What images does homecoming call to mind?  A student coming home for the first time since leaving for studies.  A soldier coming home after a long and dangerous deployment.  A family, after a while apart, being able to come together for a holiday celebration.  Young parents bringing their newborn son to meet his grandparents for the first time.  Dear friends meeting up for some time together.  A child who had been lost in addiction but now sober being welcomed back home.  A tired spouse making it home after a long time away due to work. 

As we think of homecoming in all of its different forms there are some things that are consistent – there is joy, relief, welcome, laughter, peace, tears and embracing. 

In his resurrection and ascension, Jesus returns home to the Father.  What joy there must have been – what laughter, relief, love and embracing!  The risen Jesus returns having fulfilled his mission.  It is in the Letter to the Philippians that we find the hymn singing of this mission, the hymn that goes back to the first generation of disciples.  Jesus, who though in the form of God, did not regard equality with God something to be grasped but rather emptied himself and took the form of a slave.  Being born in our likeness, Jesus humbled himself and was obedient even to death on a cross. 

Jesus, the Son who emptied himself, stood in the place where we failed and he did not fail.  Where we failed through our pride in the Garden of Eden and chose to disobey, Jesus – in his humanity – obeyed.  Jesus did not rebel, he did not fall back.  Jesus obeyed the will of the Father.  Jesus stood in that place where we failed and he trusted in the love of the Father, even to death on the cross. 

What joy must have been in the risen Lord’s heart as he returned to the Father!  Coming home to Abba!  Through his obedience, Jesus healed what had been broken by our disobedience.  Jesus is the risen Good Shepherd, carrying back to the Father what had been lost.  The risen Lord carries us home to the Father!  The joy in our Lord’s heart is now also our joy!  We were lost and now we are found!  Now, we can return to the Father’s house!  Sin, death and the isolation of the tomb are not our destiny.  We are meant for life with the Father and, in his resurrection, Jesus goes to prepare a place for us!  This is our Easter joy!  Jesus’ joy is our joy – we can go home! 

And God the Father’s joy.  (We often don’t give enough thought to this.)  God the Father who cannot abide sin or death can now – in the return of the Son who conquered sin through his humanity – once again embrace us just as he embraces the Son.  This is the joy of the Father and this is the gift of the risen Son to the Father!  What pain there is in the heart of a parent when there exists a separation between parent and child.  What deep pain.  With the separation of sin overcome; the Father can once again embrace us.  The Father can once again welcome us home!  The heart of the Father rejoices in the return of his Son!   

Easter is homecoming!  The joy of the risen Son fulfilling his mission and returning to the embrace of the Father. Our joy in being brought home in the embrace of the risen Son with the Father.  The Father’s joy in embracing and welcoming us home! 

In my Father’s house there are many dwelling places … if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back again and take you to myself, so that where I am you also may be. (Jn. 14: 2-3)