April 05, 2025 – Pastor’s Note

Easter Message

Even though I rarely hike, or bike, or ski, or kayak, I still love living in the Pacific Northwest. View for view on a daily basis, I am not sure there is anywhere more beautiful in the world.

But I also love it because living here allows me to viscerally connect with the Passion, Death, and Resurrection of our Lord. At the beginning of Lent, we are still deep into the cold, dark, gray, rainy season. In fact, we are six months into it, and our souls are ground down by so many months of oppression. I find I am always less energetic and mildly depressed around the time of Ash Wednesday, and entering into Lent is extremely difficult because I am not sure what else can be wrung out of the dry stone of my life. This is a profound analogy for sin and the way it slowly eats away at us until we are shells of our former selves.

Then, the closer and closer we get to Easter, the more the beauty of our natural Eden shows forth. The cherry buds blossom, we begin to have days so clear that you can see the mountains all the way up in Canada, and things begin the feel hopeful again. I can think of fewer experiences more like emerging from the tomb of death into eternal life. Living here most of my life, I cannot separate PNW Spring from Easter, and I am thankful for it: I can feel, in my bones the joy and exultation of the Resurrection of our Lord.

Of course, there is overlap. In my ideal world, we would have unending rain right up through Good Friday, and then nothing but sun for the 50 days of Easter. That never happens. We start to see glimpses of Spring even during Passiontide, and locals know the rain does not disappear until at least July 05. And yet, that is the reality of life this side of the Resurrection: Even though Jesus has conquered death, we still experience the effects of sin and death in our lives; and even when we sin, the light of God pushes through. And yet, we know and believe that the Resurrection is as inevitable as the changing of the seasons, and praise God for that!

I hope you and your families have an incredible Easter. There is nothing more majestic than our salvation through Jesus Christ.

Christus surréxit! – Surréxit vere, allelúja!