From the Chaplains

‘Come Alive in 2025’ through the lens of Easter

Over the past months we have introduced a new song to chapel by Uniting Church composer and musician Tash Holmes called All of This is Us.

With Tash’s help we introduced this song to Pymble in Term 3 last year well before knowing the ‘Come Alive’ or ‘Respect’ theme for 2025. Looking back I wonder if there was something of ‘God (coming) alive in this place (and) doing a new thing’ in the mysterious way often happens without us noticing.

Here are the first verses and chorus:

‘The many faces of our God

reflected here among us.

With every heart to love you more

Here we stand upon new shores

The sacred ground on which we stand

we pay respect to precious land.

Desert red and stars above

we are united by your love.

God is alive in this place

doing a new thing once again.

Hallelujah, every voice raised

Hallelujah, giving you praise

All of this is us.’

With the above words and tune ‘ear worming’ their way around my head this week I have begun to ask myself what it means for us to ‘come alive’ with ‘respect’ when viewed through the lens of the Easter story.

What does it mean when we think of Jesus final acts of invitation, service, suffering and ultimately ‘coming alive’ through the resurrection when we sit all of that beside our ideal of respecting self and others?

And what that might all of that say about where God is alive for us in 2025 at Pymble?

I don’t have the answers here but the song and the scriptures have helped me to identify three possibilities that I want to mention today.

Jesus teaches us that sometimes sacrifice, in the form of giving of ourselves, leads to life. The death of Jesus led to his resurrection. This did not make the sacrifice worthwhile or just. It did not lesson the pain. But it reminds us that God is there in our darkest moments helping us to rise up again in a different way. It reminds us that God loves our brokeness as well as our beauty, and is with us in our pain.

We also learn that ‘coming alive’ is not an individual thing but about ‘all of us’. To ‘come alive’ and to be part of the ‘new thing’ that God is doing, like Jesus, we need to ‘lengthen (our) table’ to include and value everyone, even those we don’t want to, including those who we do not consider ‘worthy’ of our hospitality and inclusion. Jesus was not alone in the story of his final days. We sometimes forget this. There were so many others there both named and unnamed. Probably most did not identify as his followers, but they were included regardless. At the last supper Jesus included both those he would betray him, and those who would leave him in his hour of greatest need, as well as those who didn’t. No one was left out of his welcome.

Finally we learn that ‘coming alive’ is about serving others, in particular the most vulnerable as we embrace our land and all people as sacred. To fully ‘come alive’ we must choose to accept God’s invitation to service those we would not usually choose to serve. We must include those who are not included. We must get our own hands dirty rather than waiting to be served, even if this contravenes social normals and accepted practice. In the words of the song, our faith must move us ‘beyond a prayer’ and ‘live beyond the song’ to become tangible reality through acts of justice. For Jesus this meant turning over the tables in the temple, bringing healing and wholeness to those seen as ‘unclean’, washing the feet of his disciples and choosing not to use force or harsh words during his betrayal, arrest and trial, and inviting his disciples to do the same.

May we notice this new thing that God is doing among us as we ‘come alive’ this Easter.

Reverend Danielle Hemsworth-Smith

College Chaplain