Category Archives: Easter

One last time

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Your heart was full
Of deep, flowing love as
You gathered your friends;
The upper room warm with light and
A lamb readied for hopeful remembrance.
How you had longed to share
This meal with them
One last time.

How much did you love them?
More than words could contain,
So you stripped yourself
Of everything – fully laid bare –
To become the lowest
Servant of all, washing their feet
And teaching them a new way;
One last time.

As you tore the bread, your heart
Was being torn, not under the weight
Of love, but rent by one who had
Sold his priceless piece of your heart
For the allure of thirty pieces of silver.
Yet you dipped your bread in the same
Bowl and offered it to your friend
One last time.

In the garden, you asked your friends
To watch and pray, yet belly full and
Heavy with wine, the balmy night
Wrapped around them like a blanket,
Lulling them to sleep. In your anguish –
The intensity forcing out beads of blood –
You knew they could not stay with you
One last time.

They tore your beard; they spat on you;
They tried you and lied about you;
They mocked you and flogged you;
And then they crucified you.
As you drew your last breath,
Entrusting your spirit to the Father,
You allowed death to have its say
One last time.

Reflection for Good Friday, 2nd April 2021

Relational Reality

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We live.

This much we know, but why we live at all is not so easily known.
And yet we know that life exists because of right relationships, formed out of right conditions, and so if we know we are alive then we can also know that our life is an expression of a right relationship, behind, throughout and within the universe we exist in.

In the beginning Elohim – the one GOD who is also a community of Father, Son and Spirit – created all that is, seen and unseen, out of HIS relational reality, in order to be a relational reality; from super massive black holes, to sub-atomic particles, and everything in between.

If we are to make sense of our life, and what it means to be alive, then we need to start with relationships, because this universe exists so that we might be in relationship with the Creator as our Father.

One man in his humanity has lived in right relationship with the creator and having died and resurrected has made eternal life – that which proceeds from being in right relationship with the creator – available to all.
This man is Yeshua (Jesus) of Nazareth.

“In him was life, and the life was the light of men.”
John 1:4

Resurrection

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“He is not here, He is risen!”
The words hang in the air,
A freeze-frame moment
As the truth revealed slowly
Becomes the truth received.
He told us it would be so
And yet, the obvious truth
Remains the most implausible
Of all the possibilities.
Has the gardener moved Him?
Can I believe the women
Or must I see for myself?
If I can touch the wounds
Then I will surely know.
But resurrection is not
Of this world and so
Does not play by the rules
Of reason or logic or
Empirical proof – it defies
The laws of nature as it
Defies death, facing it down
Into completion submission;
The death of death through
His resurrection power.
For the eyewitnesses it
Remains true as it does for us,
That seeing is not believing,
And touching not required,
Because only a heart as open
As the tomb itself can know,
Beyond all reasonable doubt
That He is is not there,
Because He is risen!

Insurrection – resurrection

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In my being,
Right there
In the centre,
In the darkness,
Lies a cold,
Hard, dead heart,
Which stands up
In weak defiance
And rebellion
Against the One
Who made me,
And loves me.
My lifeless heart
Confirming the truth
That I am dead
Through my
Insurrection.

The Father calls,
The Spirit breathes,
My heart awakens
To the beauty
Of the Son,
And as I believe
His grace moves
And that which is dead
Quickens to life,
And rises up
With strong conviction
And deep certainty.
My beating heart
Confirms the truth
That I am alive
Through His
Resurrection.

Because I live, you also will live

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In the darkness
Eclipsing not just nature,
But drawing death
Like a cloak over
The Light of men,
Life is crushed,
Weighed down by
Hard, lifeless hearts.

Hanging there,
Hanging on, until
“It is finished”,
Life gives way
To the death
Which brings death –
The curse of ages
Which loves the darkness.

The lost call out,
Even in His dying hour,
“Jesus, remember me
when you come into your kingdom.”
The Life knowing that through His death,
He would have life and that life
Is life for all who believe;
As He had already spoken,
“Because I live, you also will live.”

Few gasps of life become fewer
As the darkness thickens,
The blood runs ceaselessly –
Draining the life of the one who is Life.
Ever trusting; “Father!”
“Into your hands I commit my spirit!”
If we share in His death, then
We share in His resurrection.

There is a Father’s heart

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There is a Father’s heart that bears the pain of sorrow and grief.
There is a Father’s heart that breaks to see His own Son broken.
There is a Father’s heart that knows suffering as His own Son suffers.
There is a Father’s heart that cries the same tears as His own Son’s tears.
There is a Father’s heart that bleeds with the wounds of His own Son.
There is a Father’s heart that feels the pain of a mother’s broken heart.
There is a Father’s heart that cries out as His own Son cries out to the one who can save Him.
There is a Father’s heart that feels the darkness of the One who made Himself sin for us.
There is a Father’s heart that is torn as life is torn from the One He loves the most.
There is a Father’s heart that overflows with love for His obedient Son.
There is a Father’s heart that beats steadily and unceasingly even when His own Son’s heart stops beating.
There is a Father’s heart that is heavy like that of His own Son’s lifeless body.
There is a Father’s heart that forgives those who cause His pain.
There is a Father’s heart that was prepared to suffer the pain for our gain.
There is a Father’s heart that loves His Son and a Son’s heart that loves His Father.