Happy Easter!
This time of year is always a bit odd for me. It's the time when the sun is out just enough to trick me into thinking it's warm and summery, and then I wander outside in my shorts and flip-flops only to discover it's still only 40 degrees. And then the rain and hail and snow (yes, we had a smattering of snow yesterday) comes and pounds down like it's winter all over again. About the time that starts to depress me, out pops the blue sky and the birds and flowers and suddenly the world is wonderful again.
And when you mix that with the Easter holiday, it has a weird influence on me. It brings a whole new perspective on Christ's death and resurrection to see it played out daily just outside my window. To see the cycle of dying and returning in the earth, and then to think about how Jesus only had to do it once, and he did it just for me.
I've always been one of those visual/kinetic learners, where I need to see and play with things to understand them. Gardening has becomes an almost spiritual exercise; it connects exactly with what Paul was talking about in one of his letters to the Corinthian church. He uses the word picture that unless a seed dies and get buried in the ground, it cannot produce new life. A seed sitting around by itself isn't terribly useful. Only through literal and figurative death does it fulfill it's purpose. And the new life that it generates it so much greater, so much more wonderful than that little brown seed. I don't think that if I was a seed, I would ever be able to comprehend the nature and possibilities inherent in my nature. I'd have no clue that my death could have such magnificent results.
And it's the same thing when Jesus gives you new life! The gift of eternal life that he gave us, and that we celebrate at Easter, has so much more promise and hope than I could ever fathom. By spiritually participating in his death, we also participate in his resurrection - we become new. We leave all the dirty crap, the hopelessness, the worthlessness, the loneliness behind. "The old has gone; the new has come." Our lives become so much greater and so much more worthwhile than we could ever imagine on our own. My wrinkley brown seed self develops into a magnificent rose bush (or whatever flower God happens to pick for me). I have hope, I have a purpose, and I have a God who loves me and knows me and beat death so that we could be together like he intended from creation.
And that just blows my mind...
And when you mix that with the Easter holiday, it has a weird influence on me. It brings a whole new perspective on Christ's death and resurrection to see it played out daily just outside my window. To see the cycle of dying and returning in the earth, and then to think about how Jesus only had to do it once, and he did it just for me.
I've always been one of those visual/kinetic learners, where I need to see and play with things to understand them. Gardening has becomes an almost spiritual exercise; it connects exactly with what Paul was talking about in one of his letters to the Corinthian church. He uses the word picture that unless a seed dies and get buried in the ground, it cannot produce new life. A seed sitting around by itself isn't terribly useful. Only through literal and figurative death does it fulfill it's purpose. And the new life that it generates it so much greater, so much more wonderful than that little brown seed. I don't think that if I was a seed, I would ever be able to comprehend the nature and possibilities inherent in my nature. I'd have no clue that my death could have such magnificent results.
And it's the same thing when Jesus gives you new life! The gift of eternal life that he gave us, and that we celebrate at Easter, has so much more promise and hope than I could ever fathom. By spiritually participating in his death, we also participate in his resurrection - we become new. We leave all the dirty crap, the hopelessness, the worthlessness, the loneliness behind. "The old has gone; the new has come." Our lives become so much greater and so much more worthwhile than we could ever imagine on our own. My wrinkley brown seed self develops into a magnificent rose bush (or whatever flower God happens to pick for me). I have hope, I have a purpose, and I have a God who loves me and knows me and beat death so that we could be together like he intended from creation.
And that just blows my mind...
posted by Rils | 9:30 AM
1 Comments:
He is risen!!!
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