“April showers bring May flowers” is a saying we may have heard, and it is usually true.The wet, dreary weather we tend to experience in early spring gives way to a beautiful array of flowers in vibrant colours as time passes. The flowers bloom, or vegetables and trees bear fruit later in the season, because of the rain that falls on them – or in very dry periods the water that we give them.This familiar saying reminds me of a Bible verse that says, “Yet what we suffer now is nothing compared to the glory He (Jesus) will reveal to us later.” (Romans 8:18)Last year my husband, Tim, and I both experienced illness and subsequent surgery, but thankfully not at the same time so we were able to support and care for one another during our recovery times. We are both now very well and have reflected on the deep peace of Jesus that we felt throughout this time. Jesus didn’t promise us that we wouldn’t go through difficult times, but he did promise us that he would always be with us.Another phrase that I hear at times is ‘touch wood’, when someone might be hoping for some good luck, or to avoid tempting fate. Of course, common sense tells us that a piece of wood can’t have any influence on our lives. But it reminds me that Jesus died on a wooden cross and he can influence our lives in a good way if we follow him and learn from his ways.As we prepare our Easter celebrations it is good to remember the path of suffering that Jesus took on our behalf. He faced an unfair trial, was beaten, humiliated, and finally nailed to a wooden cross. On the day we call Good Friday he died; he was laid in a tomb for three days; and then on the day we celebrate as Easter Day he rose from the dead and showed himself to more than 500 people to prove that he had overcome death and was alive!So next time you are about to say ‘touch wood’, can I encourage you to pause and give thanks to Jesus instead for giving his life sacrificially for each one of us, so that we can know his love and peace in this world and for all eternity.Reverend Anne Mason
Palm Sunday/Passion Sunday – Luke 19:28-40 Perhaps there is something about the way in which the gospel writers have written about Jesus triumphal entry into Jerusalem that almost gives you the feeling that you are there in and amongst the crowd.It’s easy to imagine the scene in our minds, to hear the noises of the crowd, to get that feeling of being jostled here and there as everyone tries desperately to capture a glimpse of Jesus as he passes by.Or perhaps it is that because this is a scene we have often seen played out in various guises throughout the years that we are so easily able to imagine it.In a couple of weeks we will be marking the 80th anniversary of VE day, I wasn’t there, but I have seen images of the crowds gathered for parties up and down the country as the nation came together to celebrate.Or perhaps in our minds eye we can picture the parades laid on for victorious sports teams, having won the latest Trophy. With scarves waved high in the air and the teams song chanted out loud as the team gets paraded around in their open top buses.We might even have been a part of such a crowd at some time or other, planned or otherwise. We know what a crowd looks like We know how easily a crowd can be stirred up, how quickly in a crowd you can be swept up into the emotion of whatever is happening.So would what happened on this particular day have been a familiar sight in Jesus day?Was it normal for people to begin pulling down the branches of trees, waving them in a royal welcome, and laying their clothes across the streets.Or was this really something quite extraordinary.As Jesus has travelled around from the region, we have seen crowds gathering all over the place.We have seen Jesus resorting to pushing out in a boat onto the lake of Gennesaret, in order to be better heard as he preached to the crowds standing on the waters edge.Following a day of teaching, we have seen Jesus feed a crowd of five thousand, not counting women and children, so considerably more than 5,000 with just 5 loaves and 2 fish.Even when Jesus was in someone’s home teaching, four friends have to carry their friend to Jesus and lower him through the roof, in order to get him through the crowd to Jesus.Jesus is often seen withdrawing to a quite place, only to be followed by the crowd.Where Jesus went, crowds followed.And as they have seen Jesus ministering, healing the sick, raising the dead, giving sight to the blind, hearing to the deaf, teaching as one with authority, so there have been those who have come to realise just who Jesus is.The signs have all been there, for those with eyes to see.Now when Jesus enters Jerusalem, it is his means of transport, that for those looking for signs of the promised Messiah, was quickly recognisable. A colt, a young donkey.Jesus was doing something that many other pilgrims were doing, a week before Passover. He was arriving in Jerusalem, a week in advance in order to ensure that there was time to make all the arrangements and to go through the ritual of purification before the feast of the Passover began.It was customary however, no matter how rich someone was, to approach the city on foot. This makes Jesus’ journey of about a mile into the city even more singular and striking. We have never heard of him riding an animal before, and here he is riding a donkey, while everyone else is walking.His actions fulfilling the words of Zechariah 9:9 ‘Rejoice greatly, O Daughter of Zion! Shout, Daughter of Jerusalem! See, your king comes to you, righteous and having salvation, gentle and riding a donkey.The crowd are not slow to take the hint: they interpret Jesus’ actions as a sign that he is indeed the Messiah for whom they have been waiting. They call out ‘Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord.’But not everyone in the crowd is happy.Some of the Pharisees pick up the obvious reference too, and urge Jesus to correct this mistaken impression by ordering his disciples to be quiet. But Jesus refuses, and instead he reveals the cosmic significance of this moment – even the very atoms of the natural world are aligned with his symbolic declaration of his identity.‘I tell you, if they keep quiet, the stones will cry out.’Nothing and no one will stop the entry of the Messiah into the promised city of God, but it feels as if only Jesus is truly aware of where this journey is leadingPerhaps the people shouting hoped that, once inside the city, he would turn towards Pilate’s palace and free them from their Roman oppressors.Perhaps they were more ready to take up swords and clubs to bring about a successful rebellion than they were to submit to the sadness, suffering and soul-searching that is to come.As the next few days unfold, as Jesus overturns the tables of the money changers in the temple, as Jesus doesn’t raise up an army to dispel the occupiers, so the mood of the crowd begins to change. And on Good Friday the cry of the crowd turns from jubilation to ‘Crucify’And yet all the signs are there too as Jesus is sent to the cross, just as they were on Palm Sunday. Only perhaps they are the more difficult signs the signs we don’t want to see. The ones that refer to the suffering the Messiah would endure.But let’s just for a moment go back to those stones that would cry out if the people kept quiet.Luke is the only one who records this in his account of the triumphal entry. But it is a powerful image.As I said earlier, the very atoms of the natural world are aligned with his symbolic declaration of his identity.And on Good Friday, it is the natural world that offers some of the deepest significance to what is happening on the cross. As the crowd is finally silenced, the natural world speaksMatthews tells us ‘from the sixth hour until the ninth hour – from noon until 3pm – when the sun would normally be at his highest – darkness came over the whole land.And then as Jesus dies ‘the earth shook and the rocks split.’And when the centurion and those with him who were guarding Jesus saw the earthquake and all that had happened, they were terrified and exclaimed ‘surely he was the Son of God.’There is a danger we can limit our understanding of God, of Jesus to what we understand in human terms. Yet we see in Jesus the power he has over nature, stilling the storm with just a few words, ‘peace be still’, today he tells us, if the people are silent the very stones will cry out, and then on Good friday the sky turns black and the earth shakes.Perhaps there is a challenge in this for us today, to take more seriously our responsibility as stewards of all of Gods creation. We often quote John 3:16 ‘For God so loved the world, that he gave his one and only son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.’ God loves the world, the whole world. And it is through the whole created order that people can come to know Jesus. So let us take care of it.In order that others might say ‘Surely he is the Son of God.Thanks be to God. Amen
