Entering

Easter week is here again, and last year I promised God and myself that it would be different this time. I was going to do this right with Him, with my family. 

For the first 10 years that I've been aware of my Salvation in Jesus, I've struggled with a lack of focus on Him during Christmas and Easter holidays.

I've always pushed the blame for this on the etched habits of my secular upbringing, our obligations to family and cultural traditions... but this year I'm learning a hard humbling lesson:
I have been dead wrong.

Because nothing can stand in the way of me celebrating Jesus (Romans 8:38-39).

God doesn't require me to lock myself or my family away for days on end to be with Him. He doesn't need me to partake in a ceremonial cleansing to make myself fit for his presence. I don't have to travel to a temple, or even light a candle.

The facts are all here in my head. I just have to click on "transfer" and impart them onto my heart. I just have to pray that He will continue to make newness of this Life in Him, and then watch the New Life begin to grow.  (2 Corinthians 5:17) 

These Christ centered holidays should be the easiest times to be in the presence of God. They set the perimeters around a specific Sacred event for which we can focus on, together... and all we have to do is enter.  

And when I do, my own walk becomes enriched as I meditate on the life of Jesus and His journey to the cross, for me.

The Truth:

I've fallen short. (Romans 3:23) 

The Father knows it. (Ezekiel 11:5) 

Sin has it's consequences. (Romans 6:23) 

God sends His only Son, my friend, Jesus. (John 15:13-14) 

And what's worse than giving your own self to die but to ask your only son to die right before your eyes?

And Jesus showed, and stopped the trial right from under me. (John 18:28-40) 

He stuck out His Hand to take on the mess that kept me from Our Father...
He asked to wear my sins and stand trial in my place. 

And what would be worse than to hear your own son plead for you to let the cup pass, knowing full well your very will for him to drink of it?

(Matthew 26:42) 

But Jesus traded with me...
the cost of my flesh for the chance that I'd leave it behind to follow Him. 

(1 Peter 2:24) 

And He fully paid my penalty, The Lamb of complete atonement,
that I could stand before Him, spotless. 

(John 1:29) 

It was a brutal trial.

There was spitting for my calloused heart.
But the spit ran down His face. 

(Matthew 26:67) 

There was beating for my stubborn refusal.
But the blows pummeled my Redeemer.

(Luke 22:63)

There was mockery and humiliation for my pride.
But they stripped, jeered at, and taunted my own Brother in my place. 

(Matthew 27:29) 

There was an abandoning from The Father.

And what would be worse than asking your son to wear the ugly, suffer the brutality, die young, and to have you turn your back on Him in his final moment of earth life?
But it was done, and it was His Son who He turned His Face from. (Matthew 27:46)

There was spearing for my impurity.
But it was He who took the blade.(John 19:34)

There is the gift of freedom for me, at 33 years old,
but He was dead for 3 days, at 33 years, to make that way for me. (Ephesians 2:8-9)

And I don't need to wear a fancy dress, or wash behind my kid's ears. I don't have to find a rock and throw myself across it for the night. I don't have to steal away to count, recite, or stand-sit-kneel. I don't have to moo, or hop on one foot, or offer a ram for slaughter.

The Truth is, I can look for Him right here in the kitchen, in my pajamas, with my bed-head and my broken Nikon. I can trace the nails with my trembling gratitude wrapped in shame for my partaking. I can receive the forgiveness and lose myself in His Mercy, nose down in my own stinky living room carpeting. 

I can return to my feet, grab this camera, and ask that He will bless me to find Him in this very place. (Matthew 7:7-8) 

The veil is torn. (Matthew 27:51)

The simple Truth:
No matter the eggs, or bunnies... the holy oils or monasteries,
Our God is right here. Always.

Where can I go from Your Spirit?

Or where can I flee from Your presence? 

If I ascend to heaven, You are there;

If I make my bed in Sheol, behold, You are there.

If I take the wings of the dawn,

If I dwell in the remotest part of the sea, 

Even there Your hand will lead me,

And Your right hand will lay hold of me.

~Psalm 139:7-10