I remember waking early to go with my dad to the sunrise service. The sky would be gray and dim as we drove into town to the park. I’d be bundled in a sweatshirt and a jacket, trying to ward off the crisp morning air. He’d be concerned about his fingers being cold and numb while trying to play the guitar as we led the songs. The few dozen who gathered with us would be grouped together on the wooden picnic tables, some with blankets draped over their legs.
“He is Risen. He is Risen Indeed.” This is what we gathered in the early morning to celebrate.
This Sunday, Easter Sunday, millions around the world will rejoice in and commemorate the resurrection of Christ. There will be special services and perhaps musical and theatrical productions. We host feasts with families and friends, and for those who have been fasting throughout the Lenten season, those fasts are broken with celebration.
We should rejoice as we remember the resurrection. It is one of the central realities of our faith and of the Gospel. Christ is Risen. He conquered death itself and destroyed its power. His life proves that his death was not in vain and declares Him victorious. Praise be to God!
We love to celebrate the resurrection and its bursting new life. We love the happy ending. We love the victory part of the story, with its rousing chorus of hallelujah.
But we cannot sidestep the Cross.
Read moreSeveral weeks ago, I sat cozy inside while a blizzard swirled outside. The New England winter was attempting to keep March in its clutches for as long as possible. I read my morning emails, including one from 40acts, a Lenten generosity challenge Scott and I have been participating in this year. The day’s theme: Chocolate Tuesday. The challenge of the day was to gift someone unexpectedly with chocolate. It was clear I wouldn’t be going anywhere that day. The snow was piling up inch by inch outside. Who could I offer something to?
I was looking at pictures online of others in other parts of the world, with baskets of full size chocolate bars, giving them to coworkers, handing them out at train stations, passing them out at traffic intersections. I thought about what it would be like for a complete stranger to walk up to me with a candy bar. Would I think it was a scheme? Would I be afraid to eat it? Or would I smile and start munching away?
I couldn’t do anything like that, not on a day like this.
And then it came to me. The only clear option. The chocolate had to go to Dave the mailman.
Read moreIn the picture, I’m standing beside my mom in front of the kitchen sink. I’m probably two or three, standing in my bare feet on the smooth dark wood of a kitchen chair. A gray and white striped dish towel is tucked into the neck of my white T-shirt like a rudimentary apron, hanging down well past the elastic waistline of my bright yellow shorts. I’m grinning at the camera, a dripping, sodden dishcloth in my little hand. The containers within my reach are partially filled with water, ringed by clumps of soap suds. A flood of water spreads over the peach counter, dripping over the edge, slipping down the front of the wooden cabinets onto the floor.
I was helping my mom “wash dishes”—and the counter and floor as well, by the end of it. We didn’t have a dishwasher growing up, so everything had to be done by hand. Her hands would be submerged in the soapy dishwater, scrubbing plates, cups, forks, and pots. Of course, I wanted to help—and I mimicked her in my own sloppy, flood-inducing way.
I cut my doll’s hair, like she cut mine. I baked miniature cakes in my Easy Bake oven, like she did in the big one in the kitchen. My little eyes and ears absorbed my world, and my little hands and mouth mirrored it back.
Read moreEver since T.S. Eliot and I were properly introduced during my freshman year of college, I have treasured his poetry. He certainly makes you work at it, but the words, phrases, and images he offers are ones I return to again and again.
When I think about writing, I often think of these words from his poem East Coker, the second poem in the Four Quartets.
Trying to learn to use words, and every attempt
Is a wholly new start, and a different kind of failure
Because one has only learnt to get the better of words
For the thing one no longer has to say, or the way in which
One is no longer disposed to say it. And so each venture
Is a new beginning, a raid on the inarticulate
With shabby equipment always deteriorating
In the general mess of imprecision of feeling,
Undisciplined squads of emotion. And what there is to conquer
By strength and submission, has already been discovered
Once or twice, or several times, by men whom one cannot hope
To emulate—but there is no competition—
There is only the fight to recover what has been lost
And found and lost again and again: and now, under conditions
That seem unpropitious. By perhaps neither gain nor loss.
For us, there is only the trying. The rest is not our business.
Read moreHave you ever been around someone with poisonous speech? You know, the ones who always have something critical to say or someone to make a snide remark about? I leave them and have to shake off the bitterness and anger.
Have you ever been around someone with life-giving speech? Their words speak life and peace. They find ways to encourage and comfort or to spread laughter and joy. I leave them with my heart buoyed up and my spirit refreshed. I smile when I remember their company.
We all know the power of words. It’s not something I need to convince you of.
I am always struck by the high standard the Bible holds us to with our words. Perhaps being a “words person” makes me more attuned to these statements. I think so often of the power of words—both the kind that reverberate from my vocal chords to someone else’s ear drum and the kind that are put in the black and white permanence of a book (or in this case computer screen). So often, though perhaps not often enough, I reevaluate and reflect on what sort of spirit my words embody, what sort of fruit they bear.
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