Easter Message 2000

The Festival of Festivals, the holy season of triumph and glory is with us once more. Let us rejoice together in heart and soul as we proclaim those most precious and joyful words:  THE LORD IS RISEN.

      There are mysteries in our Christian faith which baffle and perplex the corrupt and unbelieving world, which indeed, as the Apostle Paul has told us , are foolishness to those who are perishing. We bow down and venerate the Cross, an instrument of torture and death. We receive the newness and fullness of life from a Tomb, a place where a dead body is laid.  These are sacred mysteries which the present world does not and cannot understand.

      Christ the God-Man laid down His life as a sin-offering for the sins of the world. As the Apostle Peter tells us, "For Christ also suffered once for sins, the just for the unjust, that He might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh but made alive by the Spirit" (I Peter 3:18).

      We know that God the Father accepted the death of His Son as a full atonement for this reason: GOD RAISED HIM FROM THE DEAD. The tomb is empty; eternal life is God's greatest gift for us, and it springs forth from the empty tomb.

      I am going to quote a few lines from an Easter sermon preached by one of the greatest Saints of our Church, St John Chrysostom. "No one need fear death, for our Saviour Himself has died and set us free. He confronted death in His own Person and blasted it to nothing, and He descended to Hades and laid it in ruins."

      Have you ever allowed the fear of death to come between you and your peace of mind? Our Lord has conquered death and trampled it under foot. He rose from out of the tomb, the greatest and most glorious Victor who has ever walked the earth.  United in faith with Him, none of us need ever fear death, which is the gateway to Paradise.

      My prayer for each of you is that you will have a most happy and holy Easter and that the peace and joy of the Risen Lord will be with you in abundance. In the peace and joy of this festive  season, I exhort you to be strong in the faith and diligent in fulfilling your duties as Orthodox Christians.

CHRIST IS RISEN!

With fatherly love

Archbishop Makarios of Zimbabwe