"The Lord God has opened my ear, and I was not rebellious, I did not turn backward.  I gave my back to those who struck me, and my cheeks to those who pulled out my beard; I did not hide my face from insult and spitting ... I have set my face like a flint" Isaiah 50:5-6, 7

Dearly Beloved in Christ,

On Palm Sunday within less than thirty minutes we move from "hosanna" to "crucify."  It took a week for the crowd in Jerusalem to turn from hailing Jesus as king to condemning him as blasphemer.  But none of it took Jesus by surprise.

He told his disciples three times that he was going to Jerusalem to be mocked, flogged, spat upon, and crucified.  Knowing what awaited him he still "set his face to go to Jerusalem."  He was born to die this death for you and me.

Seven hundred years before Messiah's birth God revealed through his prophet Isaiah the suffering servant nature of the one who would bring us release from captivity to sin.

In the first of the "Servant Songs" in Isaiah (click here for the Scriptures) the Lord reveals that the Servant of God is one in whom God delights, and upon whom God's Spirit rests.  He is gentle and yet has the resolve and strength to accomplish the task of bringing justice - God's rule to all the world.  In the second Servant Song of Isaiah the servant himself speaks about his call "from before I was born" and his commission to be "a light to the Gentiles," to bring God's salvation to the ends of the earth. In the third Servant Song, which was read on Palm Sunday, we immediately make the correlation between what is happening to the suffering servant and what happened to Christ at his trial and scourging: "I was not disobedient ... I gave my back to those who strike me ..."  In the fourth Servant Song the crucifixion of Christ is described, he was marred beyond human semblance, he was despised by the people, "he was wounded for our transgressions, crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the punishment that made us whole, and by his bruises we are healed."

We can tend to sanitize Jesus on the cross - we can perhaps cope with a cleaned up body on a cross - but on Palm Sunday we are confronted with a man of sorrows, with a suffering, sacrificing servant Lord so disfigured by the scourging that he is barely recognizable.  With a servant king who came for this.  With a God/Man willing to go to any lengths, to any depths of humiliation, through any amount of excruciating pain if by it he can rescue his beloved and bring them home.  And that beloved is you.  "God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us." Romans 5:8

He did it for love of you.
In the Peace, Grace, and Love of our Lord,
Rev'd Sarah+ 

On Sunday afternoon I saw this video posted on Facebook - it seems to fit with the message .... at the second "crucify" it suddenly hits the younger brother ...

Palm Sunday

BEATING THE BOUNDS AND CREAM TEA PHOTOS
Thanks to our wonderful photographers: Jim Sutton, David Guerdan, Terri Sims, and Charlotte Everbach, and to kitchen crew Valerie Welch, Jada Walker, Terri Sims and many others who pitched in, and to those who brought the sandwiches, scones, and other goodies, and those who set such beautiful tables. 

Beating the Bounds - March 17, 2013

THE PASCHAL TRIDUUM
Maundy Thursday 6:30 pm
All Night Watch 8:00 pm Thursday to Noon on Good Friday
Good Friday 12:00 noon - Mass of the Presanctified
Good Friday 6:30 pm - Stations of the Cross
The Great Vigil of Easter/Sunrise Service - 6:30 am
Easter Services - 8:30 am and 10:30 am

  Click here for Holy Week and Easter on the website

EASTER LUNCH

Easter Sunday, March 31st after the 10:30 am
ALL ARE WELCOME!

 

Edie Guerdan and Jean LeMieux-Warthen