Hanging On

I'm in my fourth day at my new church. I'm loving every minute of it! But this is pretty intense time, as one might imagine with Holy Week nearly upon us and a very different cast of characters on hand this year as opposed to last year, both for the church and for me. 

The great thing is that I simply love Holy Week and am so energized by the excitement that surrounds it. There are many parts to the whole thing and yet those parts are not at all new. The Church has been doing these things for such a very long time. I feel that I have been doing them for a very long time, too, although granted I've played many parts. 

My very favorite liturgy of the whole church year is the Easter Vigil. I love how it helps orient (and re-orient) us to remind us of how we are embedded in the wonderful story of salvation. It shows us where we came from and also where we are going. I love the fact that it's a little bit foreign, not something we do very much. I love carrying the Paschal candle into the church and chanting "The Light of Christ" three times. I love the Exsultet. I love the readings that remind us that God has acted over and over again to give us life and intervened with a mighty arm to save us again and again. 

The story gives me comfort. It gives me strength. And it gives me hope that God is there for me, for all of us, again and again, because we are going to need saving again and again as people and as a people who are but dust.

And so, things may be intense right now, but I'm hanging on. I'm grounded. There are new details to master, for sure, but this is the old, old story, and I know that it ends in salvation, and that knowledge makes me secure and ready to face anything.