Although various transitions occur within the scope of this joyous season, the Great Fifty Days of Easter (culminating in the Feast of Pentecost Day) are in some respects a continuous celebration, an ongoing participation in the never ending Day of the New Creation (Revelation 21:22–25) which has begun in the Resurrection of Christ Jesus from the dead (1 Corinthians 15:20–23; Revelation 1:5). The festive quality of Easter is not a denial of life in this world under the Cross. It rather belongs to the Church’s confession of faith and her ongoing exercise of hope in the face of sin and death (Rom. 8:18–25; 1 Cor. 15:12–26); which is simply to say that her life under the Cross is lived in the light of the Resurrection. As throughout Lent and Holy Week, so also throughout the season of Easter, the Cross and Resurrection of our Lord are remembered and relied upon together, rather than divided from or set in opposition to each other.
The Season of Easter is celebrated in stages, moving as it does from the commemoration of the Resurrection of Our Lord into the subsequent and ongoing life of His Body, the Church. Both of these focal points are included in the seasonal Gradual of the three-year series: “Christ has risen from the dead. [God the Father] has crowned Him with glory and honor, He has given Him dominion over the works of His hands; He has put all things under His feet” (adapted from St. Matthew 28:7; Hebrews 2:7; Psalm 8:6). Here the accomplished fact of the Resurrection is confessed as the foundation upon which Christ has been given all authority in heaven and on earth, with which he now governs and protects His Holy Church through the ongoing ministry of His Gospel (St. Matthew 28:18–20; St. Luke 24:45–49).
The first two or three weeks of Easter focus on the Resurrection appearances of Christ. The Second Sunday of Easter (the Octave of the Resurrection) features the appearances of the risen Lord Jesus on the first and eighth days, once while the Apostle Thomas is absent, and then again when he is present (St. John 20:19–31). Notably, this Holy Gospel is heard on that Second Sunday every year, not only in both lectionaries, but across the entire Church catholic, both East and West.
The proclamation of the Resurrection itself persists throughout the season in the Easter Proper Preface, which breaks from the usual pattern at the conclusion by mentioning several of the key witnesses of the crucified and risen Lord Jesus by name: “With Mary Magdalene, Peter and John, and with all the witnesses of the Resurrection, with angels and archangels, and with all the company of heaven we laud and magnify Your glorious Name” (LSB Altar Book, page 232).
Moving beyond the first few weeks of Easter, “Good Shepherd Sunday” (whether on the Third or the Fourth Sunday of Easter) emphasizes the Lord’s pastoral care for the Church. Having laid down His life willingly and taken it up again (St. John 10:17–18), He gives abundant life to His sheep through the ministry of the Gospel. The same point of emphasis may also be found in the Holy Gospel for the previous Sunday in Series C, St. John 21:1–14 (15–19). The optional verses in that case feature the reinstatement of Simon Peter (following his three-fold denial of Christ) and the Word of the Lord commissioning him to feed and tend His lambs and sheep.
The remaining Sundays of Easter, as well as the Day of Pentecost, consider the Church’s life on earth in view of the Cross and Passion of her Lord and in the promise of His Resurrection from the dead. Accordingly, the Holy Gospels appointed to these Sundays are from the Lord’s final discourse on Maundy Thursday evening (and from His “High Priestly Prayer” in the three-year lectionary). In those chapters, Jesus looks through the lens of His Sacrifice to the life of His Body, the Church, following His return to the Father. He teaches His disciples, now as then, to pray to His Father with faith and confidence in His Name, and to rejoice in His victory over sin and death, even in the midst of suffering and pain; and, that they might do so, He gives them His Word and Spirit. Such prayer and rejoicing characterize the Christian faith and life in the Resurrection of Christ Jesus, as reflected in the historic names and emphases of the latter Sundays of Easter: Jubilate, Cantate, Rogate, and Exaudi.
The “Rogation Days” that historically follow the Sixth Sunday of Easter, that is, the Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday between Rogate and the Feast of the Ascension of Our Lord, were days of asking for God to bless the fields and grant a fruitful harvest. This practice may have originated with occasions of natural calamity and poor harvests, but the active exercise of prayer in reliance on the Lord is appropriate in any case. The agricultural focus also offers a nice parallel to the mission of the Church in sowing the Gospel among the nations, as in St. Matthew 9:37–38, Psalm 67, and Luther’s magnificent hymn, “May God Bestow on Us His Grace” (LSB 823).
Throughout the Great Fifty Days of Easter, the Church revels in the sure and certain hope and promise of the Resurrection of our Lord, which is the surety of our own Resurrection. It is the foundation of faith, as well as the guiding light of life and love in Christ Jesus. As St. Paul indicates, apart from the Resurrection of Christ Jesus we would be the most pitiable of all people (1 Corinthians 15:19); but as it is, Christ has been raised from the dead, the First Fruits of them that sleep, and we who believe and are baptized into Him shall also rise to live with Him in body and soul forever and ever. Christ is risen indeed! Alleluia!
(These comments on Eastertide are excerpted and redacted from my chapter on the Church Year and Lectionary in the LSB Companion to the Services, CPH, 2022.)