“Christ is the new Pascha, the living sacrifice,

the lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.''

(Resurrection Matins)

Dearly beloved,

The hymn you have just heard we chant at matins as we celebrate this evening the “feast of feasts,'' all holy Easter. “Christ, is our new Pascha. He is the living sacrifice who sacrificed His earthly life for the life of the world. He is the lamb of God who bears upon himself the sins of the world, to free the world from its sins.'' Let us stop for a few minutes and ponder these ideas of the sacred hymn of our Paschal liturgy.

      Christ is our new Pascha. The old Pascha, Phascha (Passover) of the Mosaic Law, is the “passage'' of the Jews, their transfer from the land of Egypt, the land of servitude, to the land of Canaan, the land of freedom. It is the feast of the unleavened bread; the feast of the bitter herbs, and the feast of the one year old lamb, which remind the Hebrew people of several things: their bitter enslavement in the land of Egypt; their protection by the blood of the lamb from the extermination of the angel; and their passing through the desert, which lasted for forty years. It is only then that they arrived at the promised land.

      In the eight days of the Jewish Passover, recently completed, today's Hebrew people in continuity with their tradition, proudly celebrate these great things done by God in the history of the Jewish people. They remember the bitter servitude in the land of Egypt; their protection from the exterminator angel; their exit from Egypt; the crossing of Red Sea; their venture in the Sinai Desert; and their entrance in the land of Canaan, without great Moses, their leader, who was thus punished because a minor mistake of his.

      Christians are the followers of the New Dispensation, signed by the precious blood of the Lamb Immolated before the creation of the world. They find all these events of the Old Covenant being fulfilled through the life and the work of the Lord Jesus the Christ. All these events of the history of Israel of old symbolize for them new realities, brought about by Christ who came to make new realities of history out of old allegorical events in the life and history of the chosen people of God.

      The major of these allegories is that the slavery of the land of Egypt is the enslavement of humankind to sin. True slavery is the enslavement under Satan and its dominion, the pseudo-power of evil and death. Christ came to free us from this enslavement, through His incarnation.

      The precious blood of the Lamb of God was shed upon the Cross to free us and protect us against this eternal death, which is separation from God, our true life. The passing of Christ from death to life through His glorious resurrection from the dead, granted us eternal redemption and freedom from all our miseries, and from our last enemy, death.

      Christ, being our new passing, our new Passover, gave us all these new realities: through His resurrection, He carried us over from death to life and from earth to heaven; He carried us from the land of dislocation and exile to the promised land, from the pseudo-dominion of evil and death to the eternal, unwaning and unsetting Kingdom of God, the life of which is the glorious life of Resurrection and incorruptibility.

      Christ is the living sacrifice. As such, He is different from all the sacrificial victims of the Old Testament. Just remember the animal sacrifices of the Epistle to the Hebrews: these sacrifices, the blood of calves and goats and the ash of the heifer, could not cleanse the consciences of the people who were offering them from their dead works, so that they could offer worship to the living God. For that purification, and so that we may find eternal propitiation, the blood of Christ was necessary, the blood of the Covenant of eternal life.

      The famous scapegoat, allegedly and symbolically charged with the sins of God's people and sent to the desert, could not actually free the Hebrews from their sin. To achieve this freedom from sin and this forgiveness, the Lamb of God was needed, Who takes away the sins of the world. The symbol became reality when the Son of God carried upon Himself, upon the human nature He assumed, all the sins of all the human generations; when He washed clean all the sins of the entire human race with His precious blood shed upon the Cross.

      Being a divine person, the Son of God assumed a human nature without sin, and offered it upon the Cross as a propitiation victim on behalf of the entire human race. Thus, upon the Cross and through His Cross, Jesus of Nazareth became the Lord of History, changing human history to a history of salvation. The life of Resurrection as the world knows it in the Lord Jesus, is not only the center, but also the goal, and the moving force of all human history.

      It is this life of resurrection which we celebrate as we celebrate Pascha. Christ, our new Pascha, the living sacrifice, the Lamb of God Who takes away the sins of the world, is both the creator and the giver of this life. The Light of the Risen Christ, the Light of Resurrected Life gushes forth abundantly from the empty Tomb of the Risen Christ. As every year on Holy Saturday, the world has witnessed this miracle early this afternoon in Jerusalem. Let us come and receive this Light of the Risen Christ, the unwaning Light of God's eternal, unsetting Kingdom. And let us glorify the Risen Lord, the King of Glory, and thank him for the gift of Resurrected Life, and the gift of its glorious and unwaning Light.

      Christ is Risen, brothers and sisters. May His Light enlighten your way, now and ever and forever. May His Light fill all your life and existence unto all eternity.

      Have a happy and blessed Pascha.

With all my love in the Risen Lord, I remain,

Your Bishop,

+MAXIMOS

METROPOLITAN OF AINOU

BISHOP OF PITTSBURGH