We Are Raised With Him
April 5, 2026 – Easter Day, Year A
Acts 10:34-43; Colossians 3:1-4; John 20:1-18
On the Saturday before Palm Sunday, as we were getting everything ready for the next day’s procession around the church, children in Lebanon were going house to house, singing carols and collecting eggs for Easter. Nearly forty percent the people of Lebanon are Christians, and most of them are Maronites—Christians who trace their origins not only to the fourth-century saint from whom they get their name but also St. Peter, St. Luke, and St. James, whose influence shaped their distinct traditions. One of those traditions is the commemoration of Lazarus Saturday, the day before Palm Sunday.
You may have heard a little about this tradition on NPR this week. I did, and it captivated me so much that I rewrote my Easter sermon. On the day before Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem, we remember that he raised his friend Lazarus from the dead. For Maronite Christians, the celebration of Easter would be incomplete without a celebration of Lazarus, whose resurrection from the dead was a prefigurement of Christ’s own resurrection—a gift he gave to his friends to help them understand what would happen to him on the third day.
On Lazarus Saturday, children in Lebanon go caroling from house to house, signing traditional hymns about Lazarus and how Jesus raised him from the dead. When a group of children arrives at your house, you are supposed to let them inside and allow them to reenact the miracle in your own living room. The children take turns being the one who gets to lie down on the floor as Lazarus, while the other children hold a sheet over the pretend-dead child and yell out, “Lazarus, get up! Lazarus, get up!” When he awakens from the slumber of death, the children sing, “Lazarus is screaming. He is hungry. He wants a lot of eggs.” And then you’re supposed to give them eggs, which they eventually carry back to the church, where they are boiled and dyed in anticipation of Easter.[1]
This year, however, things are different. Israeli military strikes on southern Lebanon have forced thousands of Christian families to flee their homes. The Israeli government has warned that they intend to continue to bomb villages throughout the region because of suspected Iranian-supported Hezbollah militants living nearby. Right on the cusp of Holy Week, congregations and families have had to decide whether to pack up and flee the violence or remain in harm’s way.
As the NPR story made clear, Lebanese military protection has largely been withdrawn as Israeli tanks have taken over control of the area. Homes are being destroyed. Civilians are being killed. So far, 1,268 civilian deaths have been reported by the authorities in Lebanon, including at least 124 children.[2] Their reenactment of Lazarus’ resurrection was cut short this year, but those who remained behind participated in the tradition as an act of faithful defiance. And I can think of nowhere on this earth where celebrating the power of the resurrection as a physical act in which we participate is more important than on those front lines.
“Set your mind on things that are above, not things that are on earth, for you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.” Paul wrote those words to Christians whom he had never met before. He had been told about their faith and about their struggle to remain faithful. They, too, had a hard time remembering that Jesus’ victory over sin and death was a victory that makes a real difference in our lives—not only in the life to come but here and now. All of us have that struggle. It’s hard to remember that we have already died with Christ and have already been raised with him to new life when the life around us looks like anything but heaven.
Our translation doesn’t really do justice to the encouraging words that Paul offers. The conditional “if” he uses at the beginning of this reading is that of a possibility he knows has already been satisfied. The rest of his words confirm that. As the New International Version puts it, “Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God.” Because we have been united with Christ in our Baptism and through our faith, we are one with him. That part of us that is subject to the powers of this world has died with him upon the cross, and we have been raised with him into new life.
But we are all still here. And the world isn’t yet the place God intends it to be. And, even if we have been raised with Christ, our lives on this earth are often plagued by struggle, illness, pain, grief, and sometimes even danger. But that’s exactly why Paul tells us to seek the things that are above—to set our minds upon them—not only by holding them in our thoughts but by searching for them, endeavoring for them, inquiring after them, desiring them with our whole selves, and requiring them as our daily food. We must remember every day that our true home is already in Jesus Christ, who sits at the right hand of God the Father.
But how do we do that? How do we set our minds upon things that are above so fully and completely that the struggles of this life, though real and painful, no longer have any power over us? Through repeated acts of faithful defiance—meaningful acts that refuse to allow the forces of sin and death to quench that resurrection flame that burns within each one of us. Paul wants us to take turns lying down on the ground, waiting for our friends to yell out, “Get up! Get up! Be raised from the dead!” until the truth of our own resurrection has settled into our minds and bodies and souls and spirits. And the most important time for us to reenact our own resurrection is when the tanks are rolling in and the bombs are exploding all around us. For it is in the face of death itself that Jesus Christ was raised from the dead, and it is from the tyranny of death that you, too, have been saved.
Every time you come to church and receive the body and blood of Jesus Christ, you participate in his death and resurrection—an act of faithful defiance that refuses to allow the forces of evil to encroach upon it. Every time you dwell in God’s Word by reading the holy scriptures, you sit in the presence of the risen Christ, who is God’s Word and whose victory has set you free from the power of death. Every time you approach God in prayer, you stand within the body of Christ, who gives voice to the needs of your heart by interceding on your behalf to the Father. In prayer, therefore, you ascend again to the heavenly throne where you belong in Christ, an act of defiance against those hellish forces that seek to keep you earth-bound.
You are one with Christ. You have died with him, and you have been raised with him into the new life of the resurrection. The powers of this world can do their worst, but they cannot have you. You belong to Christ. You belong to God. So set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth, for you have died [and have been raised], and your life is hidden with Christ in God. To him be all honor and glory, world without end. Amen.
[1] https://www.discoverlebanon.com/en/forum/viewtopic_p_891.html.
[2] https://www.msn.com/en-us/war-and-conflicts/military/factbox-how-many-people-have-been-killed-in-the-iran-war/ar-AA1ZRq2r?ocid=socialshare.
© 2026 Evan D. Garner
