Lent is over. Easter is here.
“Jesus Christ is Risen today!
Alleluia!”
RESURRECTION is new life, new hope, a rising from the dead. Through this Lent we’ve looked at some ways to prepare for a new way in our lives. We may have ReSolved to do, or not do, something. We’ve slipped in our plan and RePented. We’ve been ReMinded that we must ReConcile with one another and creation in order to be ReStored and ReCreated anew.
And the COVID19 has invited us, perhaps forced us, to find ways to Re-Invent our lives. To Re-Invent our traditions. To Re-Invent what it looks like to serve the Living God.
The Easter hymn Now the Green Blade Riseth* uses the analogy of sprouting grain for the Resurrection. As the hymn notes, “When our hearts are wintry, grieving, or in pain, Jesus' touch can call us back to life again.” It's a message we need to hear now.
Think about the life cycle of a seed. Isolated in the ground, waiting for the right time to break open, sprout, and force upward to the sunlight. We too are isolated, waiting for a time when we can once again go forth. If God has worked within us during this time (and of course God IS working), then the new life will look different than before.
Alleluia! Christ is Risen Today!
The Lord is Risen Indeed! Alleluia!
These new ways of connecting, and the urgency we've embraced them says we are a social people, and we need, indeed desire, to share what's happening and listen to each other. If using technology to connect is the only way-then we jump to use it. If we now wave at the neighbor we barely know because we know everyone is feeling adrift at this time, that's a new relationship. When we break into the sun as 'the green blade [that] riseth from the buried grain', let's continue to share the 'life-giving Spirit' that raised Jesus from the grave in any and all ways possible.
There are 3 collects for Easter Day. I chose this one because it spoke to me of new life-of being Re-Invented and freed from fear and death. Almighty God, who through your only-begotten Son Jesus Christ overcame death and opened to us the gate of everlasting life: Grant that we, who celebrate with joy the day of the Lord's resurrection, may be raised from the death of sin by your life-giving Spirit; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.
LENT BOX
Our Lent box (a small box, plastic bag or storage container) is completed by the addition of a butterfly to symbolize new life and transformation.
Living Lent
The butterfly reminds us that Jesus rose from the grave. So does the image of sprouting grain. Which one touches you more deeply?
Has your Lent discipline helped you grow and change in your relationship with God and those in your life?
Pray this or one of the other Easter collects this week.
The Easter season blog starting next Sunday will offer some thoughts and recipes based on my book A Sampler of Bible Beauty. In our own homes, we can find solidarity with the women of centuries ago by creating some of the foods and beauty products they might have used. We’ll think about ways that their lives were, in fact, limited and the ways they flourished and were faithful in their time.
*Now the green blade riseth, from the buried grain,
Wheat that in dark earth many days has lain;
Love lives again, that with the dead has been:
Love is come again like wheat that springeth green.
2 In the grave they laid Him, Love who had been slain,
Thinking that He never would awake again,
Laid in the earth like grain that sleeps unseen:
Love is come again like wheat that springeth green.
3 Forth He came at Easter, like the risen grain,
Jesus who for three days in the grave had lain;
Quick from the dead the risen One is seen:
Love is come again like wheat that springeth green.
4 When our hearts are wintry, grieving, or in pain,
Jesus' touch can call us back to life again,
Fields of our hearts that dead and bare have been:
Love is come again like wheat that springeth green
