Lenten Devotion: Easter Sunday, April 8

by Ben Riggs

Christ the Lord is Risen Today
United Methodist Hymnal #302
Words: Charles Wesley, 1739
Music: Lyra Davidica, 1708

1
Christ the Lord is risen today, Alleluia!
Earth and heaven in chorus say, Alleluia!
Raise your joys and triumphs high, Alleluia!
Sing, ye heavens, and earth reply, Alleluia!
2
Love's redeeming work is done, Alleluia!
Fought the fight, the battle won, Alleluia!
Death in vain forbids him rise, Alleluia!
Christ has opened paradise, Alleluia!
3
Lives again our glorious King, Alleluia!
Where, O death, is now thy sting? Alleluia!
Once he died our souls to save, Alleluia!
Where's thy victory, boasting grave? Alleluia!
4
Soar we now where Christ has led, Alleluia!
Following our exalted Head, Alleluia!
Made like him, like him we rise, Alleluia!
Ours the cross, the grave, the skies, Alleluia!
5
Hail the Lord of earth and heaven, Alleluia!
Praise to thee by both be given, Alleluia!
Thee we greet triumphant now, Alleluia!
Hail the Resurrection, thou, Alleluia!
6
King of glory, soul of bliss, Alleluia!
Everlasting life is this, Alleluia!
Thee to know, thy power to prove, Alleluia!
Thus to sing, and thus to love, Alleluia!

Each Easter Sunday millions of people around the world attend services of worship, some of them for the first and only time all year. Nearly all of those worship services in the Protestant or Evangelical tradition begin with a bombastic rendition of the hymn, “Christ the Lord Is Risen Today.”

How does one account for the immense popularity of Charles Wesley’s resonant Easter hymn? Maybe it has something to do with that persistently repetitive Alleluia, our ancient exclamation of praise and rejoicing. If you attended worship at Christ Church on the first Sunday of Lent, you saw Katherine Turpin lead our children in a ritual that placed the word “Alleluia” into the closet for the duration of the Lenten season. Katherine reminded us of the centuries-old tradition of abstinence from speaking or singing Alleluia during Lent. We temporarily put our Alleluias in the closet to remind ourselves that Lent is a time of reflection, repentance, and remembrance.

There are moments like that in our personal lives, as well; situations when we need to put a portion of ourselves away in a safe place apart from public view. These can be times of grief, of indecision, of depression, and of transition. Sometimes the need to hide a part of ourselves is completely out of our control, placed on us by expectations from our job, our peers, our family, or our environment. The Lenten season gives us the opportunity to express these heavier emotions in the context of worship.

Having grown up in a different religious tradition, I never really experienced a season like Lent. Worshiping God in my tradition meant singing Alleluias every Sunday (and Sunday night, and Wednesday night Bible study!) There were parts of my life that were deeply hidden from my family, from me, and most especially from my limited understanding of an Alleluia-only God. How could I genuinely sing the Lord’s song when my heart was lost in such a strange land?

The Easter miracle has much greater significance for me now that it is preceded by a season of quiet contemplation. I am no longer plagued with guilt for keeping parts of myself sheltered away from harm. The third chapter of Ecclesiastes reminds us that we need to allow ourselves time for weeping and mourning as well as laughing and dancing. This Easter Sunday, after my own time of weeping and searching and mending and healing, I look forward to the supreme joy of finally letting my heartfelt Alleluia out of the closet.

Lenten Devotion: Holy Saturday, April 7

by Katherine Turpin

Come, O Thou Traveler Unknown
United Methodist Hymnal #386 & 387
Words: Charles Wesley, 1742 (Gen. 34:24-32)
Music: Trad, Scottish melody, harm. By Carlton R. Young, 1963

1
Come, O thou Traveler unknown,
whom still I hold, but cannot see!
My company before is gone,
and I am left alone with thee;
with thee all night I mean to stay
and wrestle till the break of day.
2
I need not tell thee who I am,
my misery and sin declare;
thyself hast called me by my name,
look on thy hands and read it there.
But who, I ask thee, who art thou?
Tell me thy name, and tell me now.
3
Yield to me now—for I am weak
but confident in self-despair!
Speak to my heart, in blessing speak,
be conquered by my instant prayer;
speak, or thou never hence shalt move,
and tell me if thy name is Love.
4
’Tis Love! ’tis Love! Thou diedst for me,
I hear thy whisper in my heart.
The morning breaks, the shadows flee,
pure Universal Love thou art:
to me, to all, thy mercies move—
thy nature, and thy name is Love.

This hymn includes part of a fourteen-stanza poem based on the story of Jacob wrestling with the angel at the ford of the Jabbok (see Genesis 32:24-32). I choose it for the day after Good Friday because of the story found at 387 in the hymnal: “A little over two weeks after his brother's death, John Wesley tried to teach the hymn at Bolton, but broke down when he came to the lines ‘my company before is gone, and I am left alone with thee.’” This vignette speaks to the loving bond between the two brothers, and John’s deep grief at the loss of his brother. On this day when we think of Jesus’ followers grieving the death of their friend and leader, this hymn seems most appropriate.

In the hymn, Charles Wesley uses the story of Jacob’s wrestling as a metaphor for our common human struggle to know the nature of God. The hymn invites us into the perspective of Jacob by using the first person pronoun throughout. As in the Genesis account, left alone in the terrible struggle throughout the night, Jacob will not let go until he knows the name and the nature of the One with whom he struggles. Though wounded and despairing, Jacob refuses to let go. In Wesley’s poetic rendering of the story, the nature and name is disclosed in the ninth verse (verse four in the musical setting of the hymn):

’Tis Love! ’tis Love! thou diedst for me,
I hear thy whisper in my heart.
The morning breaks, the shadows flee,
pure Universal Love thou art:
to me, to all, thy mercies move—
thy nature, and thy name is Love.

The last line, “thy nature, and thy name is Love,” serves as the refrain for the final six verses. It is, for the Wesley brothers, the central and most important theological conviction: the nature of God, revealed in Christ, is “pure Universal Love.”

Moments of deep grief and despair, particularly at the loss of a loved one, can be the impetus for serious wrestling. Like Jacob, we may walk away from the experience of grief and loss forever marked. Hopefully, like Wesley, we may also come away with a profound experience of the loving nature of God.

Lenten Devotion: Good Friday, April 6

by Patricia Dean

O Love Divine, What Hast Thou Done?
United Methodist Hymnal #287
Words: Charles Wesley, 1742
Music: Isaac B. Woodbury, 1850

1
O Love divine, what hast thou done!
The immortal God hath died for me!
The Father's coeternal Son
bore all my sins upon the tree.
Th’immortal God for me hath died:
My Lord, my Love, is crucified!
2
Is crucified for me and you,
to bring us rebels back to God.
Believe, believe the record true,
ye all are bought with Jesus' blood.
Pardon for all flows from his side:
My Lord, my Love, is crucified!
3
Behold him, all ye that pass by,
the bleeding Prince of life and peace!
Come, sinners, see your Savior die,
and say, “Was ever grief like his?”
Come, feel with me his blood applied:
My Lord, my Love, is crucified!

Why did Jesus die? In his hymn, “O Love Divine, What Hast Thou Done,” Charles Wesley offers the traditional view that Jesus died to atone for human sins: “The Son of God for me hath died…Pardon for all flows from his side.” This belief updates a pre-existing belief, operative in many cultures, that the gods, angered by human behavior, need to be appeased with sacrifices, either animal or human. In the traditional view espoused by Wesley, Jesus is the Final Sacrifice, ending the need for any further blood sacrifice.

Some find it difficult to believe in a God that requires that kind of sacrifice as a prerequisite for the forgiveness of sin. That seems to be a primitive understanding of the divine-human relation.

What Jesus’ death on the cross offers, instead, is a new understanding of the divine-human relation, retaining the power of the sacrificial act as a religious symbol but transforming it into a gesture of love. In committing his life to delivering the message of a radical new vision of the world, Jesus was consciously challenging the power of both Roman and Jewish authorities, thereby exposing himself to their systems of “justice.” The “kingdom” that Jesus offers is grounded in principles that threaten those in power. As the messenger for a salvific Kingdom of God, Jesus chose to be crucified for a vision that now stands for Christians as the most powerful force for good in the world and one that will inevitably be in conflict with flawed human “kingdoms.”

Lenten Devotion: Maundy Thursday, April 5

by Julian Rush

O the Depth of Love Divine
United Methodist Hymnal #627
Words: Charles Wesley, 1745 (Jn. 6:35-38)
Music: Carlton R. Young, 1986

1
O the depth of love divine,
the unfathomable grace!
Who shall say how bread and wine
God into us conveys!
How the bread his flesh imparts,
how the wine transmits his blood
fills his faithful people’s hearts
with all the life of God!
2
Let the wisest mortals show
how we the grace receive;
feeble elements bestow
a power not theirs to give.
Who explains the wondrous way,
how through these virtues came?
These the virtue did convey,
yet still remain the same.
3
How can spirits heavenward rise,
by earthly matter fed,
drink here with divine supplies
and eat immortal bread?
Ask the Father’s wisdom how:
Christ who did the means ordain;
angels round our altars bow
to search it out, in vain.
4
Sure and real is the grace,
the manner be unknown;
only meet us in thy ways
and perfect us in one.
Let us taste the heavenly powers,
Lord, we ask for nothing more.
Thine to bless, ’tis only ours
to wonder and adore.

What actually occurs in the act of Holy Communion? Some believe the bread literally becomes the body of Christ upon ingestion, just as the wine becomes Christ's blood. At the opposite end of the spectrum is a belief that the elements are simply a symbol to remind one of the significance of Christ. The common denominator, of course, is one's recognition of communion as a deeply meaningful experience and practice.

In this hymn, “O the Depth of Love Divine,” Charles Wesley expresses the wonder one is able to discover in Holy Communion. The love and acceptance God has for us, as Wesley describes, is “the unfathomable grace,” or in contemporary words, the experience of God accepting us and working within us.

As a high school sophomore, I attended a Methodist camp meeting in southern Mississippi, where something happened. I don't recall any words or messages from the evening service, but I lay awake most of that night contemplating my existence for the first time. I emerged from that “wrestling with my angel” with a decision to go into ministry. Some might consider my experience implausible, but there was no “hocus pocus” about it for me. Whatever took place that night was real and still is. Somehow I opened myself up to God in a way I had never had before, and, to my surprise, something happened! And what happens with each of us personally during the act of Holy Communion can be real as well. The miracle of God working within us, in Wesley's words, is “only ours to wonder and adore.”

The message delivered by Wesley in “Come, Sinner, to the Gospel Feast” is intrinsically connected with the Holy Communion experience. God accepts us, all of us, just as we are. We are all worthy of God's love—an idea which is difficult for us twenty-first century creatures to buy when we are so constantly bombarded with images of unworthiness: too-thin people, fat people, poor people, ridiculously rich people, sick people, old people, people different in skin color or culture or nationality or religious or political persuasion or, god forbid, orientation! Unconditional acceptance is not an easy concept for us to entertain, but Wesley's hymn, even today, hammers the message home. We are loved and accepted.

The poor, maimed, and blind of Christ's day are included in the gospel feast, just as all the unworthies of our own time must be as well. God loves and accepts us all. The message is timeless. We are still being invited to the feast, and if we open ourselves to that invitation, something might actually happen!

Dear God, during this Lenten season, help me to remember that I am loved; I am accepted; I am worthy. Enable me to open my heart and mind and my life to You. Then, help me to be very, very still and to listen patiently. In Christ's name, Amen.

Photos from 2006 Seder Meal

Relive memories from last year's Seder for Maundy Thursday by viewing this slideshow of great photos.

Lenten Devotion: Wednesday, April 4

by Darlene K. Harmon

Jesus, Lover of My Soul
United Methodist Hymnal #479
Words: Charles Wesley, 1740 (Wis. 11:26)
Music: Joseph Parry, 1879

1
Jesus, lover of my soul,
let me to thy bosom fly,
while the nearer waters roll,
while the tempest still is high.
Hide me, O my Savior, hide,
till the storm of life is past;
safe into the haven guide;
O receive my soul at last.
2
Other refuge have I none,
hangs my helpless soul on thee;
leave, ah! leave me not alone,
still support and comfort me.
All my trust on thee is stayed,
all my help from thee I bring;
cover my defenseless head
with the shadow of thy wing.
3
Thou, O Christ, art all I want,
more than all in thee I find;
raise the fallen, cheer the faint,
heal the sick, and lead the blind.
Just and holy is thy name,
I am all unrighteousness;
false and full of sin I am;
thou art full of truth and grace.
4
Plenteous grace with thee is found,
grace to cover all my sin;
let the healing streams abound,
make and keep me pure within.
Thou of life the fountain art,
freely let me take of thee;
spring thou up within my heart;
rise to all eternity.

Throughout the season of Lent there is much to be learned about the courage it takes to trust in God. As we study the last days in the life of Jesus, we can begin to recognize the courage that he exhibited in his trust in God. His greatest teachings were best represented in the way he lived his life. He taught us much by the example of his own relationship with God. In his hours of despair in Gethsemane, he prayed, “…all things are possible for you. Take this cup of suffering away from me. Yet not what I want, but what you want.” (Mark 14:36 TEV) He surrendered himself to God and prayed to accept God’s will for his life. Yet, our Lord felt despair again and prayed as he hung on the cross, “My God, my God, why did you abandon me?” (Matthew 27:46 TEV) Again he showed his courage by trusting in God at the end of his earthly life with these words: “Father! In your hands I place my spirit.” Yes, the human side of Jesus surrendered to God, then doubted, then surrendered again. Is this so much different for us today as we face the difficulties and great sorrows that our lives hold?

In the days ahead, we are all called to examine our relationship with God as set by the example of Jesus. We, too, are called to have the courage to put our trust in God. When we clutch our problems, live with fear and rely on our human understanding, we close ourselves off from God, our source of help beyond our understanding. It takes courage to trust that God is indeed with us. We must humble ourselves before Him, as Jesus did, and be willing to accept God’s will for our lives. We must have the courage to trust that God’s ever abiding presence is with each of us as our lives unfold. Let God be God—He is all wise and all powerful. Let us remember the words of Christ as he appeared to Mary Magdalene and the other Mary, “Peace be with you. Do not be afraid.” (Matthew 28:9 TEV)

In his hymn, “Jesus, Lover of My Soul,” Charles Wesley so well depicts our need for courage to trust in God and our need to surrender to His care:

Other refuge have I none,
hangs my helpless soul on thee;
leave, ah! leave me not alone,
still support and comfort me.
All my trust on thee is stayed,
all my help from thee I bring;
cover my defenseless head
with the shadow of thy wing.

Yes, let us all have the courage to trust that we are in God’s care and will not falter under the “shadow of His wing.”

Lenten Devotion: Tuesday, April 3

by Shelly Spalding

Jesus, United By Thy Grace
United Methodist Hymnal #561
Words: Charles Wesley, 1749
Music: Johann G. Nageli; arr. by Lowell Mason, 1845

1
Jesus, united by thy grace
and each to each endeared,
with confidence we seek thy face
and know our prayer is heard.
2
Help us to help each other, Lord,
each other's cross to bear;
let all their friendly aid afford,
and feel each other's care.
3
Up unto thee, our living Head,
let us in all things grow;
till thou hast made us free
indeed and spotless here below.
4
Touched by the lodestone of thy love,
let all our hearts agree,
and ever toward each other move,
and ever move toward thee.
5
To thee, inseparably joined,
let all our spirits cleave;
O may we all the loving mind
that was in thee receive.
6
This is the bond of perfectness,
thy spotless charity;
O let us, still we pray,
possess the mind that was in thee.

Charles Wesley wrote “Help us to help each other, Lord, each other’s cross to bear; let all their friendly aid afford, and feel each other’s care. Touched by the lodestone of thy love, let all our hearts agree, and ever toward each other move, and ever move toward thee.” (vss. 2 & 4)

What would the world be like if each of us practiced kindness and love as Jesus did? What if we walked through the world with an eye ready to see, an ear ready to hear, a hand ready to help, and a heart ready to feel? “Kindness is a grace that all can understand,” wrote J.C. Ryle, an Anglican Bishop. As we move through this Holy Week, let us strive to remember these words from Robert Fulghum:

“All I really need to know about how to live and what to do and how to be I learned in kindergarten. Wisdom was not at the top of the graduate-school mountain, but there in the sand pile at Sunday school. These are the things I learned:

“Share everything; Play Fair; don't hit people; Put things back where you found them; Clean up your own mess; Don't take things that aren't yours; Say you're sorry when you hurt somebody; Wash your hands before you eat; Flush; Warm cookies and cold milk are good for you; Live a balanced life - learn some and think some and draw and paint and sing and dance and play and work every day some; Take a nap every afternoon; When you go out into the world, watch out for traffic, hold hands, and stick together; Be aware of wonder. Remember the little seed in the Styrofoam cup: The roots go down and the plant goes up and nobody really knows how or why, but we are all like that; Goldfish and hamsters and white mice and even the little seed in the Styrofoam cup—they all die. So do we; And then remember the Dick-and-Jane books and the first word you learned—the biggest word of all—LOOK.

“Everything you need to know is in there somewhere—The Golden Rule and love and basic sanitation. Ecology and politics and equality and sane living.

“Take any of those items and extrapolate it into sophisticated adult terms and apply it to your family life or your work or your government or your world and it holds true and clear and firm. Think what a better world it would be if all—the whole world—had cookies and milk about three o'clock every afternoon and then lay down with our blankies for a nap. Or if all governments had a basic policy to always put things back where they found them and to clean up their own mess.

“And it is still true, no matter how old you are - when you go out into the world, it is best to hold hands and stick together.” (from All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten, by Robert Fulghum)

Read Ephesians 4:17—5:2

Lenten Devotion: Monday, April 2

by John Jaruzel

Forth in thy Name, O Lord, I Go
United Methodist Hymnal #438
Words: Charles Wesley, 1749
Music: John Hatton, 1793

1
Forth in thy name, O Lord, I go,
my daily labor to pursue;
thee, only thee, resolved to know
in all I think or speak or do.
2
The task thy wisdom hath assigned,
O let me cheerfully fulfill;
in all my works thy presence find,
and prove thy good and perfect will.
3
Thee may I set at my right hand
whose eyes mine inmost substance see,
and labor on at thy command,
and offer all my works to thee.
4
For thee delightfully employ
whate'er thy bounteous grace hath given;
and run my course with even joy,
and closely walk with thee to heaven.

John and Charles Wesley were quite a team, as we at Christ Church have been learning recently. Part Moses and Aaron, part George and Ira Gershwin; together they had a message along with a method to share it with God’s people. Adult Education’s Lenten study of the book A Perfect Love, with reflections on John Wesley’s teachings by Marjorie Hewitt Suchocki, has led us to a deeper understanding of some of Wesley’s great sermons. We now reflect on Charles’s ministry through music.

“Forth in thy Name, O Lord, I Go” was written in 1749, at the midpoint of Charles’s ministry. An apt message for this season, the words bring out the emphasis of mission and service. All we do in this life is in the service of God—not just the extra effort to attend six out of seven services at Christ Church during Lent, but kindness to family, friends or strangers around us, or even brushing our teeth.

In recent years I have served the congregation as Director of Social Action. Big community projects are easy to point out in our history of service. Painting Steven’s house or an apartment for a homeless family, work in the Church yard or work in Mississippi after Katrina, the Inner Beauty Pageant, or working with homeless families, all have emphasis on serving others.

Charles Wesley reminds us that this mission has a broader range. “In all my works thy presence find.” That is 24/7! Is this an impossible and undesirable request, or a way of life that can come as easily as fitting into our favorite old sneakers? We do many things in life that have an emphasis on service, though we may not think of it in that way. Packing lunch for the kids, calling an old friend or calling “hello” to a neighbor over the fence, these too are in God’s service. One of the amazing messages of Christ’s ministry is the radical idea of just being nice to others.

Our lives are full of “whate’er thy bounteous grace hath given.” We live in one of the most beautiful places on Earth, we live under a democratic government, and we have the freedom to worship at our “open and reconciling” church. Our mission this week and always is to try to return that grace to our community. In this Holy Week let us all make an effort to see ourselves in the role of service giver in all that we do.

Lenten Devotion: Palm Sunday, April 1

by George Gibbins

O for a Thousand Tongues to Sing
United Methodist Hymnal #57 & 58
Words: Charles Wesley, 1739
Music: Carl G. Glaser, 1839

1
O for a thousand tongues to sing
my great Redeemer's praise,
the glories of my God and King,
the triumphs of his grace!
2
My gracious Master and my God,
assist me to proclaim,
to spread through all the earth abroad
the honors of thy name.
3
Jesus! the name that charms our fears,
that bids our sorrows cease;
'tis music in the sinner's ears,
'tis life, and health, and peace.
4
He breaks the power of canceled sin,
he sets the prisoner free;
his blood can make the foulest clean;
his blood availed for me.
5
He speaks, and listening to his voice,
new life the dead receive;
the mournful, broken hearts rejoice,
the humble poor believe.
6
Hear him, ye deaf; his praise, ye dumb,
your loosened tongues employ;
ye blind, behold your Savior come,
and leap, ye lame, for joy.
7
In Christ, your head, you then shall know,
shall feel your sins forgiven;
anticipate your heaven below,
and own that love is heaven.

In 1739, 268 years ago, Charles Wesley penned the words to this hymn. Could it be sung around the world in more than 200 countries in many different languages by Christians on this Palm Sunday?

As I sit and read the line from the hymn, “Hear him, ye deaf; his praise ye dumb, your loosened tongues employ; ye blind, behold your Savior come; and leap, ye lame, for joy,” I am both depressed and grateful for science and modern technology that has been, and is continuing on a daily basis, to be developed to improve the lives of those men and women wounded in Iraq and Afghanistan. Not only are our military personnel being injured and killed, but so are many more innocent men, women and children in two countries embroiled in civil strife The war will go on because politics deems it. The injuries and deaths will continue because they are a result of warfare. Healing will take place because medical science, doctors, nurses and patients will remain hopeful of surgery, physical therapy and time.

The lame will receive some form of prosthesis. They will learn to walk and even run with the aid of a mechanical foot or leg. Artificial hands and arms are being developed that operate by means of the thought process of the brain.

The blind will embark on a new journey. Instead of sight, the blind will learn to read Braille with their finger tips; computers will read to them and recordings on cassettes and CD’s will educate and entertain.

Exploding bombs will take more tolls on hearing and speaking. Again technology will provide assistance to those injuries that are not life threatening, but debilitating in some form. Life continues for the living. By the grace of God, mankind must meet all challenges. May peace be soon to come? Oh, for a thousand tongues to sing my great Redeemer’s praise!