As we gathered together yesterday for our BWIM SC Vespers service and to celebrate CBF SC General Assembly, I wondered if the other ministers gathered were burning low. Advent and Lent were very close together this year. Easter was early and it was one of the worst flu seasons in years. My colleagues were visiting people in the hospital, tending to children with the flu, and battling the flu themselves. And as the Spring chilly air brought in the season of Eastertide, I wondered if my colleagues breathed a deep breath as well.
As I watched these candles drip and burn throughout the service, I thought about the demainds of high holy season calling ministers to offer hope and light and love over and over again. I realized the nearness of these two high holy seasons that left almost no time to rekindle between before the next one started had burned me low. The evidence of the Spirit in the swaying of the flame hadn’t left. The light of hope and love hadn’t left, but I felt myself fading.
And while I complained about the contraints of my physical body lamenting the fact that I caught the cold and coughing right before Easter Sunday instead of right after Easter, I realized how much I take for granted. I pride myself on my energy and my health rather than expressig gratitude to Creator God these privileges and blessigs. And perhaps this minister, five years into ministry, needed the reminder that my strength, my energy is not my own, but only through Christ Jesus and the resurrection.
May the God of hope and light rekindle you in the assurance that new life and indeed new strength can be found in Eastertide.