The Seasons, They are A-Changin'
I love this time of year. This morning air is crisp and cool, the sky is a brilliant blue, the vibrant and varied fall foliage transform our landscape with hues of red, orange, and yellow. And change is afoot, not only in nature. In various ways, our corner of the world is preparing for a changing season. It means closing up the cottage, settling back into the school routine, preparing our gardens for the snow, putting on our winter tires. We are right in the midst of a season of transition and change.
Today is Pentecost Sunday. The day we see and hear about some of the great symbols of faith. The day we all see red! Traditionally Pentecost is about being surprised, and being fully enlivened by God’s spirit, as Jesus was. And Pentecost is about hearing and experiencing the present-ness of God in a language we can understand... Not just in English or French or Korean or German, but also in the language of unemployment, television commercials, supermarket shopping and school playgrounds.
Alleluia, Christ is Risen! Christ is risen indeed, Alleluia! This morning, I want to say a word about Easter, a word taken from one of the great Eastern images of the mystery of the resurrection, an icon that has been a part of the Christian vision of what the Resurrection is all about since around the year 600. I have been powerfully drawn to this icon lately, and I want to talk about it a bit this morning. Let’s take a look. Remember: icons are about the theological meaning of people and events; they aren’t representative art like we might typically encounter. Icons are never depictions of exactly what happened. They’re pictures of what things mean. So, an icon of the Resurrection doesn’t show what the resurrection might have looked like back then—an icon of the Resurrection shows what it means now.