Thought for the week: Marking an important week in the life of the Christian church
We stand on the threshold of the most important week in the Christian church’s yearly remembrance of the earthly ministry of Jesus Christ.
Holy Week leads us through the main events and actions which take us to the Cross of Calvary and the empty tomb proclaiming the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
In terms of the daily Bible readings which my tradition requests be the focus of our reading, I face encounters with what is one of my least favourite Biblical books, namely Lamentations.
The Lamentations book graphicallly describes the devastation of Jerusalem, the appalling suffering of its people who are enslaved or turned into refugees, its main buildings ruined and the community has been betrayed by its friends.
Holy Week is a time for lament, for realistically facing up to what and who have gone terribly wrong. This is a way of facing up to the scale of our salvation. Jesus comes as “the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world” (St John 1:29).
This unique one, who is utterly at one with God and with us, engages with the depths of suffering, sin and death. And he does so even as one of his closest friends betrays him.
Mercifully, our readings of Lamentations are followed each day by readings from the gospel of St Luke. These report that Jesus embodies love and twice in the gospel of Luke we are given insights into how he resists temptations to let other desires have priority.
At the beginning of his ministry there are the temptations for food, worldly power and glory, and doing impressive, spectacular signs. And at the very climax of His life the temptation to turn away from the depths of suffering, sin and death in His crucifixion.
His life in order to open up to others His own deep relationship of love with His Father and with all who trust Him.
May you once again explore these accounts of the final days of Christ’s earthy ministry. In a world now occupied with tariffs, wars in Ukraine, Gaza and Sudan, and suffering communities in places like Myanmar (Burma), the Biblical accounts of the Christ of Gethsemane, of Calvary and the Empty Tomb have a contemporary revelation as Christ reaches out to us to be inspired and transformed by Him.