On Being Surprised

In my work as a chaplain, I regularly encounter families who have lost a loved one.  So often, I hear something like, “We knew it was coming, we just didn’t know it would be today.”  If we’re really honest, though, we all know “it” is coming.  We just don’t like to think about it, and we don’t want to admit we know, so death often surprises us.

Another reality that often takes us by surprise is the fact that none of us is perfect or complete, at least not on our own merit.  The truth is that, even on our best days, we have a dark and broken nature that shows itself, sometimes, when we least expect it (the bible calls it sin).  We may hide it or try to cover it up, but it will make itself known.

At this time of year, as we begin to look toward the Easter season, I’m reminded of the start of that final week, “Holy Week” as we often call it.  Christ arrived in Jerusalem to cheering throngs who laid palm fronds and cloaks on the street in front of him – kind of a precursor to our contemporary red-carpet treatment, perhaps.  We know this day as “Palm Sunday,” and many faith groups celebrate it to this day.  Sadly, the celebration and cheering were followed, just five short days later, by hateful jeering and calls for the cruel death of that same Savior.  

Sadly, the celebration and cheering were followed,
just five short days later, by hateful jeering and calls
for the cruel death of that same Savior.  

It seems a jarring, even surprising, turn of events, but should it?  We’re reminded by scripture and, if we’re honest, by our own experience that we each have within us the capacity for both incredible good and incredible bad.  The Easter season, though, reminds us that God knows us in our entirety, our good and our bad, and loves us anyway.  It’s something for which we should be incredibly grateful, and it’s something to be celebrated like nothing else.

Easter and Christmas are two parts of the same story.  Without Christ’s birth, he wouldn’t have died and risen again.  Without his death and resurrection, there wouldn't have been much point in his birth, either.  Just like its Christmas counterpart, Advent, Easter has a similar period of preparation and anticipation.  It's called Lent.  The forty days (plus six Sundays) leading to Easter are often marked by honest self-reflection, acknowledgment of personal brokenness, and humbling one's self before God.  It points us to God’s holiness and incredible love displayed so clearly at Easter.  The observance of Lent, though, starts with Ash Wednesday.

The practice of Ash Wednesday includes receiving ashes on one’s forehead, generally in the shape of a cross.  This is typically accompanied by God’s reply to Adam after Adam had sinned, “You are dust, and to dust you shall return” (Gen. 3:19), a pointed reminder of our own mortality.  But even the shape of the ashes on one’s forehead (a cross) points to what is to come – redemption and victory.  Somber though it may be, Ash Wednesday serves as a promise of God’s faithfulness and love.

The healthcare system to which our hospital belongs (SSM Health), is in the midst of an enhanced effort to raise the profile of our faith-based heritage and character.  At our hospital this year, part of that focus will include an observance of Ash Wednesday.  As I began preparing, I learned that the ashes used are often obtained from the burning of palm fronds from the preceding year’s Palm Sunday celebration.  The very implements of praise serve, also, as reminders of our brokenness.   

It seems somehow appropriate that my own
unfaithfulness should be marked by ashes from
the remains of such a shallow and transient adulation.

As I think how suddenly the crowds turned from cheering to jeering, from worship to condemnation, I’m reminded that I am guilty of that same kind of betrayal.  It seems somehow appropriate, then, that my own need for forgiveness, my own unfaithfulness, should be marked by ashes from the remains of such a shallow and transient adulation.  

Ash Wednesday is a powerful reminder of who made me, what I’ve become, what I deserve, and who I can be.  It includes theological understandings such as creation, sin, death, and grace.  While reminders of my own fallenness may surprise me at times, the faithfulness and incredible love of the God who made, redeems, and sustains me should not.  

I invite you to join me this year in experiencing the fullness of the upcoming Easter season.  You might just be surprised again, this time by what God will do in you.

#AshWednesday  #Lent  #Easter  #Surprise