Corrected Week March 24 devotions

Sunday March 24 Palm Sunday is paired as Passion Sunday as well. More and more, i appreciate the conflicting feelings of acclamation for Jesus would soon lead to the suffering (its Greek root is where we get Passion in this light). We like symmetry of feeling, but the truth is that high and low points mix easily in time. Perhaps that is why crosscutting of two different images is such an effective device in the movies.

Monday-From Lord of the Rings-Frodo: “I wish the ring had never come to me. I wish none of this had happened. Gandalf replies ;So do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given to us. There are other forces at work in this world, Frodo, besides the will of evil... you were also meant to have it. And that is an encouraging thought.” Have things come to you that have caused such reflection?

Tuesday-Take a few minutes to recollect a particular issue of the past that once was a deep prayer concern for you. How has it resolved itself? Is there any way that you notice it's still in process, or that you're being changed in relation to it? Now make a note of some current issue that concerns you. How would it change your expectations to frame it as an "answering" prayer?  

Wednesday-In my mind, Holy Week was accompanied by grey skies. That may have been a child’s overactive imagination, but it seemed that nature itself knew the weight of the week. Think about how the weather should look for Maundy Thursday, Friday, and Saturday this week.

Maundy Thursday- Some churches do footwashing this day, from the gospel of John. I admire them. I am of two minds on it, as it seems to me rooted in a far gone culture. On the other hand, I wonder what religious ritual could fit its purpose of humility and service?

Good Friday-In my new Christian Century, the cover piece is on the cross. A British author, Hefling, He asserts we have over-stressed retribution for evil and not enough about restoration and healing. It is seeking to draw good from evil, through divine acceptance and transformation of suffering, not coercion, not control. The cross is less avoiding punishment for us, it is God absorbing suffering with us.

Holy Saturday-I am always drawn back to Alan Lewis’s posthumous book on this day.”Far from being the first day, the day of the cross is, in the logic of the narrative itself, actually the last day, the end of the story of Jesus. And the day that follows it is not an in-between day which simply waits for the morrow, but it is an empty void, a nothing, shapeless, meaningless, and anti-climactic; simply the day after the end... These were anonymous, indefinite hours, filled with memories and assessments of what was finished and past; and there was no reason to imagine.. an imminent triumph.”