Easter tends to be a very quiet time here at the British Union Conference (BUC) office. A few of my colleagues have children at school, and they take the opportunity of the holidays to go away for a few days. Others visit family members or use some of their annual leave to work in their gardens or allotments, which are rapidly coming to life at this time of year.
There is a somewhat subdued atmosphere for those of us still in the office. There are considerably fewer emails and phone calls, and we have time to catch up on some of the less urgent, though still essential, jobs that have accumulated since the year began.
Those of you who join our morning worships on Facebook will know that I often show the view from my window webcam, with the daffodils, cherry blossom, and now the oak tree bursting into life. It is as if the tranquillity and stillness are masking the vast hidden energy of nature, which is about to erupt in an explosion of new growth.
Nearly 2,000 years ago, there was another still day. It was a Sabbath, and the Gospel writers hardly mentioned it. Luke briefly states that the women who had come with Jesus from Galilee "rested on the Sabbath in obedience to the commandment." Luke 23:56. Matthew tells us that, somewhat surprisingly for such devout Sabbath observers, the chief priests and the Pharisees went to Pilate and got permission to seal Jesus' tomb and post a guard. Matthew 27:62-66. But apart from that, we don't know much about the first Easter Sabbath.
I wonder if any of the disciples spent time looking at the flowers, and the buds on the trees, thinking of the parallels between nature and what they had witnessed over the past few days. I suspect that none of them could possibly have imagined the explosion of life about to be unleashed on the world. The shockwaves from that explosion are still reverberating around the world today, amplified by the more than two billion Christians celebrating Easter this year.
Whatever your approach to Easter – be it quiet contemplation or exuberant celebration – may God grant you a vision of the abundant life He has provided, in nature, but more importantly, through the power of His risen Son, Jesus Christ.
