One of my favorite Easters was spent in Ducktown, Tennessee, a town of less than five hundred. I’d been there a week for a spring break mission trip, building cabinets and wiring plugs for a single mother’s new home. The workdays were long but gratifying, and I was with a group of camp friends I loved. At my own high school I didn’t fit in so well, so being accepted by these funny young Christians felt to me like a kind of resurrection.
Sunday morning we attended a sunrise service in a tiny chapel. Our group doubled the size of the congregation. I don’t remember much about the sermon, but I remember the locals calling out “Amen” in a drawl that stretched the word into four syllables. I remember golden light streaming over the Smokies and through the windows in an otherworldly glow as we pondered the morning Christ’s tomb was opened.
There have been other Easters for me, Easters in Michigan and Wisconsin, Canada and New Jersey.
I’ve spent Easters at my sister’s big non-denominational, with fog machines and light shows emphasizing the powerful worship and emotional sermon. I’ve spent Easters in my hometown Methodist church of a hundred, holding hymn books older than me to sing “He Arose” accompanied by organ.
I’ve spent Easter celebrating the birth of my first niece, and another mourning the end of a love I thought would last.
I’ve spent Easter fresh from a trip to Israel, pondering the steps I took in the land of Christ, sailing on the Sea of Galilee and peering into a makeshift tomb outside Old Jerusalem.
I’ve spent Easter alone as an eight-year-old, unable to bear the grief of going to church after my pastor father died. I held my own private worship service in the living room, preaching a sermon to stuffed animals behind a pulpit made from a piano bench stood on its end. I wondered when I would feel alive again after this nightmare of death.
One Easter morning I was in Honduras. The church service was somber compared to the citywide parades we joined on Good Friday, with rainbow-sawdust artwork carpeting the streets beneath decorated floats and bands. At Sunday’s sermon I understood words like paz and vida nueva and resurrección and tried to comprehend how God was the same here as everywhere.
Some Easters I’ve wept with emotion at the swell of “In Christ Alone” and the miracle of Christ’s sacrifice; some I’ve sat stone-faced, wondering whether any of it matters.
Two Easters now I’ve been on a couch in front of a television livestream because the church building was closed. Today I can worship in person again, standing next to family. My mom will lament that the modern worship set doesn’t include “Christ the Lord is Risen Today,” and my nieces and nephew will bounce with excitement over their egg hunt. So much has changed since the last time I could travel for Easter, yet so much is the same.
These ever-shifting Resurrection Sundays remain constant in the story they tell of Christ’s gift to us. I remind myself that he is steady despite my constant wavering. Wherever I am, whoever I am, Jesus meets me there. From one Easter to the next, I am different. He is still risen.
Laura graduated from Calvin in 2015 with a degree in art and writing. She lives in Toronto, Ontario, with her husband Josh and dog Rainy. She works as an IT support analyst and enjoys painting, rock climbing, and exploring the city.
That was a beautiful essay. I can relate to many of your memories of Easter. Blessings to you.
Enjoyed reading your memories of Easter, celebrating the special day. Christ finds us where we are on our journey of life. Thank you for being vulnerable and honest, it really spoke to me.
This is so lovely: all the memories and what you draw from them in the end. What a gift to have so many different reflections of the story that we Christians tell over and over again.