Mixed Emotions? (Thought for March 2024)

March 4, 2024

in Monthly comment

Have you prepared yourself for Easter this year? It will soon be upon us and for most people there will be less frantic preparations with the buying of presents, food and drink and arrangements for visiting family. Perhaps that is a good thing, it allows us to concentrate on what the message of Easter is really all about.
As a church fellowship we can look forward to gathering on Palm Sunday, Good Friday and Easter Sunday experiencing the pain and sadness as Jesus after his triumphal entry into Jerusalem is put on trial, flogged and hung on a cross, giving up his life in sacrifice for the sins of all people; and contrasting that with the joy of new life as we celebrate his resurrection three days later. It is surely a time of mixed emotions and one which Jesus himself speaking to the disciples shortly before his arrest and trial took pains to explain that his death would not be the end for a time of joy was to follow.
Jesus had used the illustration (in the previous verse 21) of a woman in childbirth experiencing much pain as the time of the birth approached but forgetting all that as the baby is born bringing great joy.
We can be thankful that this time of mixed emotions ends on a high – the joy of a resurrected Lord Jesus and the promise that we who follow him will see him again with a rejoicing that no one can take away. So often in life there are times of great expectation that end in sadness and despair, this is not the message of Easter. Easter is a time of hope for all who know Jesus as the Son of God who brought glory to the Father through his death and resurrection.

Many of those about us will be thinking of Easter as just another holiday perhaps with chocolate. They do not know and are therefore missing out on the true joy of Easter.

We have opportunity to change all that as in the power of the Holy Spirit we are called to reach out with the message of Easter this year through various ways, our T@4 special meeting for families, the book table in the Carfax and Afternoon Fellowship as well as our worship services mentioned above. We also have the prospect of meeting up with family and friends over the holiday period so why not take this as an opportunity to hand out a tract or a leaflet telling of the Easter story. It is a story that must be told!

May I wish you all, a truly blessed time this Easter.

Stuart

Elder

March 2024

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