 |
 |
Pastor’s Page —March Madness
While not everyone follows the flurry of basketball activity known as March Madness that happens this month, most are at least aware of what it is. March is usually a crazy month anyway, basketball or not, with all of the increased busyness involved in moving back outdoors and gearing up for all of the green life that starts sprouting up from the ground again.
It’s interesting to note that Lent comes as a time for slowing down and intentionally reflecting on our lives of faith when the activity level is ratcheting up. Lenten services really weren’t devised to add yet another thing to our already filled schedules, but to remind us to pause and return to our priorities as people who have been saved by grace and created anew in Christ Jesus to carry out his good works in this world (Ephesians 2:8-10.)
So, during this month of March that ends with the start of Holy Week and looks ahead to those momentous first days of April—Holy Thursday, Good Friday, Holy Saturday, and Easter Sunday—let’s think of madness according to the other definitions: intense excitement, enthusiasm (a word that means “filled with God”), and senseless foolishness. Senseless foolishness, you say? Yes! Not just any foolishness, but that St. Paul wrote so beautifully about:
The foolishness of God is wiser than people’s, and the weakness of God is stronger than people’s…. God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is lowly and despised, things that are nothing, to bring down the things that are…. He is the source of your life in Christ Jesus, whom God made our wisdom and justice, our holiness and salvation…. We are fools for Christ’s sake (I Corinthians 1:25,27-30; 4:10).
Reflecting on “the foolishness” of Jesus’ way and life a number of years ago, musician Michael Card wrote these lyrics:
When we in our foolishness thought we were wise, / He played the fool and He opened our eyes. / When we in our weakness believed we were strong / He became helpless to show we were wrong. / And so we follow God’s own fool, / For only the foolish can tell. / Believe the unbelievable, / And come be a fool as well. // So come lose your life for a carpenter’s son, / For a madman who died for a dream. / Then you’ll have the faith his first followers had, / And you’ll feel the weight of the beam. / So surrender the hunger to say you must know. / Have the courage to say “I believe!”... (“God’s Own Fool”).
May the madness of God, which fooled all who thought Jesus was dead and out of the picture, bring you through this month of renewal to the great and unexpected joy of Easter! Yours in Christ, +Pr. Joel