EMU celebrated Easter with a morning of worshipful music, biblical readings, and reflections on the holiday’s significance during a campus worship service at Martin Chapel on Wednesday.
The service was co-sponsored by Eastern Mennonite Seminary and led by graduate students Makinto and Mukarabe Makinto-Inandava. It included musical selections from Makinto, as well as the EMU Gospel Choir led by Kay Pettus ’25, and biblical readings from Mukarabe.
Reflections on Easter were shared by English Professor Dr. Kevin Seidel, who teaches and writes about the changing relationship between religion, secularism, and literature. His message, titled “Women Explain Things to Me: A Sermon on Luke 24,” focused not so much on Jesus’ bodily resurrection from the dead but on the “slow, difficult coming to terms with the significance of the resurrection by Jesus’ followers as portrayed in Luke 24.”
“In Luke, the resurrection of Jesus isn’t a simple, triumphant end of the story, but a kind of difficult beginning that unfolds in the Book of Acts,” Seidel said. “The resurrection doesn’t settle debate among Jesus’ followers about who he is. The resurrection proves, I think, profoundly unsettling for them.”
After the service, Seidel said he was glad for the chance to reflect on parts of the resurrection story in Luke 24. “The service was a good way to mark and celebrate the beginning of the seven-week Easter season in the church calendar,” he said.
University Chaplain Brian Martin Burkholder said Wednesday’s Easter celebration follows EMU’s practice of honoring and observing significant Christian traditions and holidays, including Ash Wednesday and Good Friday.
“This morning, as we gathered, there was an opportunity for education about Easter,” he said, “as well as an invitation to worship in the spirit of Easter through Scripture, singing, and reflection.”
Makinto, a frequent worship leader at chapel events, performed Jesus Is Risen, an original song he wrote in 2013, as the opening song for this year’s Easter worship service. The song tells the Easter story and connects it to our own lives, he said.
“So, as he is risen, we as well can rise above all the challenges we have, above the pains we have, above the solitude we have, and also conquer death and situate ourselves squarely in life with our community around us,” Makinto said.
Makinto and his wife, Mukarabe, moved from California to pursue degrees at Eastern Mennonite Seminary and the Center for Justice and Peacebuilding, respectively. They are the directors of Amahoro International, an organization that connects people at the local and global levels for the purpose of development, unification, and spiritual and physical well-being.
University Chaplain Brian Martin Burkholder speaks during a campus worship service on Wednesday in Martin Chapel.
Mukarabe Makinto-Inandava reads a selection from Luke 24 (left). Members of the EMU Gospel Choir (right) sing during Wednesday’s campus worship service.
About Campus Worship
Campus Worship is an invitational space for gathered worship in Christian traditions and a variety of styles. Services are held in Martin Chapel of the Seminary Building on Wednesday mornings every other week.
Campus worship continues with a final service of the academic year on April 22 recognizing EMU’s senior student chaplains: Emily Suarez Nunez, Dia Mekonnen, Sara Kennel, and Miranda Beidler. The event will be livestreamed on EMU’s YouTube channel.
Watch a video recording of the service below!
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