Life, Hope, and Happiness

Friends in Christ,

    As we enter fully into the season of Lent that ends in the remembrance of our Lord's passion, death, and resurrection capping the month of March, Easter being on the 27th this year, I am mindful that the Ashland congregation has had, more than usual in my still short experience here, a lot of grief and sadness over the death of dear friends since Christmas, as well as significant celebrations of their lives and their witness. And life goes on among us - Jesus Christ's eternal life in which we personally and communally participate.

    This season in which we find ourselves is marked by both a realistic and an honest reminder about our human limitations and our creaturely mortality. But ending with Easter, as it does, we're reminded, as we always need remember, of a beginning. Easter proclaims to the world a beginning that is all about hope - hope that life does indeed go on - hope that life can and does flourish in the midst of our limitations and our disappointments, our ailments, and our hurts too - hope that God does not abandon us, but loves us and shepherds us and leads us into a life that is eternally with ought limits, even if we can't comprehend all that we will do with that life, or what help to others our life is, or may become, to others. And that hope does not disappoint ( Romans 5:5). As Clarence W. Hall once remarked, "If Easter says anything to us today, it says this: you can put truth in a grave, but it won't stay there. you can nail it to a cross, wrap it in winding sheets and shut it up in a tomb, but it will rise!" May Easter bring us all its living hope.

Peace,
Brett Morgan, D.Min.