Dear friend
She was an older member of a church in a small rust-belt town. She was asked what Easter meant to her. She said that her dad had worked in one of the iron mills. He made good money but his family never saw much of it. He would drink it away on his way home from work.
She knew what it was like to be poor, pants too short with patches and shoes with cardboard to patch the holes. But when she was twelve years old her dad walked with them to church one Sunday morning. Then he walked with them to church the following Sunday. Then one morning he began cooking breakfast before church. The dad who was never home and who was barely present when he was became a different man.
She does not know what prompted this change, but you could call it an Easter story. Life and light breaking into her family. Love reaching them in the darkness.
My personal experience as a pastor confirms a life changing reality. The Resurrection is much more than a one-time miracle that proved Jesus was God. Jesus’ death and resurrection is happening everywhere and all the time. There is always hope. There is always a new day. Death has been defeated.
What's your Easter story? Or are you still waiting on one?
The message for Easter Sunday is
Love
Rises. You have four opportunities to attend an Easter service this weekend: Saturday at 5:30 PM and Sunday at 8:30, 9:50, and 11:10 AM.
Christ is Risen,
David
(The story is, as I recall it, from a sermon preached by Rev Chris Neufeld-Erdman on Easter Sunday at Davis Community Church.)
