CELEBRATING FREEDOM

Happy Easter! Chocolate eggs and bunnies and daffs may seem quite a long time ago now, but Christians are still celebrating Easter. We’re known for making people feel a bit guilty about eating chocolate for 40 days. What is less well known is that we follow Lent with 50 days of celebrating, culminating in the festival of Pentecost (this year on 12^th June). Pentecost celebrates the outpouring of God’s Spirit (a direct result of Jesus’ rising from death on Easter Day), which energised Jesus’ followers to continue and multiply the exuberant, abundant life and healing and hope that Jesus brought to people during his 3 years ministry in Palestine.

Christians’ Easter celebrations last 50 days because there is so much to celebrate. It’s all about freedom. On Easter Day there was a cataclysmic earthquake – the stone rolled away from the tomb – and Jesus' body was not there. He was free. ‘Do not be afraid’ was the message to those present (the most frequent command in the Bible). The resurrection sets us free from fear because fear of death is at the root of most of our fears, and Jesus has overcome death. The resurrection sets us free to live the life that in our best moments we would love to live, because it gives us the confidence to trust that an outwards-focused life – giving of ourselves generously to others as Jesus did – leads not to our destruction but to our flourishing, because that is what happened to Jesus. It sets us free in our everyday here-and-now lives, because the Spirit of the risen Jesus, loosed in the world, comes to empower, and guide everyone who abandons the pretence of self-sufficiency and asks for help.

My current anxiety is for the most vulnerable teenagers in Wellesbourne. As the County Council Youth Service funding is cut, what will become of them? Easter helps me to not be fearful, not to focus on our inadequacy, but to be hopeful that we do have the resources as a community to draw alongside them and support them through the turbulent teenage years. If what I’ve written above sounds airy-fairy, think of it as freedom from fear of the loud-mouthed insecure adolescent, freedom to give time to support youth activities, freedom for young people (and you too) to flourish in ways you never thought possible.

May the Spirit of the risen Jesus free you from whatever makes you anxious, free you to live a deeply satisfying life, beginning here and now, today.

Revd Kate Mier

A labour of love by Moreton College students (p5)

Some of the band at Wellesbourne Community Church (page 6)

Two happy partygoers in Chapel Street
(More pictures on p7)