Paschal Three Days I - Maundy Thursday - I Cor 11. 23-26 Body of Christ
It is probably in the last century that we have seen the renewal of Easter (Pascha) celebration as three days providing the central holy days of who we are. The passion of Jesus and His rising from the grave; the Holy Sacrament of Baptism, particularly as foreshadowed in the flood and in the rescue of Israel through the sea and the journey to the promise land; the Lord's Supper as the food of our redemption and sustenance of the daily and weekly life which is that of being a servant to others. The Paschal story it is of the lamb of God taking away the world's sin moving toward the lamb who sits on the throne as Ruler of the Universe, the apocalypse or revelation that we seem to forget in the terrors and tragedies of the world.
Our outlook on "Holy Week" is living in a transition between three individual holidays with titles for each day and the Triduum or three days which are of one liturgy, over multiple days. From a culture that goes home between days as a majority culture toward a renewal that is more like a celebration that you wouldn't even think of missing a moment. Celebrating the Paschal three days are a little more like a county fair or convention of Christians than a club dance where you have to show your membership card to get in. There is tension for the identity of celebration itself, with great implications for what our faith itself is about.
The possibilities are as boundless as our redemption for themes and emphases in the worship that begins Thursday night and concluding in the vigil into the day of resurrection. The "sunrise" service" is solidly set in the protestant ethos of our country, while virtually unknown in catholic practise (both Roman and otherwise). Then there are those churches who live the continuing tension in scheduling Easter. In recent times, it seemed that three days renewal lost out and sunrise services won out, but in the collapse of protestant Christianity out of cultural dominance in the last generation, so also has Easter - except for eggs, bunnies, and chocolate - lost out with unusual worship times of any kind.
To gather in praise and thanksgiving as the Body of Christ in this time and place is particularly to sing, "Christ is risen." Even in the first few words of a Three Day's service, our annual celebration points us to the truths of the entire year. The forty days concluded give way on Sunday to 50 days to Pentecost, the revelation of the Church to the world, the body of Christ and his dying and rising "for the sake of the life of the world."
As we read John 13, the Gospel for Holy Thursday, we may see the true life of the body in the love that is eventually (i.e. in the events of life) happening through the members of Christ's Body. His love for the world that led Him to be lifted up on the cross to draw the whole world to Himself, His rising from the dead to ascend to His Father in order that we too might come to the eternal life for which we were born. Our life "abundant" (per John 10.10) is life in the Body of Christ receiving nourishment from that body for life of that body.
In this season of COVID-19 the Body of Christ has a particular challenge. Its' many members around the world try to live with a situation in which the battle against a virulent and death dealing disease requires isolation from one another, simply in order to have a semblance of control of it, both in prevention and in palliative care, to slow or halt the disease's course toward causing death in many of its' victims There is remarkable unity around the world in this matter. Whether rulers and authorities choose to save lives, wager lives in inactive prevention tactics, thereby betting that hospital systems will not be overrun, or even deny the disease or use the disease to attempt to crush political opposition, minorities, or other nations (as if the virus can read border posts or cares about skin colour.) America wins nothing in a race with suffering and death. It is not a beauty competition between nations and states.
The Body of Christ is giving up its greatest treasure, corporate worship, in the interest of our common humanity, to stem the tsunami of COVID-19. This ministry we offer in the name of Christ's healing is also the weapon of political oppression. Nonetheless, in the face of so many deathlike things going on around the world, we face as church an unprecedented world wide move against this disease as yet without a cure.
The life of Jesus of Nazareth, His death and His resurrection, was His Father's action against a disease that humankind cannot escape. Around the altar and pulpit we have received the Lord's body and blood and are shaped by the Holy Spirit to be children of God. Our lives are no less equipped to offer good news to the world . But the Holy Spirit is not troubled by or bound to our addictions to busyness and wordiness.
"Now the silence, now the peace, now the empty hands uplifted. . ." (ELW 460)
I don't think that Jaroslav J Vajda was going all pandemic on us when he wrote this text back in the mid 1960's. Such is the way of prophecy, however. It could be the Body of Christ with all its members, are called to stand boldly - could be in silence, could be with empty hands uplifted - until the day when death's power is broken, and a truly noisy celebration of resurrection will explode forth!
Our outlook on "Holy Week" is living in a transition between three individual holidays with titles for each day and the Triduum or three days which are of one liturgy, over multiple days. From a culture that goes home between days as a majority culture toward a renewal that is more like a celebration that you wouldn't even think of missing a moment. Celebrating the Paschal three days are a little more like a county fair or convention of Christians than a club dance where you have to show your membership card to get in. There is tension for the identity of celebration itself, with great implications for what our faith itself is about.
The possibilities are as boundless as our redemption for themes and emphases in the worship that begins Thursday night and concluding in the vigil into the day of resurrection. The "sunrise" service" is solidly set in the protestant ethos of our country, while virtually unknown in catholic practise (both Roman and otherwise). Then there are those churches who live the continuing tension in scheduling Easter. In recent times, it seemed that three days renewal lost out and sunrise services won out, but in the collapse of protestant Christianity out of cultural dominance in the last generation, so also has Easter - except for eggs, bunnies, and chocolate - lost out with unusual worship times of any kind.
To gather in praise and thanksgiving as the Body of Christ in this time and place is particularly to sing, "Christ is risen." Even in the first few words of a Three Day's service, our annual celebration points us to the truths of the entire year. The forty days concluded give way on Sunday to 50 days to Pentecost, the revelation of the Church to the world, the body of Christ and his dying and rising "for the sake of the life of the world."
As we read John 13, the Gospel for Holy Thursday, we may see the true life of the body in the love that is eventually (i.e. in the events of life) happening through the members of Christ's Body. His love for the world that led Him to be lifted up on the cross to draw the whole world to Himself, His rising from the dead to ascend to His Father in order that we too might come to the eternal life for which we were born. Our life "abundant" (per John 10.10) is life in the Body of Christ receiving nourishment from that body for life of that body.
In this season of COVID-19 the Body of Christ has a particular challenge. Its' many members around the world try to live with a situation in which the battle against a virulent and death dealing disease requires isolation from one another, simply in order to have a semblance of control of it, both in prevention and in palliative care, to slow or halt the disease's course toward causing death in many of its' victims There is remarkable unity around the world in this matter. Whether rulers and authorities choose to save lives, wager lives in inactive prevention tactics, thereby betting that hospital systems will not be overrun, or even deny the disease or use the disease to attempt to crush political opposition, minorities, or other nations (as if the virus can read border posts or cares about skin colour.) America wins nothing in a race with suffering and death. It is not a beauty competition between nations and states.
The Body of Christ is giving up its greatest treasure, corporate worship, in the interest of our common humanity, to stem the tsunami of COVID-19. This ministry we offer in the name of Christ's healing is also the weapon of political oppression. Nonetheless, in the face of so many deathlike things going on around the world, we face as church an unprecedented world wide move against this disease as yet without a cure.
The life of Jesus of Nazareth, His death and His resurrection, was His Father's action against a disease that humankind cannot escape. Around the altar and pulpit we have received the Lord's body and blood and are shaped by the Holy Spirit to be children of God. Our lives are no less equipped to offer good news to the world . But the Holy Spirit is not troubled by or bound to our addictions to busyness and wordiness.
"Now the silence, now the peace, now the empty hands uplifted. . ." (ELW 460)
I don't think that Jaroslav J Vajda was going all pandemic on us when he wrote this text back in the mid 1960's. Such is the way of prophecy, however. It could be the Body of Christ with all its members, are called to stand boldly - could be in silence, could be with empty hands uplifted - until the day when death's power is broken, and a truly noisy celebration of resurrection will explode forth!
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