Thoughts

The month of April encompasses the second half of the season of Lent, from after Mothering Sunday to Easter day on 21^stApril. It is almost twenty days as the Sundays of Lent are not part of the Lenten observance or fast. The midpoint of a journey is always important because you start to get nearer to your goal rather than your starting point. After the midpoint, it is usually quicker to go on than to turn back. Easter and Holy Week suddenly draw closer.

As the name Holy Week suggests, it is a religious observance which lasts a week. The idea is to follow the last week of Jesus’ earthly life. It starts off with Palm Sunday (14^thApril) which remembers the people welcoming Jesus to Jerusalem with great joy. There is a sudden change of mood as the clouds gather around Jesus as the plot against him thickens. On Maundy Thursday (18^thApril) we remember Jesus at the Last Supper with his disciples and Judas Iscariot betraying him to the Jewish authorities. Good Friday (19^thApril) remembers Jesus wrongly accused and found guilty by the Roman governor. He was executed by crucifixion on a cross. He was hastily buried in a borrowed tomb. On Easter day (Sunday 21^stApril) the tomb was found empty and Jesus was seen alive. 

The journey through Holy Week is often a harrowing time. The events of Jesus’ last earthly week echo some of the events of our lives. We can become isolated and challenged for sticking to our values and beliefs in the face of popular opposition. There are times in our lives where people conspire against us, usually to make our lives more difficult. We try to explain to our closest friends our concerns and worries and they fail to grasp the full significance. We are wrongly accused of things we have not done and are sometimes wrongly found guilty. It is very easy to put ourselves in the position of the victim, but it is much more difficult to place ourselves in the position of the perpetrator. We easily forget that these are the things we have done to others consciously or unwittingly. It is these dark parts of our lives which we are called to bring to God for forgiveness. The events leading up to and including Good Friday speak to us of all that is wrong in us, and the world that we live in. There is no denying that we need salvation!

Easter Sunday presents us with two gifts, that of hope and new life through the resurrection. The hope has always been part of the promise of a relationship with God. The new life through resurrection is a change in the way we view our lives and heaven. Jesus gives both proof of this new life and the grace to receive it. Yet, this is frequently outside of our own experience and this makes this new order so much more difficult to believe. It requires faith rather than proof; this is quite a stumbling block for many.

March seems to bring new energy to our year. It often feels that January is still in the shadow of Christmas or perhaps even paying for Christmas! February feels like glimmers of hope and changes. But in March it really starts to change, in terms of light and day length. As we move past the 20^thMarch the days become longer than the nights and it should, in theory, start to warm up as we approach summer.  As it warms up, the trees and plants spring back into life.  In the early calendars, March and spring signified the beginning of a new year.  There is a sense of the movement from the death of winter into the new life of spring.  You can see why people regarded spring as a new beginning.

From a Christian perspective, March sees the beginning of Lent. It starts on Ash Wednesday on 6th March. The ash in Ash Wednesday refers to the sign of the cross made in ash on the forehead of a person wanting to show a turning away from wrongdoing and coming back to God. Where does this originate from?  In the Old Testament, several characters like Job and in the story of Jonah, the King of Nineveh wear sackcloth and ashes as a visible sign of turning back to God. The use of ashes is only recorded in the 10^thand 11^thcentury for admitting the penitent in readiness for baptism or for readmittance into the church at Easter.  By the middle ages,the Season of Lent was seen not about getting ready to join the church but as a focus on Jesus’ sacrifice for our sins and our renewed commitment to living the Christian life.  It was at this time that the whole church, not just new or returning disciples, used Lent as a time to prepare for Easter. We are encouraged to prepare by self-examination and repentance; by prayer, fasting, and self-denial; and by reading and meditating on God’s holy word. I would encourage us all to try and get realigned with God and use this time of getting ready to adjust our lives into God’s way. 

This year Mothering Sunday and British Summer Time coincide on the last day of March. This has two significant consequences, firstly it marks approximately the midpoint of Lent, so you still have three weeks of your Lenten observance, keep going you will be just over half way to Easter. Secondly, if you are making breakfast in bed for Mum, you will have to remember to change your alarm clock and get up an hour early! It is sometimes all about the sacrifices we make for someone else that we love that is really important. Jesus leads the way in self-sacrifice and he points us back to God’s love for us.

Rev. Martin Wood. The Rectory, Church Lane, Cheriton Bishop EX6 6HY 01647 24119 (Tuesday to Sunday) revwood163@gmail.com

Easter is in late April this year. It is the fifth latest date for Easter. If your birthday is on 21^stApril, the last time Easter landed on your birthday was 1957. However, if you live long enough there are a few Easter birthdays to come in 2030, 2041 and 2052! Then it will be nearly another fifty years until you see Easter on your birthday again; make the most of these four Easters. Back to the pancakes: because Easter is later, Shrove Tuesday (Pancake Day) is on 5^th March. The date of Easter is a moveable feast and everything else has to try and fit around it, which is often easier said than done. Take for instance the school term. The spring term can be very short. This year with a late Easter, the term is twelve weeks long, two or three weeks longer than usual. Consequently, the first half term of the summer term is just five weeks long with three bank holidays to fit in.

In the church year, it often feels that Easter comes hot on the heels of Christmas. When Easter is as late as this year, there is a gap of a month between the end of Christmas and the beginning of Lent. The church calls this ordinary time when there is no special season. On the face of it,this does not seem very interesting. Yet writing this article between Christmas and New Year, when I have been busy and pressurised by work, the idea of a quieter simpler time is enormously appealing. We can only stretch ourselves beyond our normal capacity for a short period of time. Doing anything excessively always results in some form of damage. If we ignore the warning signals, we start making bad judgments, forgetting important things and often becoming ill. Our lives need to be accentuated by highlights which encourage and enthuse. We have to endure the low points in our lives. For most of the time,our lives should be normal and balanced. Too much of the good stuff can be exhausting and make us complacent. Too much of the bad stuff can make us feel low, withdrawn and lead to depression and illness. Life has, for the most part, to be lived normally. What is normal? This is a cause of great debate but I think we know what is right and good for us and we should aspire to get that balance. As part of normal living, there needs to be a good spiritual dimension. We need to keep the lines of communication open to God. God is not just there for a crisis and important times. It is just as important to share our small worries and simple thanks on a daily and regular basis. It is important to develop a real relationship with God and include Him as an integral part of our everyday lives.

Ordinary time reminds us that we need to cultivate a good and healthy lifestyle that incorporates a real spiritual dimension. A little and often works so much better than crisis management.

Rev. Martin Wood. The Rectory, Church Lane, Cheriton Bishop EX6 6HY 01647 24119 (Tuesday to Sunday) revwood163@gmail.com

I am always a little surprised how early Christmas decorations appear, they have drifted into November. When I was growing up, the Christmas decorations went up a week before Christmas. We always seemed to be behind everyone else’s decorations. By contrast, the decorations disappear very quickly within the twelve days of Christmas. I am not sure if people have become tired of the space that the decorations occupy and want their home back to normal, or perhaps the old wives tale of a year’s bad luck if you fail to get them putaway still holds some power. Whatever the reason, the long expected and awaited Christmas is very quickly put away and boxed up for another year.

Now, try to remember your best Christmas present. I do realise it was last year but it is still only a week ago! Try to remember who gave you such a thoughtful and special present that you really wanted. Now imagine taking that present putting it in a box, sealing it and putting it away for next Christmas. The present is so special that you decide to use it only at Christmas every year, that way it will never really get used or ever wear out. What kind ofreaction do you think you might get from such a generous present giver?It may well be the last present you receive from that person!

My point is that thestoryof Christmas is about the birth of Jesus, however,if he just gets born and that is all that happens, it is just a short story and not life changing. But that is not what happens, there is a whole life to be followed and engaged with. Yet, it seems people are happy to celebrate a birth and ignore the significance of the life that follows. The birth becomes important because of the significance of the life lived by Jesus. As we follow Jesus’ life, it brings a new perspective to the ordinaryworld that was around him. Everyday events and experiences took on new significance as Jesus encountered life. At the heart of this Jesus lived an ordinary existence,nota privileged sheltered life. He encountered people in desperate need, often cast out from their community. Jesus met their need and reintegrated them back to their families and communities. He was equally eager for people to encounter and engage with God. Through Jesus,we get glimpses of how God sees the world and how God seesand cares for us.

People thought that God had forgotten them and did not care. But the opposite was true, God was there waiting for them to find their way home. Unlike the person who gave that special present that you put away for next year, God will keep trying each and every time to engage and find us. It is more a matter of whether we have forgotten about God.  Perhaps we put him away until Christmas next year or there is an emergency we cannot handle. That is not a healthy way to encounter Jesus.

Rev. Martin Wood. The Rectory, Church Lane, Cheriton Bishop EX6 6HY 01647 24119 (Tuesday to Sunday) revwood163@gmail.com

The nativity play is often very much part of the preparations for Christmas. Yet, we come to the nativity with mixed feelings. Perhaps, we have been involved in the production of the nativity play, all the children are off sick and we are not sure how we are going to manage! Maybe we look back with fondness and remember a time when we were playing an important part like Mary, Gabriel or a King, and it made a great impression of us. On the other hand, we may be emotionally scarred by not being given a leading role and had to settle for a minor role like a donkey or a sheep and still resent the person who got a better character. I guess many of us might have missed out on the whole thing and it is either a source of relief or a great sadness.

Putting aside personal involvement, I guess most of us have seen several nativity plays and have different memories of them. They often range from very simple with very young children to very accomplished with both adults and children. They can be set in a traditional way or a more contemporary way, yet we recognise the same underlying story. It is often a personal connection that makes one play stick in our minds. I always think of my father in law, as one of the kings in splendid robes bringing gold as a gift. The story often has amusing dimensions, some intentional and some unexpected. There must be a huge catalogue, characters dashing off to the loo, or really not getting on with their fellow actors, or spotting a parent and being completely absent in the middle of the play. The grumpy innkeeper, who has no room at the inn and would rather be safely tucked up in bed usually makes for a colourful character.

Yet, behind the happy outward story, there are some quite painful truths that are easily forgotten. Mary and Joseph were traveling home yet there is no welcome or mention of the family to help out. It was Mary’s first child, she would have been very afraid of what was about to happen to her. There is no mention of a midwife to help with the birth. Complications with births were life-threatening events for both mum and baby. When you understand some of the dangers involved and social isolation, the celebrations of the safe arrival of the baby and mother doing well resound from heaven to earth. The shepherds witness it first hand and are moved to find out more. The people of the East see a star and travel to find out more of what has happened.

If you see a nativity play this year, will it be just like a Christmas decoration that is got out every year and put away for the rest of the year? Or like the shepherds and wisemen will we be drawn into the story and be able to give thanks to God for Jesus Christ, who lived like us?

Rev. Martin Wood. The Rectory, Church Lane, Cheriton Bishop EX6 6HY 01647 24119 (Tuesday to Sunday) revwood163@gmail.com