Do You Feel It?

Here we are at the beginning of Holy Week and I'm not sure that I feel more holy today than I did last week. Do you feel it? Well, maybe it's not about us anyway.

It seems that the media is running out of news to report because there has been much talk already of Christianity, Holy Week, and Easter. I'm not complaining, but this isn't technically "news"; is it? I thought that news was well new and we Christ followers have been celebrating the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus for some 2,000 years now. Maybe I'm missing something? Does the parable of the wine skins have anything to do with this "news" thing? I'm not sure, we try not to talk to much about that parable in the Nazarene tradition, you know since it discusses fermented grape juice and all. I guess you have to come out of a Christian "brand" heavily influenced by the prohibition movement to really understand that one.

I guess that I just find this Holy Week stuff somewhat paradoxical - I'm confronted again with the scandal of particularity. Holiness should encompass every week...why is this one particularly holy? We celebrate the resurrection every Sunday or even every day as Christ-followers, why is this Sunday special? Maybe it is supposed to be a paradox - old and new, specific and universal, ordinary and holy, common and full of grace. Maybe it is by celebrating Holy Week that we come to understand that all time is infused with God's grace and is given as a gift to us. Maybe it is the best kind of news - Good News. Maybe it doesn't matter how I feel...the holiness of this week certainly isn't based on me and how I feel (thank you for your wisdom, grace, and mercy, Lord), but rather it flows out of the One who was, and is and is to come. Thanks for letting me talk...I'm beginning to see past the haze of my self toward the horizon...I'm begging to feel it. This truly is a Holy Week. Maranatha!