Seasons. An Advent and Lent Podcast By Willow Park Church Willow Park Church

The Great Gardener.



John 20:11-18



And so on Easter Sunday, our Holy Week Journey with Jesus has come to an end. Today, we begin with the first day of the new creation! The day
that Jesus rose from the grave!

 

Our journey ended yesterday with Jesus laid to rest in a new
tomb within the walled garden of Joseph of Arimathea near Golgotha.

History and archeology suggest to us that in the time of
Jesus, Golgotha was an abandoned quarry used as a garbage dump.

 So we could say it this way: Jesus, the stone rejected by
the builders, was crucified in a quarry-turned-garbage dump, but he was buried as a seed within a verdant garden.

 When Jesus is first seen alive in that garden on Easter morning, Mary Magdalene mistakes him for the gardener. But, in fact, it’s no
mistake at all. Jesus is the gardener who turns garbage dumps into gardens!

Jesus is not a conductor punching tickets for a train ride
to heaven. Christian hope is not about getting from earth to heaven; it’s about
getting heaven to earth.

Jesus is not a lawyer to get us out of a legal jam with an
angry judge. God is not mad at sinners. Jesus told Mary to tell his disciples that his Father was their Father too!

Jesus is not a banker making loans from his surplus righteousness.

Jesus is a gardener! A gardener cultivating resurrection life in all who will come to him. The
conductor, lawyer, banker metaphors are mostly false, giving a distorted view
of salvation. The gardener metaphor is beautiful as it faithfully depicts the
process of salvation in our lives.


A gardener’s work is earthy and intimate. Gardeners have
their hands in the humus. (We are humans from the humus.) Conductors, lawyers
and bankers are concerned with abstract and impersonal things like tickets,
laws, and money. But gardeners handle living things with living hands. Jesus is
not afraid to get his hands dirty in the humus of humanity.

 

I promise you that your life is not so shattered that Jesus
can’t nurture you into something beautiful. The empty tomb is the open door
that leads us away from the ugly world and back into the Garden as God intened.
 Not many have captured the idea of
Easter as the inauguration of a new world with Christ as the gardener better
than G.K. Chesterton

“On the third day the
friends of Christ coming at day-break to the place found the grave empty and
the stone rolled away. In varying ways they realized the new wonder; the world
had died in the night. What they were looking at was the first day of a new creation,
with a new heaven and a new earth; and in a semblance of a gardener God walked
again in the garden, not in the cool of the evening, but in the dawn.”
–G.K. Chesterton

 

Music by, Allswell, Simon Wester.

Holy Saturday




And so on Holy Saturday, our Holy week comes to an end.
Our journey ends with Jesus laid to rest in a new tomb within the walled garden
of Joseph of Arimathea near Golgotha.

 

As we begin today, I want to reflect on the work of Paul
Zach as he writes about Holy Saturday.

After the cross has been carried
After the weight is laid down
After the body is buried
Down where the darkness surrounds
After the end of the violence
After the sky has gone dark
Now there is nothing but silence
Broken by the beat of our heartsHe's goneAfter the last words are spokenWe lay him down in the graveAfter our hearts have been brokenHave all our hopes been betrayed?
He's gone

Here at the tomb with our spicesLove from our hearts is not goneWatch 'til the breaking sun risesWhat will we see in the dawn?


Paul Zach

 

As we listen to Luke Parker, sing Sweet Surrender,

let us take a moment to appreciate the freedom that comes on the death and resurrection of
our Lord. The full presence that we have from the sweet surrender that Jesus
gave on the cross.

 

Todays reading comes from John 19:31-42

 

31 Now
it was the day of Preparation, and the next day was to be a special
Sabbath. Because the Jewish leaders did not want the bodies left on the
crosses during the Sabbath, they asked Pilate to have the legs broken and
the bodies taken down. 32 The soldiers therefore
came and broke the legs of the first man who had been crucified with Jesus, and
then those of the other. 33 But when they came to
Jesus and found that he was already dead, they did not break his legs. 34 Instead,
one of the soldiers pierced Jesus’ side with a spear, bringing a sudden
flow of blood and water. 35 The man who saw
it has given testimony, and his testimony is true. He knows that he
tells the truth, and he testifies so that you also may believe. 36 These
things happened so that the scripture would be fulfilled: “Not one of his
bones will be broken,”[c] 37 and,
as another scripture says, “They will look on the one they have pierced.”[d]

The Burial of Jesus

38 Later,
Joseph of Arimathea asked Pilate for the body of Jesus. Now Joseph was a
disciple of Jesus, but secretly because he feared the Jewish leaders. With
Pilate’s permission, he came and took the body away. 39 He
was accompanied by Nicodemus, the man who earlier had visited Jesus at
night. Nicodemus brought a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about seventy-five
pounds.[e] 40 Taking
Jesus’ body, the two of them wrapped it, with the spices, in strips of
linen. This was in accordance with Jewish burial customs. 41 At
the place where Jesus was crucified, there was a garden, and in the garden a
new tomb, in which no one had ever been laid. 42 Because
it was the Jewish day of Preparation and since the tomb was
nearby, they laid Jesus there.



Holy Saturday is a time of both absence and presence. Still
your body and mind as you invite Jesus to be with you in this midway place.
Asking for the courage to stay in the ‘valley of the shadow of death’. how have you been able to sense God’s presence during this challenging week?


What thoughts, desires or feelings have arisen within you as you prayed with
this week’s Scripture passages?
Many Christians bypass Holy Saturday, leaping from the sorrow of Jesus’ death to the triumphant celebration of his resurrection. The church's ancient creeds invite us not to do that, but to stay with a sense of his absence, as his disciples felt it. Why do you think that is? How does the story of Jesus’ suffering and death leave you feeling?



Lord Jesus, on this holy day of quiet rest, we await your
resurrection, but we don’t want to rush by; we want to wait beside you in that
sweet surrender.



Music by Luke Parker, Salt of The Sound, Dear Gravity, Simon Wester.

Today is
good Friday.

 

 

As we
gather together today we stop to remember the darkest of days on the Christian calendar.


As we enter this moment and listen to Salt of the sound Sing nearer Jesus Keep
me near the cross, let us place ourselves at the foot of the cross, close to
our saviour and near his sacrificial love even in this darkest of moments.

 

On Good Friday, we
think about one thing: the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. This is the epicentre
of the Christian faith. At the core of Christianity, we don’t find perennial
religion, meditation techniques, or a course in ethics, but a crucifixion.

The gospel is not
motivational talks about happy marriages, being debt free, and achieving your
destiny. That all belongs to the broader world of proverbial wisdom, and it’s
fine as far as it goes, but it has little or nothing to do with the gospel.

The gospel is about the cross, and the cross is a scandal.

When the Apostle Paul
told the Corinthians that he had determined to know nothing among them except
Jesus Christ and him crucified, he admitted that the cross was often viewed as
a scandal and folly. So be it. Any attempt to make Christianity less offensive
and more palatable by de-emphasizing the cross is a betrayal of Jesus Christ
himself. So today, above all days, we look unflinchingly at Christ crucified. To
enter deep into the mystery of the cross is to encounter the greatest
revelation of who God is.
as we listen to the traditional reading of the crucifixion of Christ from John
19:16-30 let us ask the spirit to show us what we need to see.






The Cross is the
death by which Christ conquers Death.

It’s the abolition of
war and violence. It’s the supreme demonstration of the love of God. It’s the
re-founding of the world around an axis of love. It’s the enduring model of
co-suffering love we are to follow. It’s the eternal moment in which the sin of
the world is forgiven.

The cross is where Jesus reveals God as saviour.

The cross is what God in Christ endures as he forgives. The cross is where the sin of the world
coalesced into a hideous singularity so that it might be forgiven en masse. The cross is where the world violently sinned its sins in the body of the Son of
God, and where he absorbed it all, praying, “Father, forgive them.” The cross
is both ugly and beautiful. It’s as ugly as human sin and as beautiful as
divine love—but in the end, love and beauty win.

  

Lord Jesus, as we look at you on the cross, with your arms outstretched in an offered embrace, we pray,
forgive us, Lord, for we know not what we do. Amen.





Music by Salt of The Sound, Simon Wester, Dear Gravity and Luke Parker.

Luke 22:14-29, John 13:1-17


Today is Maundy (or mandate)
Thursday, the day when Jesus at the Last Supper gave his disciples a new and
supreme mandate to love one another. 

 

At the Last Supper Jesus
re-appropriated the ancient Passover meal commemorating Israel’s liberation
from bondage in Egypt, giving us the sacramental meal of Communion by which we
commemorate the Lord’s death and partake of his body and blood. 

 

Of course, the disciples didn’t know this was the last supper before Jesus’ suffering and death—they
were still anticipating the arrival of the kingdom of God in the way of conventional conquest. Yet Jesus was explicit about this being the last meal of an old age, telling his disciples that he would not eat or drink again until the kingdom of God had come. And thus we see the significance of Jesus eating and drinking with his disciples following his resurrection!








Sadly, the poignancy of this final meal was marred by a dispute among the disciples over who would be
regarded as the greatest in the coming kingdom. Once again, for the last time
before his death, Jesus stressed to his obtuse disciples that what is counted
as greatness in the empires of the world is not what is counted as greatness in
the kingdom of God. 

Now that we have heard of the
dispute among the disciples lets take a moment to hear what else happened at
the last supper from John’s account of the event. Let’s read about Jesus
washing his disciples' feet from John 13:1-17
As we hear from this portion of the evening picture, the events are taking
place. How do the actions of Jesus contrast the attitudes of the disciples
who are arguing over who would be the greatest in the coming Kingdom?








Caesar and all his successors
measure greatness by power—power to kill, power to obtain, power to control.
But in the kingdom of Christ, greatness is measured by love, humility, and
service. Jesus modelled this kingdom version of greatness when he washed his
disciples’ feet during the Last Supper. Despite the disciples’ inability to
fully grasp what he was saying and doing, Jesus spoke warmly about how they had
stayed with him through his trials. As a result, they are to eat and drink at
his table in his kingdom.

 

As we finish today, take a moment to imagine what it was like to be a disciple
having his feet washed. Now take a moment to place yourselves in the seat of
the disciples. See Jesus washing your feet. What is your response to this situation?

Lord Jesus, as we partake of your body and blood on this holy day, may we be your flesh and blood presence
in the world, and may our presence be characterized by love, humility, and
service. Amen.

 

Wednesday, 5 April 2023

Today is Wednesday, the 5th of April, in Holy Week.


Today, as we recognize the presence of God with us, we look to Jesus and him
showing us the great purpose of his death.  

As we take a moment to listen to Salt of the Sound sing
Nearer my God to thee, let us take a moment to thank God for the cross and through
the cross, we have every opportunity to draw close to him and be nearer to him.

 
Today’s reading is from the Gospel of John 12:20-36

 

Jesus Predicts his death.


As we recognize the presence of God with us on this Holy
Wednesday, we come to the time when Jesus predicts his death.

 

But what does the crucifixion of Jesus Christ accomplish?

 

This is one of the few passages in the Gospels where Jesus
offers any interpretative meaning to his death.

 

He says his crucifixion will accomplish three things:

 

It will judge the world. 


 

It will cast out the ruler of the world. 

 

It will draw the whole world to him.  

 

The cross of Christ pronounces judgment on the basic
arrangement of the world. The principalities and powers—the rich and powerful,
the structures they represent, and the spirit generated by them—claim they have
the right to rule the world because they are wise and just. But the cross
exposes the principalities and the powers as neither wise nor just, but simply
greedy for wealth and power.

 

The cross also drives out the ruler of this world, the accuser
who unites people around the practice of scapegoating a vilified other, but the
the cross exposes scapegoating for what it is—the lynching of an innocent victim.

 

Finally, the cross re-founds the world. When we see Jesus
lifted up on the cross, perfectly displaying God's love by forgiving the world's sin, we find the place where human society is reorganized. Instead
of a world organized around an axis of power enforced by violence, we discover
a world organized around an axis of love expressed in forgiveness. As we gaze
long upon the sacred mystery of Christ crucified, we find ourselves drawn
into the saving orbit of love and forgiveness.

 

 

As we read the final section of this passage again

 

Take some time to process in your own words what you think
Jesus means when he talks about having the light just a little while longer,
but that we are to become children of the light.  

 

Jesus said he would be with them in person for only a short
time, and they should take advantage of his presence while they had it. Like a
light shining in a dark place, he would point out the way they should walk. If they
walked in his light, they would become children of the light, revealing the
truth and pointing people to God.
As Christians we are to be light bearers, letting His light shine through us.
Take the next few moments to walk through the rest of your day and the rest of
your week asking God how you could be a light bearer to those around you.



Lord Jesus, thank you for all that you accomplished on the cross
and thank you for the forgiveness that we have received. As you have called us
to be children of light, may we go forward bringing the light of forgiveness
into this world for everyone to see and receive.





Music by Salt of The Sound, Simon Wester and Dear Gravity

Jesus Predicts the Denial by Judas.



Lord, have mercy; Christ, have mercy, Lord, have mercy.

 

These imploring words, which have been sung for
centuries are a reminder of the inexhaustible mercy of God and of God’s
unfailing compassion and forgiveness.

As we enter into our time today, I want us to take a
moment to ready ourselves before God by confessing that we come to him only by his
great mercy that he lavishes on us.

As we listen to Salt of the Sound sing When I Survey, let's take some time to place ourselves into the care of a merciful God who
loves us, even when we have chosen a different path than the one that he has intended for us.

Hearing this story with the Knowledge of the situation that we have, allows us a vantage point that was not afforded to the rest of the
disciples.

How would it feel to be any one of the characters in the story? Judas, Peter,
the beloved disciple, or the others. What words or feelings come to you as you
relive the scene?
Jesus loves all his disciples, including Judas.
There is a Judas, a Peter and a beloved disciple within each of us represented
in our lived response to Jesus.


We have all betrayed Jesus, broken promises to Jesus, or sat close to Jesus, reclining
in his presence. What does it feel like to know that he loves us despite the
dark fragments of our own, broken story? What does it feel like to know his
mercy extends to every part of you?
As you listen to part of this reading again, notice what stays with you and why.
Can you face hearing Jesus’ words and meeting his eye? If not, why not? If so,
what desire arises within you?



 Each of the three disciples named here has a personal story of the response to Jesus that subsequently unfolds. What is your response as a
participant in this scene?

 As we finish today, Let us read a prayer of mercy that we
can take with us when we are tempted to cast judgment.

 

Mercy triumphs over judgment.

When you can blame…have mercy.When you can shame…have mercy.When you can criticize…have mercy.When you can condemn…have mercy.
When you have a political disagreement…have mercy.
When you have a theological disagreement…have mercy.When you are certain you are completely right…have mercy.When you could exact your revenge and get even…have mercy.So that when you pray, “Lord, have mercy on me”—There will be a large reservoir of mercy for God to draw from.

Lord, have mercy.Christ, have mercy.Lord, have mercy.



Music by Salt of the Sound, Dear Gravity, Simon Wester.