Easter C

Sunrise

Introduction

Have you ever had one of those nights? You cannot sleep and the worry and fear keeps gnawing at you... maybe someone you love is travelling all night, perhaps you are waiting for word of a new job, or a medical result... Or maybe something horrible has happened and you cannot let it go.

So you toss and you turn and you stare at the ceiling. And eventually, somewhere close to when it doesn’t matter anymore whether you sleep or not; blackness engulfs you.

Now, here is the real question... have you ever woken up from one of those nights to discover that everything is all right? That the person made it, the test is negative, you got the job or your kids are safe...

That is Easter Morning.

This is the festival of new life, this is the celebration of hope, this is Spring and flowers, and sunshine, and stones rolled away and every good thing we can think of rolled into one service.

And it started with a story of a man who said that love was more powerful than death. Almost no one believed him... his closest friends and followers gave up on him during his arrest, trial, and execution... they all had that long dark night of the soul when they were sure their dreams were gone, when they were sure their friend was dead, when they were sure they were next.

But then came morning; and the reality that life had so much more to offer and that feeling was so powerful that the followers of Jesus have been sharing it ever since.

The Politics

Crucifixion is meant to put down rebellions. Pure and simple, effective too; you find the leaders of the movement, and you hang them up in the sunshine on the road into the city. I tell you this, the next person is going to think twice before suggesting we go against Caesar.

Of course, the thing is, Jesus kept trying to tell them... it was not Caesar he had any problem with, it was the way people were living. And the story he told went back to childhood tales around the fire, of a God who created a man and a woman and put them in a garden with the animals and said, “take care of each other.”

And Jesus wondered, whatever happened to that? Whatever happened to the days when you knew your neighbours name, when you trusted the mechanic and the teacher and the police officer and the banker? 

Whatever happened to neighbourhood BBQ’s and letting your kids play outside all day on their own... what has happened to life?

And the people in charge pointed out that life is better now than it has ever been; although no one quite believed them; and they got rid of this guy who dared to speak for God, who dared to say that life should be different.

But the thing is, the message seemed true to the people. It echoed what they had always been taught in church, they believed the words of the prophet Isaiah who said that God was going to make the world better, peaceful, loving, hope filled. And Jesus was just pointing out that these were the promises of God.

4,000 year old promises for us... that the lion will lay down with the lamb. And sure, there are days when I am discouraged, there are times when I think it will never happen... and then I see some random news story about a stranger who does something loving.

Last week I watched a newscast from the states about a kid who threw the basketball to a member of the wrong team, on purpose... seems there was a boy with Down ’s syndrome playing this one game, he usually takes care of the equipment and the coach let him play the final game. Well, all through the game he had tried to get a basket and missed. There were three seconds left and the opposing team had the ball on the sidelines... So the boy who had the ball takes a look around, and throws it right to the guy, right in front of the net, on the other team, who has waited his whole life to take this one shot... and he makes it.

You cannot tell me that that is not a story of Easter.

Sunrise in the Garden

The story of the wee hours in the garden where Jesus was buried is a very passionate one. You can imagine the pain, the wonder, the fear... I mean, think about it... if someone you knew were dead, and you discovered the body was missing, and then that maybe they were not dead after all... how fast could your feelings keep up?

But in this one passage in John we see everything laid bare: disbelief, wonder, fear, pain, hope, loss... and we see how hard it is for us to accept the wonder that is all around us.

Mary argues that Jesus has to be dead. She argues against the miracle... And I don’t think she really wants Jesus to be dead, I just think it is next to impossible for her to accept anything else.

We know how things work... we know how the world is... and we expect the worst.

That is where Easter gets in the way.

I want you to see how powerful resurrection is, and that is why I started by asking if you have ever felt those nights of fear and mornings of relief... because this is a biggy. This is the thing that happened to those who loved Jesus – they lost everything, in one weekend, in one night....

And somehow, inexplicably, they found it all the next morning.

What if the promises of God are true? What if some of what we have said for thousands of years really does make sense? What if there is something more powerful than the darkness we too often feel? Mary, Peter, the disciples, the followers, they all came to know, completely and totally, that this was true.

They saw Jesus love come back to life in a way that cannot die.

And for them, that was the story of Easter.

Conclusion

If you ask me, the one thing we are meant to take from Jesus is the idea that anything is possible.

Add to that the truth that love conquers all and I think we have all the tools we need to make it into any future, to face any pain, and to come to love one another the way that God intended.

For me Easter is so much more than the story of Jesus returning from the grave, it is the story of the complicated way we live, stuck between all that goes wrong, and the potential for so much goodness. And when I hear this story I am able to say that there is something else... that God does come through... that new life is all around us...

This is what God invites us to celebrate.

 

Palm Sunday - C

Of Parades and Palms

A Parade

With the kids…

How many of you have ever seen a parade? What was it like? Has anyone ever been in a parade? What was that like?

The idea of a parade is that it is exciting, it is a celebration, and we are all supposed to be caught up in it, and have fun…

Why do you think they had a parade for Jesus? What do you think they wanted to say about Jesus?

Without the Kids…

One of my favourite places to watch a parade is Disney World. There is something about being there that just sucks you in, you feel like you are in a magical place, and all these magical things come to life. I remember being just as excited to watch Santa Clause parades when I was a kid, whether on television from New York, or in whatever city I lived in.

Parades create emotion… Parades create feelings… there is music, there is laughter, there are floats with magical presentations, there are smiles and waves and balloons…

That is where we start, with our own thoughts and remembrances about parades, with all that they have meant for you over the years, and with how they make you feel….

Because today is about a celebration. The Passover is about to being. The whole world makes its way to Jerusalem.

The Imperial March

Passover was the most important festival of the Jewish year. It was a time when everyone made a pilgrimage to the temple in Jerusalem. So I want you to picture the dusty streets leading up the hill to the city. It is a spring day in 30 AD and the sun is shining… Now, picture this, there are two processions winding their way up on opposite sides of the city, two parades.

One was a peasant procession, and one was an Imperial procession. The one we enacted today was the entry of Jesus. He rode a donkey from the Mount of Olives… he was a poor person from Nazareth and those who came out to watch him ride were the normal, poor, people of the city. Jesus had come 100 miles from Galilee in the North, and word had spread ahead of him, word of what he proclaimed, the Kingdom of God, which most heard as a message of freedom.

Over on the West side of the city Pontius Pilate, the Roman governor of all of Judea was entering the city with fresh troops, right off the boat. There were cavalry on horseback and infantry with their spears and bucklers rattling as they marched. Sunlight shone off metal armour and penants proclaimed this the army of Caesar. These soldiers had come to reinforce the Garrison in Jerusalem, to keep the peace during Passover. 

And as they marched they displayed not only the idea of Empire, but the theology of the Romans as well. 

According to this way of thinking, The Caesar was not only the emperor, but the son of God as well. And as the drums beat and swords crashed, these soldiers carried shields and banners emblazoned with their version of God.

You can imagine as a people who have been beaten into submission, who have seen foreign soldiers every day, that you watch this procession a little nervously, a little awed, but a lot resentful.

So back to the other end of the city, and our friend Jesus’ parade. This is a carefully crafted counter demonstration. Jesus planned it all in advance. He sends his disciples ahead of him in two directions as he approaches Jerusalem, some to get the donkey, some to go into town and gather the people who are sympathetic to the cause.

They line the streets and throw blankets and cloaks and palm branches onto the street and shout “hosanna! 

Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!” It makes the Roman parade seem a non-event.

The symbolism is from the prophet Zechariah, who wrote that the king would come to Jerusalem humbly, riding on a colt, and the foal of a donkey… Zechariah goes on to say the king would cut off the chariot, and the war horse and the battle bow. In other words, Jesus is the prophesied king, who has come to bring peace.

This is the carefully crafted message as Jesus heads to the temple for Passover.

It is the beginning of the confrontation that fills Jesus final week…

The Same Mindset

I have been doing this for a while, as have you… Palm Sunday… Easter… Christmas… Church… and when I started out as a minister I pretty much went by the book. That is what most people do in whatever job they find themselves in. But the thing is, over the years, I have found that we are moving further and further away from just doing things because we have always done them.

We need to start thinking deeper about things, asking deeper questions; and we need to start reworking our faith stories into our real day to day lives so that they make an impact, a difference.

Which for the last month has been one of my obsessions; what do these high holy days, Palm Sunday, Good Friday, Easter, mean to us? What is the “Good News” for our lives? What was Jesus trying to get across?

And the more I thought about it Jesus was trying to get something across. He was working hard on it. He had been circling Jerusalem for months, waiting for the perfect time, for Passover. He waited until Pilate was coming into the city to make a scene. He gets everyone on board and has a parade. Then the second thing he does is march right up to the Temple and kick out the money changers; so he is trying to stir things up, he is trying to get people angry, he is forcing everyone’s hand… why?

Perhaps it was about choosing sides. Perhaps it was about showing an alternative. Perhaps it was about giving us a way to recognize the right side?

This is a parade in favour of love, in favour of helping each other, in favour of honesty and compassion… all those values which we need to make it through.

And the point was to create a reaction. To get us to see that there is something else going on here. To make us think differently about what we see in the world around us.

Then there is Pilate, and the High Priest, and the tax collectors, and the soldiers; and all of those who have some reason to like things just the way they are. There are always those who want to keep things the same, who are either gaining something from the status quo or too afraid to rock the boat.

And we all know that those can be some pretty powerful enemies to make. Of course, we also know where this is leading, and what is going to happen to Jesus in a few days. But the question is, knowing what we know, are we willing to join the parade?

Conclusion

So, the problem is, we all know where this ends up. Palm Sunday is the first day of a week which ends with an arrest and execution…  It is all well and good to point out to you that there is difference between the way the world works and the way God works.

Jesus spent years trying to show the people, trying to make them trust God instead of Caesar… but there are always those who see it the other way. There are always those who are more powerful.

But as we enter this week I want you to realize that what was happening was politics pure and simple… it was about two ways of seeing the world; two ways of living life…. And Jesus was inviting us to choose.

EASTER 3 - B

Earth Day – You Have Been Witnesses

Introduction

I guess it is fair to say I am a bit of a science fiction fan. I have read most of the classics, and definitely seen most of the movies. What I really like about science fiction is that because most of it happens “in the future” they can write about whatever they want… what I mean by that is that sci fi writers can tell the truth more than people who write about what is happening right here and right now.

George Orwell and HG Wells before him wrote stories of what life would be like in a hundred years. They predicted a lot of things, like submarines, and rocket ships, and the internet…

The scarier science fiction is the stuff that is written about the environment, or about disease, or about hunger… and predicts that we are going to destroy our planet. Even something as simple as the Hunger Games, which is amazingly popular right now, simply predicts a time when food becomes scarce… and wonders what would happen.

Well – wondering about what is next is a part of our religious task, and something that the disciples knew a lot about…

Story Time – The World as an Apple

1. Think of the earth as an apple./ Slice an apple into quarters and set aside three of the quarters. These three pieces represent the oceans of the world. The fourth quarter roughly represents the globe's total land area.

2. Slice this "land" in half. Set aside one of the pieces. The portion set aside represents the land area that is inhospitable to people (e.g., the polar areas, deserts, wetlands, very high or rocky mountains). The piece that is left is land where people live, but do not necessarily grow the foods needed for life.

3. Slice the 1/8 piece into four sections and set aside three of these. The 3/32 fraction set aside represent those areas too rocky, wet, cold, steep, infertile to actually produce food. They also contain the cities, suburban sprawl, highways, shopping centers, schools, parks, factories, parking lots, and other places where people live, but don't grow food.

4. Carefully peel the 1/32 slice of the apple. This tiny bit of peeling represents our arable land, the land upon which we depend for our food. Estimates suggest that we loose 25 billion tons of precious topsoil each year from erosion, yet we must feed an additional 71 million people each year on this diminishing resource.

Bringing the Dead to Life

During worship last week, the gospel reading brought us to the moment where Jesus appeared before his disciples… Those first moments after the resurrection when no one quite knew what was going on… so there were times of shock, and disbelief, and wonder…

Today, we fast forward a little bit and see how those disciples respond as they try to understand how the one they saw dead is now alive. Not only that, but this Jesus guy, who they knew was crucified and buried, is now sitting and eating fish with them.

It is not only a dramatic turnaround; it changes everything… so here are the disciples asking themselves, “How can that be? What does this mean?”…

I don’t think it is too much of a stretch for me to say that the “now what” question is always with us. I also do not think it is too much of a stretch to say that it always has to do with the world around us.

The Genesis story talks about God giving Adam and Eve a garden and then asking, “Now what?” The story of Moses and the Promised Land, same thing, “you got us out of Egypt, now what? You got us to the Holy Land, now what…”

In each case the response is, ‘What are you going to do with what has been given you…’

Jesus has come back; life is stronger than death, now what?

Simply answering that question required a massive shift in the way the disciples thought. First off, their leader was dead and the movement was over, right? Then, they were followers not leaders, right? Well, no, and they had to get their heads around the miracle that things change overnight.

Biologist Elizabet Sahtouris uses the familiar image of a butterfly as a sign of hope for our age.

She says that within each chrysalis a miracle occurs. Tiny cells that biologists actually call “imaginal cells” begin to appear. They are completely different from caterpillar cells. At first, the caterpillar's immune system perceives these new cells as enemies and attacks them.

This is not unlike the way that new ideas in science, medicine, politics, and religion are first perceived. But the new cells are not deterred.

They continue to appear in even greater numbers, recognizing one another and bonding together to form clumps. With enough clumps, the caterpillar's immune system is overwhelmed.

The caterpillar body then becomes the perfect environment for the growth of the butterfly. And we all know what happens when a butterfly emerges from a cocoon. It flies off to embrace its new world.

See, resurrection, Easter, Spring, new Life… it is all the same theme. We just have to learn to see it as part of the way we live life… we are called upon to recognize the new things happening in our midst, and to embrace them, and allow them to change us.

If that sounds a little new age hippy like, let me put it into old fashioned religious language: We can be raised up with Christ, and filled with that same creative spirit of God that was in Jesus.

Conclusion

The disciples succeeded beyond their wildest dreams.

I like to think it is because they became so passionate about the idea of new life that it became contagious.

Too often all we hear about is the bad stuff, oil spills and global warming, floods and death and destruction… Maybe what this world needs is a little more carrot and a lot less stick.

Everything is possible, we have all we need right here, God has given us every good gift and If you look around, you will discover that new life is all around you. Embrace the possibility. Amen.

Easter 3 A

WHAT THE HEART KNOWS

Introduction

Have you ever just known something? Just felt it to be right inside of you? Ever had the experience of looking back at a situation and thinking to yourself, I knew that was going to happen... or that you felt something so deeply you are surprised it surprised you?

Augustine, one of the earliest writers of the church once said, “My Soul is restless until it finds its rest in Thee” while talking to God. A very poetic way of saying that he knew something was missing; and felt drawn to find that missing piece of himself in God.

For a moment – let’s call that love.

Each of us has different experiences of love. We fall in love as children with silly people who were never meant to last. We meet someone who changes everything for us and give them our heart; we even lose people and start over – finding some way to fill the empty space in our hearts. We experience love from family, from friends, from partners, and even from strangers.

Love draws us ever onward. You don’t control it. You can’t necessarily turn it on or off... it is.

Love is consuming... it is pain, it is joy, it is sacrifice, it is loss, it is memory, it is desire, it is everything.

My soul, my very being, is unsettled, restless, searching for love.

For many of us, that searching almost seems like a return – we knew that love once, when we were held by our mothers; when every single thing that scared us was fixed by those that loved us the most, when all of our needs were met at the expense of our mother’s health, career, sleep, perhaps even happiness.

And so... we search...

Family Trees

Ink Pad – Thumb Print

Close to Home

Not everyone had the best childhood. I certainly did not. I am getting pretty old to still be nursing the wounds of growing up; but I am.

I mention this because all love is imperfect. It is human. It is dependant.

My mother was brought up by a woman who was not the nicest on the planet. And so when she had kids, some of that continued to be passed down from generation to generation. My mother gave up some of herself for her husband’s career. And that probably drained some love from her. My mother was too tired some times when I expected too much of her.

So there have been moments when I actually did not like my mother at all.

All of you would be lying if you did not say the same. That time when your mother wouldn’t let you go out with your friends... or that time when you really needed her to understand and she didn’t... maybe when you were older and she disapproved of the person you brought home?

Human love, whether from a mother, a father, a friend, a lover... it has flaws because we are all flawed.

I know you don’t want to hear this...but the truth is, this is a huge part of our faith. It is a huge reason why Christian Contemporary Music is all love songs. It explains the Psalms. Faith is our longing for perfect love. A longing we rarely find, and which is fleeting, in the human realm.

Perfect love is the stuff of God.

Did Not Our Hearts Burn...

You see, the thing we feel throughout our lives is a type of loneliness. It is emptiness... and we try to fill it as best we can with money, with food, with gambling, with alcohol, with sugar...

We get married and live in relationships, we have friends, not to fill the loneliness but as a reflection of what we are searching for. In the same way that we are created in God’s image, human love is a reflection of divine love... but it is not enough to fill the emptiness...

I have often wondered if this was part of the mystique of Jesus... When we say that Jesus was the embodiment of God are we saying that Jesus loved in a way that overwhelmed? When Jesus looked at you did you feel safe, complete, loved, understood, hopeful, and powerful? I think you did.

I think this was why a no one person born in a nowhere place so rocked the world... the depth of charismatic love that Jesus had within him so reflected God’s love that it was almost inconceivable.

It sort of explains Easter, right. It explains the way it as so easy for the disciples to turn their backs on Jesus. They honestly did not know what they had. Three years of being loved and understood had just come to seem natural to them. So the loss of Jesus was sad, but not catastrophic... until they realized what they had really lost.

Every story after Easter shows a level of despondency and hopelessness that is sort of rock bottom. The disciples find themselves locked away in the upper room. They head back to Galilee and go fishing, something they have not done in like four years... they are lost, and aimless and lonely...

We find two of them dragging their feet through the dust on the road to Emmaus today. Lost and heartbroken they jump at the chance to tell this stranger all about Jesus...

But wait...

How are you feeling, one says to the other as they stop for lunch... This seems familiar... do you feel that – in your heart? Strangely warmed as if... wait... could it be...

They realize something that they have known, but not realized all day; this is Jesus. This is love.

You see, these Biblical stories are not just about them – they never are, they are about us.

They are about how we feel the same way when we have a religious experience. It is fleeting to be sure, but there are times when we feel totally understood and totally loved. And those moments make us understand what God is; God is love, wholly unconditional, totally undeserved, love.

We have those Emmaus road moments. Maybe you know what I am talking about. Maybe yours is yet to come. Maybe it will be the last thing that makes you smile on your deathbed. But it will be there.

It will also remind you of something. It will remind you of the first smile you ever saw; your mother’s. That sort of love that first envelops us is probably the purest moment of the divine love we have this side of eternity...

Conclusion

Last night I listened to an old Pete Townsend Song... ‘Let my Love Open the Door’ and it made me think of exactly what I am trying to say here. Just that one line....

We spend a lot of time in pain, a lot of time searching, we lose the people and places we love the most, we struggle with bills and sickness and kids and careers...

Well... no matter where you are this morning. God is Singing Peter Townsend... God is inviting you to remember the best love you ever felt. God is inviting you into a love that is better even than that.

You might just find the love burning so brightly within your own hearts that you run to tell others.

This then, is the good news.

Easter 2 A

I get by with a little help from my friends...

Introduction

Easy answers are great things, are they not?

If only we could have them more of the time.

I would like to think that every now and again I could have something I was totally and without reservation sure of…. But so far that has never happened.

Death and Taxes… the only two things you can count on…. However, in my humble opinion not even those two are sure… my taxes change year by year and I never know whether I owe money or am going to get like a huge bonus… and death? Surely you have come to the same conclusion as I have; that I might live to be 120 years old and I might be dead by the end of the day… Doesn’t sound very certain does it?

Really, is there anything that you don’t wonder about, at least every now and again? It could be as simple as, is red wine a good or a bad thing… all the way up to, why do people who seem to be good have such bad things happen to them…

There are moments when conviction grabs hold of us… you are going to hear one in a second when I read from Peter’s first sermon in Jerusalem… but even for Peter, the head of the church after Jesus died, that conviction was fleeting and he had his bad moments… He thought too much… he had a lot of questions…

And I would like to suggest to you that thinking about things is the reason that God gave us the minds we have in the first place.

Elijah the Pancake Hunter

Story from Mark Gillman “God’s Mailbox”

Conviction

So what is conviction? IS your faith more precious than Gold? Are you willing like Peter to stand in the marketplace and declare that Jesus has died and is risen and that it changes everything? Do you love him? Believe in him? Or like the Psalmist is your heart glad that God leads you through each and every moment of life – preserving you from danger?

You know what news is, right? News is anything that is “out of the ordinary” at the end of the day those reporters come on TV or sit down behind their computers and start talking about everything that was surprising… a shooting… which hardly ever happens… a stabbing down on Main Street… only once in the last five years… and NDP upsurge… unheard of… these things are news.

The fact that someone was so assured of God’s love and grace that they did not fear the enemy, or death,… the fact that they felt they knew the purpose of their life… like Paul wrote in our letter or The Psalmist wrote in his poem - this was news.

Most people were far more like Elisha the Pancake Hunter – just trying to figure things out…

Or like Thomas… Unsure of what it all means… but we will get there…

For now I want you to recognize that the type of faith that moves mountains and never wavers – that faith has almost never happened. And when it does, it is fleeting.

Thomas

There are characters in the Bible I have real affinity for. I guess I like the underdogs… I always want to defend Joseph when Christmas comes around, and point out that he did not get enough recognition for his part in the whole Mary pregnancy scandal thing….

Then there is Judas… the most misunderstood and vilified of all the Biblical Characters; who I swear thought he was doing a good thing in forcing Jesus’ hand… or at least believed he was doing what God and even Jesus wanted him to do in order to make things happen according to plan.

Thomas is another one who I don’t get why he has a negative reputation… Let’s be serious; I come to you and tell you that I have seen your dead friend walking around last night… is you going to believe me right away?

Besides which, the other disciples were not unafraid and confident… they were cowering in the back while Jesus tried to convince them it was all right…

So let’s skip this and say Thomas was not extraordinary… that the doubting Thomas thing should not have stuck the way it did; and look at it a different way.

This story is about recognizing resurrection.

Thomas is not the main character, just one of the characters.

It is a story about us…. About what we need in order to know that God is at work in the world…

More importantly – it is a story about what is possible once you find out.

Thomas was the disciple who needed time, space, and evidence in order to come up with a plan to move forward. He wanted to figure it out and he had his doubts about what was happening.

He was also the only disciple to spread Christianity outside of the Roman Empire… he travelled to Egypt; He travelled to India; he travelled throughout Syria; he apparently wrote one of the most interesting collections of quotes from Jesus, The Gospel of Thomas – and he got into a few fights with Peter along the way.

That is why his impact on Christianity has all but been forgotten. That is why he got the bad name… it was political…

What Thomas actually was as a person was the most effective and surest of all the twelve… he was the one who was careful, who had doubts, but then used those doubts to figure out his life and to move on…

He never looked for easy answers and neither should we.

Easter A

as a pre-note; this is what I had in front of me on Easter morning. I am not sure how much it resembles what I actually preached. The stories are the same; but the way it is woven together happened more on the fly than normal....

Easter is...

Introduction

What do you refuse to believe in?

I have a few – money buys happiness, might makes right, despair is stronger than hope...

I refuse to believe that bullies will have the last word. I refuse to believe that I am anything less than perfect in God’s eyes. I refuse to believe that people are as mean as they often seem to be...

I refuse to believe that evil has the last word... I guess that is at the heart of what I am talking about...

I have hope.

That, for me, is what Easter is all about.

Kids

Two eggs needed. One normal, one ‘blown’. (Google if don’t know how) Start the talk with the great Easter Day and how the tomb which they thought would be full was empty. Think how surprised the women were when they saw it was empty. Often talk about eggs at Easter etc. I’ve got an egg here and a badminton racket. Now look I’m going to try and hit this egg to the back of the church. Throw egg up and deliberately miss. (Egg splaters all over a tray) Oh dear I missed that one. Lets try again. Take blown egg and this time hit it of course its just bits of shell. The look of horror that passes children’s faces when you hit it is amazing. Then talk about how they all expected the egg to be full but what a surprise it was empty

Life – Death – John

In John's Gospel, there is a story often entitled, “Jesus Speaks About His Death.” It comes right after the events of Palm Sunday. Jesus says to a group of people, “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. Very truly, I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.”

That reminds me of a type of tree that I encountered once. Along the Cabot Trail, in Cape Breton, there is a trail called the Jack Pine Trail. You can find these forests throughout Canada. There are all these unique-looking trees growing in the cracks of rocks. The interesting thing about Jack Pine trees is that they need forest fires to open their cones in order for new trees to grow. So, in the process, the trees get destroyed in order for there to be new life. Wildfires naturally occur as nature's way of making sure this happens. It's painful to watch these trees burn but from the ashes of death and destruction, beauty and life arise.

Every night we look at the bright moon and the twinkling stars and we marvel over the vastness of the universe and the beauty of creation. But at daybreak, the moon fades until it disappears and we have to say goodbye for a little while. But as the moon sets, the glorious sun – that ball of fire in the sky – it rises and brings life to the earth.

Conclusion

We are in the midst of Spring. We have been witnessing transformation around us. From the deadness and cold of winter comes the beauty of delicate little flowers popping up and melodic little birds filling the air. And now that spring is hear, the pain of winter has become a distant memory. At the time, mountains of snow and below zero temperatures plagued our every day.

But now we don't think about that. Instead we celebrate what is before us. We shout, “Hallelujah!” when we can grab a light jacket as we head out the door. We want to sing as we spend time outdoors once again – at the park, in our backyards, going for a walk. The darkness has passed and the light surrounds us.

A couple of days ago, we remembered the agony that Jesus endured. We lived the pain of the cross, the moments of uncertainty and despair. But now that we see in our mind's eye, an empty tomb, a risen Christ, renewed hope – we put those feelings aside and focus on celebrating!