Area pastors focus on rebirth during troubled times

As the economy continues to struggle, people are losing jobs each week with no signs indicating the job losses are abating.

But during this Easter season -- the Christian holiday that celebrates Jesus Christ's return to life three days after being crucified -- area faith leaders say they aren't focusing today's sermons on the bleak economy.

"There is enough negative; I don't need to talk to them about that," said the Rev. G. Thomas Brown Jr., pastor at Ivey Memorial United Methodist Church in Colonial Heights. "There have been enough layoffs that everybody in our congregation probably knows someone who lost a job."

Instead, preachers say they are sharing a positive message of Easter, one of hope and renewal. Brown said his Easter message includes the topic that death has been conquered through Jesus' resurrection.

It's a message that resonates beyond the spiritual level and the walls of the church, faith leaders say. The words spoken today from pulpits across central Virginia can be applied to fears and concerns people are feeling in all aspects of their lives.

"My intention is to preach a message of hope and meaning in the midst of these difficult days in the church, the community and the world," said the Rev. Charles D. Alley, rector of St. Matthew's Episcopal Church in Richmond. "Like today, the events of Jesus' death and resurrection occurred during a time of confusion and even chaos on the religious, political and social scenes."

He said the physical resurrection in that sort of environment is evidence "of the truth of God's promise of the creation of a new heaven and a new earth."

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The resurrection of Christ shows that by maintaining faith in God, the evidence is there for a dawn awaiting at the end of the stormy times people encounter, pastors said.

The Rev. Patrick Golden, rector of the Cathedral of the Sacred Heart, said he'll focus on how God can "raise us up through troubled times."

"If there is trouble . . . because of our faith in Christ, we can see our way through it," he said.

The Rev. Jim Langlois, pastor of The Master's House in Ashland, said his sermon is built around the Scripture in Romans 8:11 and the power of the resurrection -- that if the spirit that raised Jesus from the dead resides in people, it brings life to the mortal body.

Those effects extend beyond the physical and can play a part as ways to cope with outside pressures that may seem daunting.

"If you bring life to your physical body, it will lift the spirit and mind," he said.

In the end, it's faith that is providing people with the hope to carry on, pastors agreed.

"The Easter message is a message of hope -- the hope that is in this world, but has its roots beyond this world," Alley said. "It is a hope that will stand when all else fails, because it is based on the eternal promise of the ever-living God."
Contact Jeremy Slayton at (804) 649-6861 or .