The Light of Dawn

"Early on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene came to the tomb . . .”  (John 20:1) 

There’s an old Hasidic tale that goes like this:

The rabbi asks: “how can we determine the hour of dawn, when the night ends, and the day begins?”One of his students suggests that it is dawn when, from a distance, you can distinguish between a dog and a sheep.“No,” the rabbi responds. “You know it is almost dawn when you can look into the face of human beings, and you have enough light in you to recognize them as your sister or brother. Until that time, it is still night, and the darkness is still with us.”

Notice that Mary Magdalene comes to the tomb just before dawn.  She has come very early on Sunday morning to do the work that could not be done on the Sabbath; to prepare her friend’s body for burial. But it is still dark outside. After discovering the body is not there, and as the sun comes up, she looks into the face of a gardener. In her grief she is initially unable to see the face of Jesus. But then she does. And her life is changed for good. 

That is the power of the Resurrection. And that is the good news of Easter. The tomb is empty. Jesus is not there. But as Mary turns to speak with a stranger, she sees her friend, and she hears his voice. 

By the dawn’s early light, she sees the face of Christ in the face of the gardener. How do we know the hour of dawn? When it is light enough for us to see in the face of the other a brother or sister.

Almost all of the Resurrection narratives take the same shape. My personal favorite is the story about those travelers on the road to Emmaus. It's later in the day in that story. But there, too, it is in the face of a stranger (and then in the breaking and sharing of the bread) that their eyes are opened and they see the face of Christ. Were not our hearts burning within us? Which I think is a way of saying that the heart often knows what is real before our minds can process it. 

We know too well the darkness of the world and of our own lives, a darkness that provides cover for so much fear and pain and death. Most days, we feel (or at least I confess that I feel) powerless against all of that darkness.

It took me a long time to get used to the Easter Vigil as a liturgy. I grew up with a more Protestant Easter Sunrise Service. And that also has meaning and beauty. But after multiple trips to the Church of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem I have come to see how important that holy fire is, especially to Orthodox Christians and by extension to those of us in the west for whom the Easter Vigil has become meaningful. In the west we tend to associate the candles with Christmas Eve and singing Silent Night in a dark church very near to the midnight hour, just a few days after the Winter Solstice. But the meaning is the same at Easter and throughout the liturgical year: the Light of Christ has come into the world. We who have walked through darkness have seen this great light. And we know in our hearts (and sometimes in our heads, too) that the darkness cannot overcome it.

Although this year we won't huddle around that fire, we will do so again, as Christians have done for centuries. We will light that Paschal candle which burns not only throughout the fifty days but at every Baptism and every funeral throughout the year. It reminds us of who God is, and of whom we are called to become. With God's help.Whether at Christmas or at the next Easter Vigil, we'll light our little beeswax candles again and watch the flames dance, little tiny reminders of of what the dawn brings. We light our candles and the light shines in the darkness. 

So we pray on this Easter for enough light to take hold in us that we might see Christ face-to-face; that we might see our brother, Jesus, in the face of our friends and family. And then, in practicing that, to look for him alive in the world in the face of our neighbors, and eventually even in the faces of strangers. When we can see God there, then we, too, will know it is almost dawn.

In that learning we rediscover Easter faith that could never be boxed into buildings in the first place. Yes, there is grief, to be sure at what we have lost this Lent and Holy Week. But we can still pray, even now (especially now) for God to make us an Easter people. And not for our own sake, but for the sake of this world. We pray that the light of Christ might continue to shine in and through our lives as all until the whole creation is made new, and the dawn breaks, and we make our song again:

Alleluia, Christ is risen!

The Lord is risen indeed, alleluia!