Easter

Our first Easter at Failsworth was surreal in many ways, but good. A real sense that God is moving among us, and He is starting to work in some of the areas we have been concerned about.

It was a great privilege to be able to lead a Holy Week series, based this year, mostly, on Matthew's gospel, tracing some of the teaching of Jesus about Himself and the Kingdom from Palm Sunday through to the events of the Passion. Meetings every evening of Holy Week plus Good Friday and, of course, Easter Sunday, meant a great deal of preparation. Next year I will need to carve out a week much earlier to produce Easter material.

My own Easter journey has been helped greatly, however, in the disciplne of study and preparation. I am constantly struck by the way in which Jesus redefines our narrow human understanding of Kingship, love, service, humility. I'm still working on Volf's "Exclusion and Embrace" but in thinking about the events of the Last Supper we are confronted with a Jesus looking across the intimacy of the shared meal table at His friends who will run away, at the one who will betray Him. Jesus who embodies "embrace" and we who can so easily embody "exclusion".

I've been much helped by Tom Wright's, "Surprised by Hope". This from chapter 4 which is entitled, "The Strange Story of Easter":

"Thomas, like a good historian, wants to see and touch. Jesus presents Himself to his sight, and invites him to touch; but Thomas doesn't. He transcends the type of knowing he had intended to use, and passes into a higher and richer one... Thomas takes a deep breath, and brings faith and history together in a rush. 'My Lord,' he says, 'and my God.'" (p81f)

May we all have the courage to pass into higher and richer ways of knowing our Risen Lord Jesus.

Heaven is important but it's not the end of the world

My copy of Tom Wright's new book, "Surprised by Hope" has arrived and gone to the top of "waiting-to-be-read" pile. This has encouraged me to revisit some of NTW's other work in "Simply Christian" and elsewhere. Wright challenges the contemporary gnosticism that the world is inherently evil and the task of Christians is to escape the world and take as many people with us as possible.

Listening to NTW speaking about "Simply Christian" I am reminded that Jesus' Kingdom project was about the the kingdom coming "on earth as it is heaven", that in the person of Jesus heaven and earth overlap."

NTW's assertion that "Jesus is Lord and therefore Caesar isn't" challenges all competing world views.

These are themes I have looked at before but I find that now I spend a lot of time preaching on the Kingdom that I need to return to them, and as I reflect on other aspects of our ministry here in Failsworth, God is teaching me new things about His purposes.