ll ever preach is, “I have seen the Lord!” And the most powerful witness is the life you and I live after seeing the Lord because Easter isn’t over! Resurrection isn’t past tense!
God is still creating joy out of fear, still forgiving, and still raising the dead.
And maybe, just maybe, God is doing it through you and me! “I have seen the Lord!”
Shalom, Paul