Guest Post: Where’s the Hope of Easter?
by Rachel
Recently, I volunteered myself into a Primary teaching calling with my husband. Over the last few weeks, the kids have been working hard during singing time to learn a beautiful song, “Risen,” by Shawna Edwards, to perform in sacrament meeting on Easter. As we’ve been learning the different verses, it’s been amusing to see how reluctant the kids are to stop singing before the chorus. Even after the chorister cuts them off, they’ll often keep singing right into the chorus. They love the chorus. I love it too.
Risen, to set the captives free
Risen, to ransom you and me
to bind up every broken heart
to conquer death and sin
Risen, to bring us home again.
These children’s voices create a beautiful picture of the hope that Jesus Christ brings us.
But it’s become hard for me to hear. I can’t separate the song from the images I see in the news. The idea of captives isn’t just a mental image or an object lesson. Every day we can see pictures of people in shackles being led onto an airplane, perhaps to be dropped off in a country they’ve never lived in, or perhaps to be thrown without a trial into a prison known for human rights violations with little hope of ever being found again.
Every day we can see broken hearts as families at home and abroad are torn apart, loved ones captured or killed, or even as we fight bitterly with our neighbors on Facebook about whether or not to build a town hall in a peaceful, affluent suburb. We see a longing for a home as refugee admissions are halted or current refugee status is revoked or immigrant visas cancelled without explanation.
We see our retirement accounts dwindling, children dying of preventable disease, hard workers losing their jobs, women living in fear of losing their right to decide what happens to their bodies, and mistrust, fear, anger, and outrage all being carefully cultivated by social media algorithms to turn our attention into money. We don’t need to sing about “spiritual“ death or captivity–we have actual death and captivity on our hands, and there is no deliverance in sight.
As I live in anxiety about what’s to come in my son’s lifetime, I’m greeted at church largely by platitudes. I watched hours of a global General Conference with little to no mention of the large and immediate problems so many of our brothers and sisters are facing. I sit in church and listen to my fellow members talk about Jesus Christ and I can’t help but wonder, are you okay with what’s happening now? Singing songs of redeeming love means very little if those songs aren’t also sung with the heart to change our world. Being safe on the covenant path isn’t reassuring while our fellow citizens and elected leaders are marching everyone down a path of misery and destruction.
It’s beautiful and fortifying to hear fresh, bright, intelligent children singing about hope. But it also makes me sad to realize exactly how much we’ve put on Christ’s shoulders. It feels as though many of us, however good, hardworking, and well intentioned, have completely given up the project to build the kingdom of heaven on the earth, instead content to kick the can down on the road on the assurance that Christ’s Atonement will make it all right in the world to come. What about the life we have now? Christ’s grace will indeed save us all, but do we deserve any part of it when we’ve abdicated our responsibility to love our neighbors here and now in the life we’re currently living? Isn’t our time in this world supposed to be for something, after all?
On Easter, I’ll be thinking about the miracle of Jesus Christ’s resurrection. I’ll feel hope and pride and comfort as I watch my Primary children sing a beautiful song. But I’ll also be feeling a despair that comes from the vast difference between the words and our reality. I know Jesus Christ will save us in the end. But I also know that we’re capable of doing so much more to save ourselves.
Rachel is a full-time mom and sometimes writer living Utah Valley. She graduated in humanities from Brigham Young University.
