As we celebrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ tonight, the word that marks this moment is hallelujah.
It means praise God, which is sort of odd to say praise God as a way of praising God. The truth is hallelujah is a rather untranslatable word: it is more a guttural affirmation; a mysterious proclamation; a joyous outburst, beyond definition.
It is a word that sort of rolls up inside us then leaps out into the world like a ram through a gate, breaking a barrier between us and God; Hallelujah–like an eagle off the edge of her nest, majestically soaring into the very presence of God. Hallelujah.
It is a Resurrection word that signifies there is nothing that stands between us and God, not a fence or a gate, or air or gravity, not even death…. Hallelujah!
Hallelujah is scattered through the Bible. We find it in the Psalms:
“Hallelujah! Give thanks to the Lord, for God is good” (Ps 1-06:1).
“Hallelujah! I will give thanks to the Lord with my whole heart
in the assembly of the congregation” (Ps 111:1).
And then right at the end of the Bible, in the Book of Revelation:
“Hallelujah! Salvation and glory and power to our God” (Rev 19:1).
“Hallelujah!” For the Lord God the Almighty reigns.
Let us rejoice and exult and give God the glory…” (Rev 19:6).
Hallelujah!
So, you might be wondering, Preach, what’s all this business about Hallelujah…other than we weren’t allowed to say it in Lent, and now we are? I’ll tell you… it is about busting barriers; it is about revealing the Kingdom of God; it is about closing the space between heaven and earth; it is about closing the space between people; it is our battle cry, it is our sacred word as we move from the Great Time-out to the Great Time-in.
I was reminded of the power of Hallelujah to break down barriers the other day as I was driving by Walgreens in the U District. It was there I met a man many years ago named Vern. Now some of you have heard the story, but I’m going to tell it again, because I think it is a story meant for us as we move from the Great Time-out to the Great Time-in.
It’s a story that begins with a song. And the song goes like this:
The line it is drawn
And the curse it is cast
The slow one now
Will later be fast
As the present now
Will later be past
The order is rapidly fadin’
And the first one now
Will later be last
For the times they are a-changin’
That was the song that launched Bob Dylan’s career, and made him an icon and spokesman to bust barriers in the 1960s. And so, what does Dylan have to do with Halleluiah?
Well, it is a riddle that starts with a broken shoelace. It was some years ago, and it was my day off. I had meetings at church, so I changed into my clergy duds; and as I was tying my shoelace, on my good black church shoes, the lace broke! (smote by Satan-not really, but I was irritated.)
So, when I dropped Desmond off at Boys Choir in the University District, I ran into the Walgreens to get some shoelaces. As I strode across the parking lot toward the entrance, a man loitering there, sort of stepped out in front of me. As he did his three companions took a few steps away, as if I was kryptonite, a man with a collar. I have experienced that before.
But one guy took a step toward me. He was as broad as a barn and much shorter than me. He had an open face, and a well-trimmed beard, and a tattoo of eagle’s wings draping off the corner of his eye. He just looked at me, right in the eyes. My impulse was to put up my hand and say I’m in a hurry and brush by him.
I know how to do that. I’ve done it before. Many of you have done it as well. I was busy. I was irritated. And my shoelace was untied. Which come to think of it is maybe why I slowed down? Or maybe I paused because I was wearing my collar, and I didn’t want to be one more reason why Christianity has a bad rap.
So, I hesitated, and when I did, he reached out his hand to shake mine, breaking the space between us, and as he did (pre-pandemic) he said, “Excuse me.” So, I took his hand. It was warm and dry, and he held onto my hand for a period longer than a polite handshake, and lingered there, breaking handshaking protocol, and as he did he looked me full in the face and asked, “Why is God angry with me?”
Our hands dropped apart, and I replied, “I’m not sure God is angry with you. In fact, I’m pretty sure God loves you, and is with you. I know from experience though it doesn’t always feel that way.” He smiled. I continued, “Sometimes we get in the way of ourselves, at least I do, and that makes us wonder where God is when God is really right here.”
“Stay here,” he said, as he turned to his companions to beckon them over. As he did, I asked if these were his friends, to which one man replied: “No, we are his family.” They were reluctant to get close to me, as if I had COVID-19. I asked the man with the draped eagle wing what his name was, and he said Vern. His friends were eager to put some distance between me and them, which was ironic, as that was my impulse when I first saw them.
As they started to drift away Vern turned to me, and put out his arms to hug me, and he hugged me and I hugged him back, with a little lame pat on the back. A barrier was broken. I was uncomfortable, but, in that moment it seemed OK to accept the invitation.
But then he reached up and gave me a kiss on the cheek and that was a barrier shattered….smashing any space left between us…priest and loiterer. I jumped back. He apologized. I said, “No, no that’s OK,” because even in the moment I realized it was the universal kiss of peace. The peace of God. The peace which surpasses understanding. It was the peace that joins all humanity together. Hallelujah!
But that is not the weird part of the story. You see there was a smell; a clean, fresh smell, like a flower, or a grove of trees after a rain shower, and it lingered as I looked for the shoelaces…and it wasn’t the smell from the Walgreen’s perfume section either. I know this because as I returned to the car that smell remained as if to force me to consider the encounter; which I wasn’t sure I wanted to, so I did what I always do, I went to put in my ear buds to make a telephone call. And when I did I heard—
The line it is drawn
And the curse it is cast
The slow one now
Will later be fast
As the present now
Will later be past
The order is rapidly fadin’
And the first one now
Will later be last
For the times they are a-changin’
I-Tunes was on, and shuffle was engaged, and as Dylan faded I heard: Hallelujah, Hallelujah, Hallelujah – Handel’s Messiah. And the fragrance lingered: “As a fragrant offering, acceptable and pleasing to God” (Paul / Phil 4:18) as if a fragrant offering “lifted as if on eagles’ wings” (Moses / Exo 19:4).
We build barriers, and we break barriers down. We build them accidentally, and we build them intentionally. We tear them down accidentally, and we tear them down intentionally. We do this all the time. I’ll give an example: The American bald eagle. We accidentally built up a barrier that led to its near extinction, by how we encountered the environment in which we live. When we figured that out, we intentionally tore down to those barriers as a way of protecting and restoring the habitation of the American bald eagle. We did it intentionally, and we did it successfully. Today the bald eagle thrives. Hallelujah.
Now as we move from the Great Time-out to the Great Time-in let’s decide that our watchword, our battle cry, will be Hallelujah; because it is the word that moves us from a place of division, a place where there are outsiders and insiders, to a place where all people can share the kiss of peace, even a priest and a loiterer, outside Walgreens in the University District.
As we move from the Great Time-out to the Great Time-in we are called to be barrier busters like Vern. How? By being people who sing Hallelujah irrespective of tone, tune, genre or style (or even ability) whether it be Handel’s Hallelujah, or Leonard Cohen’s Hallelujah, or Demi Lovato’s Hallelujah, or Ed Sheeran’s Hallelujah, or Jeff Buckley’s Hallelujah, or Jon Bon Jovi’s Hallelujah, or Celine Dion’s Hallelujah, or the Canadian Tenor’s Hallelujah, or Vern’s Hallelujah….Hallelujahs are everywhere because the Resurrection is God’s busting barriers to be with us.
Tonight, we celebrate the Resurrection of Jesus Christ, which is the moment when God said “NO” to barriers—busting the spaces between, even space made by death.
These times they are changing as we move from the Great Time-out to the Great Time-in. The barriers are coming down, and veils are being lifted, and the gates of heaven are swinging open, and where they are closed we break through, and where we can’t get through we fly over…our mission is the kiss of peace, the peace of God, the peace which surpasses all understanding.
The Resurrection signifies that there is no longer anything that stands between us and God! And the word that punctuates that point is Hallelujah!
HAPPY EASTER!