Preferring Nothing to Christ

Matthew 28: 8-15

Filled with awe and great joy the women came quickly away from the tomb and ran to tell the disciples.

When I read the Gospel text for today it is the word ‘ran’ which leaps out at me. We hear it several times at our Easter Vigil, in John’s account of the resurrection. There we have the rather charming details of who ran faster and got to the tomb first.

I can’t remember the last time I had to run anywhere. Much of my life takes place at a fairly sedate pace. The pattern of the monastic day means that you are more or less sure of what is coming next and you organise yourself accordingly.

I probably most associate running with being a child and being eager to get somewhere or just running for the sheer pleasure of it. As a child there’s energy, freedom and excitement all mixed together as you run.

The women, we are told, are ‘filled with awe and joy’. Their reaction is immediate and heartfelt: they run to share the news, only to encounter Jesus himself along the way. It’s love which powers their running. When Jesus says “Do not be afraid,” he is offering both comfort and a call to action, reminding us that encountering the risen Christ is not the end of the journey, but the beginning of a mission—to go, to tell, to witness.

Can you picture yourself running to tell the news of the resurrection?
Can you imagine the love that powers you?

John 20:1-9

I’ve always loved the early morning. I was usually the first up at home and loved to be in school extra early. There is something about the quiet and the dark that prepares me for the day. Often in the morning I find that my heart and my mind have found a solution to a problem or that a difficulty from the day before doesn’t look quite so bad. Neuroscientists tell us that our cortisol levels are raised in the morning, so things really do look and feel much better.

I can easily picture myself with Mary Magdalene, having awoken from a light sleep and wanting to be at the place where Jesus was laid. I can picture myself standing by the entrance to the tomb and waiting a while before I can look right in. I imagine the dark as a kind of protection for the confusion that Mary feels.

What begins in darkness for Mary ends in dawn and recognition as Jesus speaks her name. This moment of encounter always makes my heart beat faster. Don’t we all want someone to say our name and to know us as we truly are? Mary’s exclamation of ‘Rabbuni’ is our cry of recognition too.

Where do you see the face of the Risen Christ?

A Sonnet for Mary Magdalene

Men called you light so as to load you down,
And burden you with their own weight of sin,
A woman forced to cover and contain
Those seven devils sent by Everyman.
But one man set you free and took your part
One man knew and loved you to the core
The broken alabaster of your heart
Revealed to Him alone a hidden door,
Into a garden where the fountain sealed,
Could flow at last for him in healing tears,
Till, in another garden, he revealed
The perfect Love that cast out all your fears,
And quickened you with loves own sway and swing,
As light and lovely as the news you bring.

Malcolm Guite

Holy Saturday is often spoken about as a day of ‘emptiness and numbness’. On one level this is true, but since entering the monastery I have discovered another dimension. On a day when you could feel out of sorts and not quite know what to do the for best, the framework of the monastic liturgy boundaries time and space for me. We begin the day with Office of Readings and listen to a text from the Lamentations of the Prophet Jeremiah. A cantor sings the descant line and the melody is played on a tenor recorder. It is a hauntingly beautiful combination. Every word is poignant.

‘The favours of the Lord are not all past,
nor his kindnesses exhausted;
every morning they are renewed;
‘My portion is the Lord’ says my soul,
‘and so I will hope in him.’

‘The Lord is good to those who trust him,
to the soul that searches for him.
It is good to wait in silence
for the Lord to save.‘

There’s tremendous comfort in knowing that the Lord’s kindnesses are not exhausted. There’s hope too in the knowledge that each day God’s love and faithfulness for each of us is renewed.

Can you bring to mind people in your own life who most need to hear these words?

Sometimes in the face of great sorrow and hardship all we can do is ‘wait in silence for the Lord to save.’

Can you pray these verses for someone you know to be suffering great hardship? Can you be the one who waits in silence with them?

Hebrews 4:14-16, 5:7-9

Every piece of text in the Good Friday liturgy is heavy with meaning. Pieces of scripture that I may have heard throughout the year have a whole new resonance today. I found it hard to pick just one text. I settled on the text from Hebrews. In a series of fairly complicated chapters the writer wants us to understand that Jesus is our model. It’s that simple. The way in which Jesus lived, loved and worked is our model.

The writer of Hebrews doesn’t sugar coat things. Jesus learns to obey through suffering. This may not sit easily with us. My own instinct is usually to avoid suffering. I wouldn’t naturally associate this with a growth in obedience. It is usually after the event that I look at a period of suffering as a time of growth. Life in the monastery has taught that obedience is much more than keeping rules. It’s a type of deep listening where you confront your true self.

Commentators tell us that the writer of Hebrews wants to suggest that Jesus learnt and developed during his life, just like us. On the cross Jesus’ learning is complete and he knows himself as Son. His whole life has pointed to this moment of obedience.

What have you learnt during Lent ?

Exodus 12:1-8,11-14
John 13:1-15

Each year I am stuck by how much the liturgy invites us to engage our senses during Holy Week. We wave a palm branch, we hear the story of the anointing and can imagine the smell of the perfume filling the house, we picture the silver coins of betrayal and the darkness of the night as Judas leaves the Last Supper. When we reach Maundy Thursday we are invited to one of the most intimate rituals in our liturgical year. It’s a ritual with an in-built vulnerability.

In his book Healing Wounds, Bishop Erik Varden quotes from Confessions of a Chiropodist, by Katja Oskamp on the vulnerability and shame people feel on revealing their feet to another:
‘Whether they’re labourers from a building site or vain fellows covered in tattoos, whether they’re pregnant or old ladies, spiritual low-flyers or academics, all apologise, the first time they remove socks and shoes, for their feet.’

So in the liturgy that marks the beginning of the most solemn three days of our liturgical year the Church invites us to a place of vulnerability. Bowls, jugs, water, feet, a kiss: here we see our servant King. Here Jesus embodies the kingdom. Every value is reversed. In one verse of Scripture we see the power of the Incarnation;

‘He got up from table, removed his outer garment and, taking a towel, wrapped it round his waist; he then poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples’ feet and to wipe them with the towel he was wearing’

Jesus shows us love in action:

got up,
removed,
taking,
wrapped,
poured,
wash,
wiped.

The ritual of foot-washing always reminds me that there is a two-way dynamic of grace. There is the grace of the one who serves and the grace of the one who accepts the service. Our world needs both.

Can you have the grace both to serve and be served?

Isaiah 50:4-9 
Matthew 26:14-25

Today we have Matthew’s telling of the Last Supper. Once again Judas is in full focus and his actions seem inevitable. Those thirty pieces of silver are lodged in our collective imagination through art, poetry and hymnody.

Stories of betrayal are always uncomfortable. Betrayal can happen in a matter of seconds. We can say or do something that we can never take back. Perhaps Judas stands for all of our moments of betrayal? Perhaps he stands for all the times we have ‘headed out into the night’? Perhaps he stands for all those times we have watched our hope die and made a wrong choice?

Scripture scholar Ben Witherington comments that Judas may have been a zealot and so would have expected a political Messiah: ‘If this was Judas’ background, then his dreams of what Jesus would accomplish at Passover A.D. 30 would have been shattered by the last supper in which Jesus made clear he was about to give his life for his disciples, and others. We must all beware when we love our vision and dream of the Kingdom more than we love Jesus– for Jesus will require it of us. I suspect Judas was such a person.’

How do you see the character of Judas?

Isaiah 49:1-6
John 13:21-33,36-38

While at supper with his disciples, Jesus was troubled in spirit and declared, ‘I tell you most solemnly, one of you will betray me.

In today’s Gospel the mood intensifies. We can easily imagine the scene of Jesus sharing a meal with his disciples. When film producers portray this they build the drama with music and dramatic pauses. I always imagine it as a sultry night.

Meals are intimate occasions. Friendships can be deepened and difficulties healed through the sharing of food. They can also highlight discord and deepen rifts. In this meal the figure of Judas comes into full focus for us. It’s uncomfortable and leaves me unsettled. I am always left wondering what motivated Judas. There seems a certain inevitability about the events that will unfold. His fate seems sealed:
As soon as Judas had taken the piece of bread he went out. Night had fallen.

This always chills me. In John’s Gospel there is a play between light and darkness, sight and blindness. The very next lines in the text are ‘now has the Son of man been glorified’. There is no portrayal of a victim here. Jesus is in control. That God’s glory is to be revealed through suffering is our focus now, to this we cling.

Imagine the scene.
Do you follow Judas out into the night?
Or do you stay sitting at the table?

How is God speaking to you through this scene?

Isaiah 42:1-7
John 12:1-11

The anointing at Bethany stops me in my tracks each year. For much of the liturgical year the lectionary leads us through the teaching and miracles of Jesus. From time to time we have a personal encounter: Zacchaeus, the Syro-Phoenecian woman, the Samaritan woman etc. Each encounter is life-changing.

Today’s text from John 12 always shifts the focus for me. Here at Bethany Jesus is amongst friends. He has shared his life with them. He has been more than a teacher and a worker of miracles. And then, at this crowded gathering, Mary does one of the most intimate things recorded in the Gospels. In all love and reverence she kneels at his feet, pouring out perhaps the most costly thing she had. She doesn’t speak. She shows her love in a silent action. We are left to imagine how Jesus experiences her love and reverence.

I find Janet Morley’s writing helpful here:

My cup was spilling with betrayal,
but she has filled it with wine;
my face was wet with fear,
but she has anointed me with oil,
and my hair is damp with myrrh.
The scent of her love surrounds me;
it is more than I can bear.
She has touched me with authority;
in her hands I find strength.
For she acts on behalf of the broken,
and her silence is the voice of the unheard.
Though many murmur against her, I will praise her;
and in the name of the unremembered,
I will remember her.

(All Desires Known)

Can you picture yourself in the scene?

What do you see?

Listen to Miriam’s Story
Read Ps 118 and Mark 11:1-11

Imagine that you are part of the crowd.
What do you see? What do you hear?

Miriam sings Ps 118, longing for the Messiah to come.
What do you long for as Holy Week begins?

Image © Ally Barrett (www.reverendally.org) and used with permission. 

Isaiah 50:4-7
Philippians 2:6-11
Luke 22:14-23:56

Each morning he wakes me to hear,
to listen like a disciple.
The Lord has opened my ear.

As we begin Holy Week the Church invites us on a journey. This week is like no other in the year. The Church tells her story in words and images, in ritual and drama, and in silence and song. We are invited to find ourselves in the scriptural stories.

The First Reading for today from Isaiah 50 can be a helpful starting place for the week. The servant knows himself as a disciple. Each day his task is to hear what God is saying. God has already created in him an openness and a readiness. God has opened the servant’s ear. I hear this as promise that God will speak to us.

Make a conscious effort this week to listen to God in the scriptures and those around you.

What do you most want to hear?