Reflecting on Holy Week

I started this blog back before Easter ... but unfortunately I got caught up in everyday family life, church life, and a special trip to Kentucky to see my Gramma in the hospital. But I do feel this is a topic that needs to be written about.

Easter is a time of year that always seems to sneak up on us ... and unfortunately, fly by without a great deal of meditation. On Maundy Thursday, we were having our special service at church to remember the Last Supper that Jesus had with his Disciples and the time leading up to his crucifixion and ultimate death. I don't know what made this service different, but I was really moved to stop and think about what I was doing at that service and what I was supposed to be remembering that week.

The past few years I have been a college student, and as a college student Easter-time means one thing: Midterms! There is no extra time for reflection for the meaning of Easter. The ironic thing - I was a RELIGION major studying Jesus Christ. I KNOW what Easter is about. But it's more than just knowing what Easter is all about. "Easter" occurs each year so that we may celebrate and reflect on the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Yes, the traditional Easter Bunny, Easter Egg Hunts, and receiving an Easter Basket full of goodies are great things at Easter-time, but we must not forget why we have Easter. If we do not stop and think about the true meaning behind it all, we have completely missed out on a great deal! My entire future as a Christian, as a human, and as someone with a hope for life after death all lies within the meaning of Easter.

Okay ... so the reason for Easter ... Jesus' resurrection from the grave. But wow! We are missing out on so much if we limit ourselves to Easter Sunday!

Palm Sunday! Jesus returns to Jerusalem. Jesus entered the city ... and all the peoples were praising Him! One would think these people finally had it figured out! Yes! He is the one who has come to save us! He is God's Son! He is the Messiah! Hallelujah! Amen! I mean seriously, these people lined up along the road waving palm branches singing his praise! How great that must have been. If I had been there, I would have never predicted that the very next week these same people would want him dead. But the awe-striking thing is ... Jesus KNEW His fate. He KNEW that these people would kill Him. That must be hard. How do you face people who are singing your praises and not say, "You hypocrites! Here you are praising my name ... but next week you will want me dead!" This has got to be working on the pit of his stomach. He must have been uneasy about all of it!

Maundy Thursday! Jesus gathers with his closest 12. The ones who have given up everything to follow Him for the past 3 years. They have walked beside Him on long journeys. Wondered how they were going to eat at times. Staying in a different place night to night. They gather to have the traditional passover feast as was a customary Jewish tradition. There really shouldn't be anything different about this feast. But all of a sudden, Jesus - the teacher, the leader of this group - gets up and takes the servant's role. He begins to wash their nasty, dirty, worn out feet! Wow! And of course, Peter stops Him and says, "Jesus! What are you doing?! You are our teacher! Please! Let me wash YOUR feet! It should not be the other way around." But Jesus says, "If I do not wash your feet, you will have no part of me." I think there are a few things that can be gathered from that right there. 1. Jesus must be the one to cleanse us from our sin so that we can be with Him. 2. Jesus is taking on a servant role to demonstrate what His followers must do. 3. I think this was a foreshadowing of what was to come. Jesus washing His disciples' feet was unexpected and not the "norm." But it was something He must do in order for His disciples to fully receive what Jesus had to offer. In the same token, Jesus dying a criminal's death was not expected or the "norm" for a so-called Savior/Messiah. But it had to be done. I think it was also a point to the disciples that if they tried to stop Him from what He was about to go through with, they would not be with Him in Heaven.
Just thinking about what must have been going through Jesus' mind through all of this is overwhelming. These are men that Jesus had come to know and care about deeply over the past 3 years. They have spent probably every day together. They have talked together, eaten together, shared together. He loves them as if they were his own flesh and blood ... his brothers, maybe even his children. As a mother, that's a powerful bond. Could you imagine him meeting together with his men, knowing that it would be their last meeting together? What was he thinking about? A normal person might have been thinking: "How do I tell them that they will no longer have me here to guide them? How will they take the news? Will they be able to make it without me? How will they react to me being arrested? Or killed? Will they do something irrational? Will they believe me when I tell them that death is not the end for me?" But Jesus must have known all the answers to those questions already. But He still must have been thinking about them. He must have been thinking about everything, all the while trying to maintain His composure.
And what's more! He was sitting in the room with the very person who was going to sell him out for a little bit of silver! This same man who had been with him for the last 3 years, whom he had loved and cared about, was going to betray Him. And He announced this to the group. Think about it. How easy would it have been for Jesus to have called Him by name, and put a stop to the whole thing. But that would have messed up so much (not to mention the whole laws of whatever science would have been messed up if Jesus predicted something of the future that was changed, then was it really something of the future, and then what would he have to predict - yeah that circle is another topic for someone else haha). But all jokes aside, if Jesus had done that, He could have put a stop to His death - at least for the time being. But He didn't. He simply said ONE OF YOU WILL BETRAY ME! And what did EVERY ONE of them reply? "Surely Not I!!!" That's got to sting Jesus. He must have been thinking something along the lines of "Are you serious? You are going to sit here, and look me in the eye, and tell me surely you wouldn't betray me? Are you serious?" You know ... it's a good thing we have a loving, forgiving, patient, PERFECT Messiah. I sure wouldn't have fit the bill. (Which is why I am human and not God!)

So after all of this, Jesus takes His disciples out to pray in the garden. Jesus is praying so hard and really thinking about all that is about to transpire that he is sweating blood. And what are His disciples doing? SLEEPING! Seriously men! Where is your wake up call? When Jesus is actually led away in handcuffs? Or the dying on the cross part?
But think about it! How often are we like those disciples? Do we pray with earnest? Or are we more likely to fall asleep or let our minds wander while someone else is praying? The disciples had been told that His time with them was coming to an end, and they needed to pray but instead they slept. We have been told that our days are numbered and we must be ready, but instead we spiritually sleep. Where is our wake up call? Jesus has already been killed! How many times must He die before we get the picture? This is why we remember Easter each year! We need a wake up call because we seem to fall asleep throughout the rest of the year!

So anyways ...while they are out in the garden ... here come the guards ... and Judas - who betrays Jesus with a KISS! Nothing like saying I love you, but not more than money.

Good Friday! Jesus is crucified. Jesus is not just killed ... He is killed the death of a criminal. Pilate even offers to release Him to the Jews - as was the custom to release one criminal. But would you believe that those same people who at the beginning of the week were singing His praises were now demanding for a murderer to be released. They wanted Jesus to be crucified!
We've all seen the depictions of Jesus on the cross, or Him carrying His cross to Calvary. But the one movie that hit me hard was Passion of the Christ. It was gruesome! There was a lot of blood!! We've heard it said that Jesus shed His blood for us ... wow this gives it new meaning! I think the part in the movie that hit me hard was after they beat Jesus with the cat of 9 tails - ripping his flesh off his bones literally - his mother came in and began wiping up his blood with her head piece. To see the amount of blood on the floor was breathtaking - and not in a good way. Thinking about all the pain and suffering Jesus went through makes me cringe for real. And then they take him and drive NAILS through his hands and feet and then stand the cross upright. The only thing keeping gravity from pulling him to the ground were the nails in his hands and feet! Oh how that must of hurt!! When I saw the scene of Jesus on the cross in between the two thieves in the movie Passion of the Christ, I couldn't get over the skin coloring portrayed. The two thieves had "white" skin ... not bloody at all. But Jesus' entire body was red from blood from being beat so much before being put on the cross. If you want to think of it this way - Jesus was our scapegoat. The crowds took their shots at Him - I think because they were too prideful to look at their own sin, so it's easier to make someone else look like the bad one! And the ironic thing - Jesus never once did a single thing wrong! Where is the justice in this world?
But you know ........ as horrible as all of this is ..... it saddens me to realize that I am the reason that Jesus went through all of that. Before I was created, He loved me. He felt that I was worth all of this agony He went through. He knew that if He did not go through with this ... if He didn't cleanse me of my sins, I would never be able to spend eternity with Him. For this, this is why we have Easter ever year. This is what we are supposed to reflect on during Holy Week.
We should be humbled by this act of servitude by Jesus. We should be sorrowful that we are sinners. We should have a desire to turn from our sins and do anything that is asked of us by God. We LITERALLY owe God our lives!! It is not a figure of speech because we should do something for Him, it is a literal thing: Jesus LITERALLY gave His life when He was brutally MURDERED on our behalf. The LEAST we can do is serve Him! Don't we owe Him that much?

The following song was playing while we took communion at the Maundy Thursday service. I had heard the song before, but to sit in silence and really listen to these words during this service - when I was already deep in reflection - was very touching. I can't explain it. Except that I am the reason that Jesus was named a criminal and killed as such. He took on all of our crimes and paid our debt so that we will never have to. Because of Him we are free peoples.

Glory Revealed - By His Wounds Lyrics

(Feat. Mac Powell, Mark Hall, Steven Curtis Chapman and Brian Littrell)

Isaiah 53:5

He was pierced for our transgressions
He was crushed for our sins
The punishment that brought us peace was upon Him
And by His wounds, by His wounds we are healed

He was pierced for our transgressions
He was crushed for our sins
The punishment that brought us peace was upon Him
And by His wounds, by His wounds we are healed

We are healed by Your sacrifice
And the life that You gave
We are healed for You paid the price
By Your grace we are saved
We are saved

He was pierced for our transgressions
And crushed for our sins
The punishment that brought us peace was upon Him
And by His wounds, by His wounds we are healed

We are healed by Your sacrifice
And the life that You gave
We are healed for You paid the price
By Your grace we are saved
We are saved

He was pierced for our transgressions
He was crushed for our sins
The punishment that brought us peace was upon Him
And by His wounds, by His wounds we are healed
And by His wounds, by His wounds

What can wash away my sin?
Nothing but the blood of Jesus

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I want to pose a question.
If you were to have gotten into a bad car accident that left you trapped in the car with death imminent. (Even go as far as to say that accident was your fault.) While you are trapped, so many people have driven by and ignored you. Maybe some have stopped, but they simply just told you what to do but didn't want to do anything themselves. They felt that you got yourself in to the situation, you should get yourself out. But then, just when you've come to terms with dying, a stranger stops and puts his/her life at risk to save yours. How would you repay that person? I don't know about you, but I feel that I would be forever indebted to that person. I sure wouldn't treat them like a burden or put them on the back burner. I've just made a new best friend and would be continually repaying them forever.

Isn't that the way we should be with God? We are alive because He DIED - literally!

But you want to know the great thing about the God we serve? He didn't just die ... He conquered death itself and came back to life. Not too many people can make that claim. And because He conquered Death from Satan, we know that our God is The All Most Powerful! I am glad that My God is the best in the world! He is the ONLY GOD! All other gods are nothing. Satan has no power over me because I belong to Jesus Christ - the one who has defeated Satan once and for all.

THIS IS WHY WE HAVE EASTER!!
I know it has passed this year. But that doesn't mean you can't reflect on this throughout the year. But when Holy Week comes next year ... don't let it sneak up and pass by without giving it any reflection!!

Karate Baby

Bring on the Rain

Tonight was our Ladies' Prayer Group. Of course, I have a million things I need to do instead. And it was tempting to skip. But the more I thought about, the more I realized Satan was trying to convince me to skip - all the more reason why I needed to go.
So Carissa and I head out in the rain to meet with others to pray.
On my way there, I couldn't help but notice how frustrating it is to drive in the rain.

• You have people who don't practice extra precaution, and make foolish mistakes.
• Your tires may lose traction.
• Your vision may be obstructed.
• Traffic moves at a slower pace.
• It always seems to change intensity, causing you to adjust your wipers.
• You have to be careful to not hit the breaks too hard.

The list could go on. Overall, you have to be cautious and smart about driving in the rain - however unpleasant it may be.
We have to be smart, we have to be cautious, but we ultimately have to keep going. We cannot slam on the breaks or stop in the road. We have to move with the flow of things, but we have to make wise decisions along the way. Yes, there are times where the rain may become so intense that you cannot see beyond the blankets of rain on your windshield. Those are times when we have to take a break until we can see where we are going again. But it is important for us to pull off to a safe place before stopping.

As I drove, it occurred to me how on our Christian walk we all drive through the rain at times.
Without a doubt, we will endure hard times along the way. Just like the rain, we cannot control the circumstances. We have to trust God to get us through the hard times.
Yes, during these rough patches, we may briefly "lose traction" or veer off to the side, or even come close to hitting someone else. We have to make smart decisions through these hard times. The most important thing we have to remember, though, is that with God's help we will get through the rough patch. Stopping along our walk will not help the matter. Yes, we can wait and the storm may blow over - but we haven't gotten anywhere. We are still in our starting place. We cannot become complacent in our walk with God ... we must be moving forward - even if that means we have to walk in the rain.

So while I was thinking about all of this - while, of course, being a cautious driver in the rain :) - I suddenly became aware of the song that was on the radio. The song was "Call on Jesus" by Nicole C. Mullen. It seemed so appropriate that I was sitting here thinking about the hard times we will go through, and how God will be there to help us through, and here comes a song that declares that all things are possible when we call on Jesus.

Verse 2:
Weary brother, broken daughter,
Widowed, Widowed lover you're not alone
If you're tired and scared of the madness around you
If you can't find the strength to carry on

Chorus:
When you call on Jesus,
All things are possible
You can mount on wings like eagles' and soar
When you call on Jesus,
Mountains are gonna fall
'Cause He'll move heaven and earth to come rescue you when you--

Bridge:
Call Him in the mornin', in the afternoon time
Late in the evenin' He'll be there
When your heart is broken,
And you feel discouraged,
You can just remember that He said
He'll be there

It was very refreshing to be reminded that we must Call on Jesus ..... and here I was ...... on my way to a prayer meeting. I was on my way to Call on Jesus with other sisters in Christ! And I had been tempted not to go!

And then .....

After I leave the uplifted prayer meeting, I am driving home and begin to think about all of this again, and how I should blog about it. I have the radio on, but only half listening. I hear them announce a song by MercyMe. I had not heard this song before, but the first couple lines stuck out to me so I keyed in to the rest of the song and wow! how fitting it was!! The song is called "Bring the Rain." The gist of this song is that people questioned why the writer praised God through all he had been through. His response was ... why not? Essentially, it is during these times of "rain" that he felt closest to God. He realized that God was the one to keep him safe through the rain. And if it meant, being able to bring glory to God ... then bring on the rain!
WHOA! That is the story of my life! So many people are surprised when they learn of my not-so-wonderful childhood and family situation etc that I am the Christian that I am today. But instead of pulling me away from God, my circumstances pushed me into God's loving embrace! Those were the times I felt closest to God!
And to feel that close to God is so worth going through any kind of rainy day/week/month/year.

"Bring The Rain"

I can count a million times
People asking me how I
Can praise You with all that I've gone through
The question just amazes me
Can circumstances possibly
Change who I forever am in You
Maybe since my life was changed
Long before these rainy days
It's never really ever crossed my mind
To turn my back on you, oh Lord
My only shelter from the storm
But instead I draw closer through these times
So I pray

Bring me joy, bring me peace
Bring the chance to be free
Bring me anything that brings You glory
And I know there'll be days
When this life brings me pain
But if that's what it takes to praise You
Jesus, bring the rain

I am Yours regardless of
The dark clouds that may loom above
Because You are much greater than my pain
You who made a way for me
By suffering Your destiny
So tell me what's a little rain
So I pray

Holy, holy, holy
Is the Lord God Almighty

The "Church" is for God - not us!

It amuses me to see the number of people who "go to church." It amuses me more to see how many people think that they are supposed to "get something out of going to church." There are so many things wrong with this.
"The Church" is not a building. It is not a meeting. It is not a gathering. Not some service that happens at 11am on Sunday mornings. The "Church" is the people. Each Christian makes up a member of the Church. We don't "go to church." We ARE the Church.

How dare us think that this body of Christ called The Church serves a purpose to benefit us. Do we meet together on Sunday mornings to feel better about ourselves? To become refreshed or renewed? These are by no means the purpose of The Church! Yes, they may be a by-product of gathering together as the body of Christ - but it should not be our motivation for gathering. It should not be our expectation when we meet with other Christians.

The purpose of these meetings on Sunday mornings, Sunday evenings, Wednesday evenings, or any other time we meet together as The Church is to WORSHIP GOD!
Let's think about this.
Why do we have life? God gave it to us.
Why do we continue to live? God created our bodies to function in that manner.
Why do we know love? Because God loved us first.
Why do we have people in our lives that we love and they love us? God.
God is the reason for our being. He is the author of our lives. Everything we are or have we owe to Him. Because of Him, I know I can live each day not wondering what will happen to me when I die. There are so many things around us that we should realize that God is the one to whom we need to thank and praise.
We worship God on a daily basis simply by living according to His calling.
However, it is appropriate and necessary for us as "The Church" to gather to formally praise God together. When we meet together in this manner, we are communally declaring that God has been great to us, He deserves our praise, and we want to join together to show Him how much we appreciate Him.

Think about it this way. Someone you know is (having a birthday, graduating, getting married, having a baby, getting a promotion, retiring, [fill in the blank with whatever you might through a party for!]) You gather with people who all know and love this person to throw a party for this person to let them know you are celebrating them and their achievements etc. You can tell them individually that you are happy they are alive, congratulations, you love them, etc; but it just doesn't have the same impact as when everyone joins together and celebrates them!
Put a twist on this: YOU are the one having a birthday and everyone you know and love come together to throw you a party. The whole party is revolved around you. The point of the birthday party is to celebrate YOU! After all, isn't that why we celebrate birthdays? We celebrate the day each person entered the world. Celebrating that day indicates that we are happy they are alive!

In this same way, yes it is important for us to individually praise God for his existence. But it is so much more meaningful when we gather with others who feel the same way!

Now let's put a bigger twist on all of this!
Have you ever had a birthday party where someone shows up and somehow makes the party about them?! It's no longer all about you - as it should be - but it becomes about someone else.
That is how God feels when we show up for Worship hoping to get something out of it. We turn God's party to all about us!

When we go to someone else's party and are genuinely happy for them and spend the time showing them your love for them, you will genuinely have more satisfaction and enjoy yourself a lot more than if you showed up hoping to make the party about yourself. The same as with worship. When we "go to church" for us - we will not be as fulfilled as when we gather as The Church to praise God! When we praise God ... His love overflows in such a way that we become consumed in it in an almost physical way!

So next time you grudgingly put on your Sunday best, climb in the car, and head out on Sunday morning when you'd rather be in bed ....... remember that you have so many reasons to praise God that you should be itching to get to your destination just so that you can share in your excitement over the awesome things God has done in your life with others who feel the same way!