My Easter
I attended an Easter service today unlike any other in my life, and considering all the different denominations I've tried on for size, that's saying something. Shortly after the service began, our pastor pointed out that on each seat was a piece of paper and a pen. We were invited to write anything that interfered in living our lives as we felt guided by Christ. To help symbolically claim our rebirth, our resurrection, we were then invited to literally nail them to the cross, leaving them behind as we moved onward to take Communion.
I cannot describe how I felt taking a hammer and driving a nail into a cross. My thoughts went to rendered flesh, to spilled blood, to pain, to agony, and to the personal relationship with Jesus. It was my sin that nailed Him to cross, just as I nailed my shortcomings and burdens there today. Though the Passion receives so much attention at Easter, it's really just the preamble. For me the death on the cross means nothing without the resurrection. Stop the story at "It is finished" and it's just one more tragedy. Add in the resurrection, and the power of the tale is still unfolding these thousands of years later. It's not just the body coming back to life though, it's the transformation. Christ didn't just return. He returned glorified, victorious and perfected.
With that there is hope of victory and transformation and union with perfection. My concept of heaven is a conscious union with and understanding of God/dess. That perfection waits. The transformation doesn't. I can believe in the possibility of change because of God/dess. In nailing my list upon the cross, I got it on a gut level that I really can leave things behind. The action was symbolic, but the choice to move forward, to live in motion towards my highest aspirations isn't.
This has become a central tenet of Christianity for me, that it's not just to live life waiting for heaven, but to seek the wisdom to know what it is better now and make the changes to become better as I go. It's participating in my own creation. I can and do gladly accept the grace of God/dess, but I feel that it would be inappreciative, at the least, to stop at receptivity. I want to act on what I've received and learned.
Easter
Christianity
I cannot describe how I felt taking a hammer and driving a nail into a cross. My thoughts went to rendered flesh, to spilled blood, to pain, to agony, and to the personal relationship with Jesus. It was my sin that nailed Him to cross, just as I nailed my shortcomings and burdens there today. Though the Passion receives so much attention at Easter, it's really just the preamble. For me the death on the cross means nothing without the resurrection. Stop the story at "It is finished" and it's just one more tragedy. Add in the resurrection, and the power of the tale is still unfolding these thousands of years later. It's not just the body coming back to life though, it's the transformation. Christ didn't just return. He returned glorified, victorious and perfected.
With that there is hope of victory and transformation and union with perfection. My concept of heaven is a conscious union with and understanding of God/dess. That perfection waits. The transformation doesn't. I can believe in the possibility of change because of God/dess. In nailing my list upon the cross, I got it on a gut level that I really can leave things behind. The action was symbolic, but the choice to move forward, to live in motion towards my highest aspirations isn't.
This has become a central tenet of Christianity for me, that it's not just to live life waiting for heaven, but to seek the wisdom to know what it is better now and make the changes to become better as I go. It's participating in my own creation. I can and do gladly accept the grace of God/dess, but I feel that it would be inappreciative, at the least, to stop at receptivity. I want to act on what I've received and learned.
Easter
Christianity
posted by Cynthia at
10:10 PM
1 Comments:
Another wonderful piece of writing. And so true. I guess that in Christianity there is often a focus on the next world, but the real transformation has to do with how we live in this one.
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