Preacher’s Note – Sunday 11th April 2021
So here we are after Easter.
The long weekend, the chocolates, the services telling us what Jesus went through. All behind us. And so we look up, pick up our familiar heavy backpacks and start trudging on again.
What difference has Easter made? Really made?
No matter how long we’ve walked with the Lord, we so easily find ourselves in a place where we’ve let go of His hand, a dark place, groping about for meaning and direction. Carrying a heavy load by ourselves, soldiering on.
Can I give you a message of hope, right here, right now?
You don’t have to do this by yourself. Jesus said “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest”. And He means it.
He invites us to share our deepest feelings with Him, speaking to Him from the heart.
Tell him that you fear that you’ve failed Him too many times, and He must be fed up with you – you know you are. Tell Him that you’re just so tired that your bones ache, that your sense of humour failure has showed up in three meetings already today. Tell Him your deepest fears that keep you awake at night, that you keep close to your chest, and that sit in the pit of your stomach. Tell Him your heart has been broken, your hope is in tatters, and you’re hanging on, stuck in the Saturday after the pain of Friday, never getting to the joy of Sunday.
He longs for that “Lord, I need you”. And as we do that, open up to Him, He speaks to us, reaches out and touches us. And we experience the real Easter. A personal resurrection, a renewal, a rising from the dead.
Jesus is pain-taker, prison-shaker, way maker, chain breaker.
Right here, right now.