Church of the Brethren
300 E. Monument Street
Pleasant Hill, Ohio 45359

Nick Beam, pastor

Telephone 937-676-2281

Sunday School at 9:30 a.m.
Worship at 10:30 a.m.

WHO NEEDS EASTER?

The dead don’t need Easter
– they’ve already solved its mystery!
Ah, but the living need Easter as a reminder
– that suffering has meaning and limits.
– that God’s love bridges the unknown
beyond life’s final breath.
– that hope, like the sun, always rises again.
– that Divine power transforms evil into good.
– that Yahweh who spoke:
"Let there be ..."
"... have no other gods before me..."
– Jesus the Word
"Behold, I am coming..."
Continues to speak each spring.
Through a cross and an empty tomb,
Abba whispers and shouts
"I love you. Now and always."
Who needs Easter.
I do.
Do you?

Mary Sue H. Rosenberger
3/3/08

Pastor's Message

I was just thinking about our Easter service and always what a blessing it is to have some many people come for worship on this special day.   Now I know of the people here were family members who normally attend other churches through the year but come to worship with their parents or grandparents, some may have to work on regular Sundays but don’t have to work on Easter, and some are here just because it is a special day to remember the depths of God’s love.

I always hear comments after worship about how it’s too bad that every Sunday isn’t Easter Sunday.  And I wonder why it isn’t?  Jesus isn’t alive for only one Sunday out of the year – he doesn’t just rise from the dead on Easter Sunday and then had back to the tomb for the other fifty-one Sundays of the year.  I like to think that we talk about the depths of God’s love and the things the LIVING Jesus says and does most of the rest of the Sunday’s of the year.  And I wonder what it is about the other Sunday’s of the year that aren’t special enough to cause people to come to worship?  I believe there is a powerful connection between our disjointed, over-stressed, unfulfilling lives and our failure at keeping the Sabbath as God commands. 

Part of that deep love that God has for us is in the ordering of time so that there is at least one day a week set aside to rest from our labors and to remember and thank God for all he has done for us.

Ruth Haley Barton, the director of The Transforming Center in Chicago, wrote a couple of years ago about the importance of Sabbath keeping.  She says, “Sabbath keeping is a way of ordering one’s life to honor the rhythm of things – work and rest, fruitfulness and dormancy, giving and receiving, being and doing, activism and surrender.  The day itself is set apart, devoted completely to rest, worship and delighting in God and his good gifts, but the rest of the week must be lived in such a way as to make Sabbath possible.”

She adds, “There’s something deeply spiritual about honoring the limitations of our existence as human beings – physical and spiritual beings in a world of time and space.  There is a peace that descends upon our lives when we accept what is real rather than always pushing beyond our limits.  There is something about being gracious and accepting and gentle with ourselves at least once a week that enables us to be gracious and accepting and gentle with others.  There is a freedom that comes from being who we are in God and resting into God that eventually enables us to bring something truer to the world than all of our doing.  Sabbath-keeping helps us to live within our limits because on the Sabbath, in so many ways, we allow ourselves to be creatures in the presence of the Creator.  We touch something more real in ourselves and others than what we are able to produce.  We touch our very being with God.  Surely that is what people around us need most.

In my understanding of the scriptures I don’t believe that Sabbath-keeping once or twice a year or only on those “special occasions” is pleasing to God or beneficial to our physical and spiritual selves which need rest and rejuvenation.

We are a resurrection people – not just one Sunday a year but every Sunday of the year – come and hear about the unconditional love God has for you every Sunday of the year and find the rest and rejuvenation you need.

                                                                                   Pastor Nick