Rector's Reflections: April

Do this in remembrance of me

Spring has sprung! After a hard and cold winter the warm breezes of spring are swirling around. The hills are painted with all the colors of the rainbow. Even the dogwoods are in full bloom. In the same way I take drives through the mountains to admire the magnificent colors of the fall foliage, I take drives in the spring to see a new sight – a resurrection vision if you will - of winter trees and brushes that seemed so bare, laden down with spring blossoms and new leaves.

Right in the middle of all this beauty comes the springtime storms complete with lightning, heavy rain, hail, and high winds that shake the trees and bend the boughs. Even tornadoes dance around the hills and valleys threatening everything in their fickle paths.

Right in the middle of all this beauty comes a week that begins on Palm Sunday with such high expectations and ends with the eternal hope of the resurrection. BUT, in the in between time there was the storms of the high drama of each day of the week. From Monday to Saturday each day was a day filled with significance and Holy Blessings while the storms raged on and on. During the week there was the ride into Jerusalem and the palms, the teaching in the temple, a ritual meal with friends, an arrest, a trial, an afternoon death, and a tomb.

We are told that it was such an important week for those closest to Jesus that each year they would gather together in Jerusalem for a time of fasting, prayer, meditation, and remembering that week and all that Jesus had said to them including: “Do this in remembrance of me.” They also remembered what was called the great forty hours- the hours between Jesus' death on the cross and His mighty resurrection from the dead. They wanted to remember a time when they thought the beloved Son of God was dead and what the future would be like with out Him.

As we once again experience Holy Week, Easter Day, and the Great Fifty Days of the Easter season we too need to carve out a period of time to just sit in the middle of all this beauty surrounding us and pray and mediate on our future with the Resurrected Christ. The storms of life will always be with us and so will the blossoms of the dogwood and an empty tomb. Alleluia. Christ is Risen! Alleluia!

Fr. Ken †