Perspectives by Rev. Geoff Howard

New Year’s Eve is the traditional occasion for making some splendid resolutions. It’s become a time for deciding how your life should shape up for the year ahead, a time for planning how you should […]

Easter People

What is Easter?  How does one explain it? What does it mean for you?  

Bunnies, chicks, eggs, cocoons and butterflies, flowering bulbs are all symbolic of new life and spring time in our part of the world.  They symbolize the cycle of life.  New life comes after a period of dormancy or preparation.  I don’t know much about the tradition of chocolate, but we sure do like to eat it.  

Christians are described as Easter people.  In this definitive act of Jesus’ resurrection, we find hope amidst despair.  We declare that death has lost its sting.  God’s love is stronger than death.  We declare that the world’s powers and principalities do not have the last word, God does.  God’s Word is alive and dwells among us as we follow Christ.  

What matters most to me in this Eastertide and every day really, is how we live into being Easter people.

Following are a few thoughts….Wayne Shaw writes, “God has promised to do for us what he did for Jesus, and he expects us to live like it.”  

James Massey says, “The resurrection means that God has broken into our old human order with a divine deed of utter newness; he has taken that closed situation we call death and shown us that it stands open at the other end–the door torn off at the hinges!”. 

John Stott writes, “no temptation is too strong to conquer by this resurrection power.  No task is too difficult to accomplish by this same power if God has called us to do it.  Are you defeated?  Burdened?  Overwhelmed with worries or fears or responsibilities?  Then think of the resurrection of Jesus.  Ask God to open your eyes to know the immeasurable greatness of his power that raised Jesus from the death, and then as you look to Him in quiet, steady confidence, you’ll find the same power made available for you.”  

Easter is not back there, nor is it out there; it is here and now, and you and I are the proof and experience of it.  Let’s live as Easter people with its attending grace and joy and with hearts and minds that are open to the new thing that God offers to us each day.  We are re-born, re-newed, and re-created each day.  

Awaken me, this new-created day,

 O God of love, of life.

O anxious soul, still wrapped in death, come out. 

Walk free. Walk free. 

 (S. Garnaas-Holmes)

Blessings for Eastertide

Rev. Arlyce Schiebout

Lakeshore United Church

Morrisburg

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Do you know what actually proves spring is here? It’s not the robins, or the dandelions, or the leaves on the trees. 

It’s all those ambitious people, inside and outside of their homes, up to their elbows in that ritual known as “spring cleaning.”   

Actually to my mind, that’s really a misleading description. It seems to imply that people only scrub out their homesteads four times in an entire year: spring, summer, winter and fall. 

Oh, wait a minute. 

That is how I do it. And I may have inadvertently overlooked winter this year.

However, like everyone else, I do have my cleaning rituals. 

First, I line up all the magazines I have purchased and carefully pull out those cardboard “subscription” inserts either stapled or tucked into them. Then I throw them all out. Task done.

Second, I go through the refrigerator and decide what needs to be cleaned out. I always try to toss those products which have a “best before” date prior to the First Gulf War. I move from those to  containers filled with whatever I was trying to cook last week and also dump those into the garbage. Generally, I can’t identify the remains anyway. Task done.

I do dust. However, I must admit that the messages visitors regularly write on my tables and chairs are usually really amusing, and it seems a shame to use furniture polish to remove them. 

I tried cleaning the oven once. It was not a particularly successful undertaking. I won’t go into a lot of details, but that smell like charred tortoise lingered in the house for days. 

And really, I don’t cook that much anyway. Tasks done.

I painted the spare bedroom one spring in a poorly conceived plan to brighten up the walls. I dropped the gallon of paint, which wouldn’t have been that much of an issue had the can not been open at the time. I also had a little trouble with the ceiling. Seems that paint will splatter if you are using a long handled brush and I soon found myself trying to work through a confetti screen of paint dripping on my face and glasses. Consequently, I may have missed a few spots here and there. But if you put furniture or pictures over them, hardly anyone notices. Task done.

Yes, I think the Canadian ritual of spring cleaning is a wonderful one. 

When I see people scrubbing barbecues and patios, staining decks, beating rugs, painting walls, washing windows,  emptying the garage, weeding and hoeing and planting, I find it truly inspirational.

I go straight to my front porch.  

I find that after two hours in my deck chair, and maybe a drink, that urge to roll up my sleeves and get busy always passes. 

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