Monthly Newsletter

Dear Church Friends,

April brings the final days of Lent, leading to Holy Week and Easter. We experience the tumultuous events seen in the celebration of Palm Sunday, in the poignancy of Maundy Thursday; the sharing of bread and

the washing of feet, and in the anguish, betrayal and heartbreak of Good Friday, where Christ becomes one with the pain and suffering of the world.

Elsewhere in the newsletter Paula has given us an Abecedarian poem for reflection on Good Friday. This clever poem has each line beginning with a consecutive letter of the alphabet and takes us through from

Gethsemane to the cross.

From Good Friday there is a brief and mysterious pause for Easter Eve, and then the wonder and beauty of Easter Day, where new life bursts from the tomb; uncontrollable and uncontainable.

This is a truly wonderful season in the church calendar, the events at the heart of our faith. But Easter Day is not the end of our story; it is in reality the first page of a new book, a new era, a new world, a new

reality . One of our friends plays the drums for a local group of musicians .During March they played a concert celebrating the songs of Cat Stevens.

My wife and I attended and I loved the music. Towards the end they sang “Morning has Broken.” I remembered it well from primary school assemblies, and of course we have it often in church today. Although Cat Stevens made it popular, it was originally written and published in 1931 by Eleanor Farjeon, and is sung to the tune of a traditional Scottish folk song.

Morning has broken like the first morning

Blackbird has spoken like the first bird

Praise for the singing, praise for the morning

Praise for them springing fresh from the world

Sweet the rains new fall, sunlit from Heaven

Like the first dewfall on the first grass

Praise for the sweetness of the wet garden

Sprung in completeness where His feet pass

Mine is the sunlight, mine is the morning

Born of the one light, Eden saw play

The words are a celebration of new life, they are an Easter poem; they are words for every day. Every new day. They are full of joy and echo the freshness of a new dawn. A metaphor for our complete redemption, the new life given to us each and every day. Our re-creation through Christ’s grace and in God’s love.

This year, on Easter morning, Mike and I will welcome the dawn outside Christ Church. By the warmth of a small fire, we will watch the first light of Easter Day together; followed by tea and butties in the church. We

warmly invite others to join us.

Later, at a more sensible time, our two churches will join in a service of Holy Communion at St. Michael's, in a service led by the Archdeacon, as we celebrate Easter together.

In St. Michaels, Atworth we have a beautiful window which speaks to me of the Risen Christ.

The figure is a young man, beardless, and bearing no scars. That might lead us to think this is someone else, perhaps a young gardener. There is an ambiguity in the image. His bare feet are surrounded by flowers, as the very earth seems to celebrate his passing. His arms spread wide in the form of the cross, but here he welcomes us. His arms held out to embrace us. His youth, his energy, the beauty of the flora around him, all speak of new life, opportunity, and hope. There is no hint of the horror of Good Friday.

That day has passed, and Christ rises triumphant in victory over death. This is our Easter hope.

Until Easter day we wait, expectantly, in anticipation.

Sharing joy and sorrow. Sharing faith, sharing life.

May God bless us in this precious season

Keith