Lent begins with Ash Wednesday Feb 6

Lent is a time of increased reflection and confession and refocusing on Christ's life and teaching and death and finally culminating in focus on the resurrection of Jesus with Easter.

Once again this year Wineskins will be sending out emails with Lent Reflections.

Would you like to submit one? Send an email to Greg Taylor at info@wineskins.org.

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Join us for these important Lent Reflections beginning Wednesday, February 6.

Easter Sunday: Risen Indeed

The tradition I handed on to you in the first place, a tadition which I had myself received, was that Christ died for our sins, in accordance with the scriptures, and that he was buried; and that on the third day, he was raised to life, in accordance with the scriptures; and that he appeared to Cephas; and later to the Twelve; and next he appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers at the same time . . . . This is what we preach and what you believed. --Corinthians 15:3-6,11

Easter Vigil. The Lord is risen indeed. They shouted it in French, German, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, Dutch, and Arabic. There were bells, alleluias, smiles, laughter, and a deep sense that there is hope. This community of handicapped people and their assistants was loudly proclaiming that Christ's body did not remain in the tomb, but was raised to new life, and that our own bodies will join him in glory.

While all this joy was filling the chapel, I saw that Nathan stood up with Philippe in his arms and left the church. Philippe's body is severely distorted. He cannot speak, walk, dress, or feed himself and needs help every second of his waking hours. He had been lying in an assistant's lap, quietly sleeping. but when the celebration became more lively he started to howl, an anguishing howl coming from deep down in his being . . . .

When I saw Philippe in Nathan's arms I suddenly realized what we were proclaiming on this Easter vigil. Philippe's body is a body destined to a new life, a resurrected life. In his new body he will carry the signs of his suffering, just as Jesus carried the wounds of the crucifixion into his glory. And yet he will no longer be suffering, but will join the saints around the altar of the lamb.

Still, the celebration of the resurrection of the body is also the celebration of the daily care given to the bodies of these handicapped men and women. Washing and feeding, pushing wheelchairs, carrying, kissing, and caressing--these are all ways in which these broken bodies are made ready for the moment of a new life. Not only their wounds but also the care given them will remain visible in the resurrection.

It is a great and powerful mystery. Philippe's poor distorted body will one day be buried and return to dust. But he will rise again on the day of the resurrection of the dead.

He will rise from the grave with a new body and will show gloriously the pain he suffered and the love he received. It will not be just a body. It will be his body, a new body, a body that can be touched but is no longer subject to torture and destruction. His passion will be over.

What a faith! What a hope! What a love! The body is not a prison to escape from, but a temple in which God already dwells, and in which God's glory will be fully manifested on the day of the resurrection.

Easter season is a time of hope. There still is fear, there still is a painful awareness of sinfulness, but there also is light breaking through. Something new is happening, something that goes beyond the changing moods of our life. We can be joyful or sad, optimistic or pessimistic, tranquil or angry, but the solid stream of God's presence moves deeper than the small waves of our minds and hearts. Easter brings the awareness that God is present even when his presence is not directly noticed. Easter brings the good news that, although things seem to get worse in the world, the Evil One has already been overcome. Easter allows us to affirm that although God seems very distant and although we remain preoccupied with many little things, our Lord walks with us on the road and keeps explaining the Scriptures to us. Thus there are many rays of hope casting their light on our way through life.

Our Prayer

Almighty, everlasting God,
on this day
you conquered death through your son
and opened for us the path to eternal life.
And so we celebrate in joy
the feast of his resurrection.
Make us new through your Spirit,
so that we too may rise
and walk in the light of life.
We ask this through Jesus Christ.

Source: Henri J.M. Nouwen, Show me the way (Crossroad Publishing Company, 1992). Used by permission.

Mortification

You cannot have forgotten that all of us, when we were baptized into Christ Jesus, were baptized into his death. So by our baptism into his death we were buried with him . . . . But we believe that, if we died with Christ, then we shall live with him too.--Romans 6:3-4, 8

If the God who revealed life to us, and whose only desire is to bring us to life, loved us so much that he wanted to experience with us the total absurdity of death, then--yes, then there must be hope; then there must be something more than death; then there must be a promise that is not fulfilled in our short existence in this world; then leaving behind the ones you love, the flowers and the trees, the mountains and the oceans, the beauty of art and music, and all the exuberant gifts of life cannot be just the destruction and cruel end of all things; then indeed we have to wait for the third day.

But mortification--literally, "making death"--is what life is all about, a slow discovery of the mortality of all that is created so that we can appreciate its beauty without clinging to it as if it were a lasting possession. Our lives can indeed be seen as a process of becoming familiar iwth death, as a school in the art of dying. I do not mean this in a morbid way. On the contrary, when we see life constantly relativized by death, we can enjoy it for what it is: a free gift. The pictures, letters, and books of the past reveal life to us as a constant saying of farewell to beautiful places, good people, and wonderful experiences. All these times have passed by like friendly visitors, leaving us with dear memories but also with the sad recognition of the shortness of life. In every arrival there is a leave-taking; in every reunion there is a separation; in each one's growing up there is a growing old; in every smile there is a tear; and in every success there is a loss. All living is dying, and all celebration is mortification too.

Our Prayer

I call to you, Yahweh, all day.
I stretch out my hands to you.
Do you work wonders for the dead,
can shadows rise up to praise you?
Do they speak in the grave of your faithful love,
of your constancy in the place of perdition?
Are your wonders known in the darkness,
your saving justice in the land of oblivion?
But, for my part. I cry to you, Yahweh,
every morning my prayer comes before you.
--Psalm 88:9-13

Source: Henri J.M. Nouwen, Show me the way (Crossroad Publishing Company, 1992). Used by permission.