MorningtideSample

The Transformative Morning

Yesterday, we were thinking about the ache of longing for morning to come when we’re in a time of trial. It’s something we’ve all known. Yet, I’m sure we’ve also known something of what it’s like when morning does come at last. When the problem we’ve been dealing with is lifted from our shoulders, like the feeling of relief when we find something we thought had been lost. To give a very trivial example, some of us in Celtic Worship have lost cherished musical instruments on trains or in airports, and that sweet feeling of relief when they’re found again is like daylight blowing away the remnants of a bad dream. At that moment, everything is made okay.

Here at the end of John’s Gospel, we have a beautiful encounter that follows those sorts of experiences but in a much much bigger way. The recently crucified Jesus, not only a great teacher and leader but a dearly beloved friend, reappears alive! Fully physical and vividly alive. In a beautiful display of His character, He chooses to meet Mary Magdalene before anyone else. Can you imagine how she felt? I suppose the way she clung to Him gives us a clue.

What Jesus chooses to say here is really significant. Notice he asks Mary to go and tell the disciples that he is going back to my Father and your Father. Jesus is saying to them that now, after this moment of return, their position before the Father is alongside Him as sons and daughters invited to call Him ‘Father’.

This one event - Jesus’ Resurrection - is the single most important thing that has ever happened. Everything we do in Celtic Worship derives directly from that resurrection morning two millennia ago. From that morning, the conclusion of all reality became light in place of darkness, life in place of death.

"He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins." Colossians 1:13

Isn’t it amazing that God chose to do that through a literal morning? A great moment of ultimate light happened when the sun literally replaced darkness with light.

When the sun rises, remember the same thing happened 2000 years ago and as a direct result you are invited to address God as ‘Father’. Why not pray to Him now? Join us in singing ‘Because He lives’ - a profoundly simple and beautiful expression of worship in response to this transformative morning.