Onward to Holy Week

Well, Lent is over. How have I done this year? As usual, not so well. It's not just that my hypoglycemia keeps me from fasting as strictly as prescribed (after all they are fasting rules - not laws). It's hurried, distracted prayers in the morning, substituting spiritual readings for prayer, devouring my neighbor through uncharitable thoughts and words, and my pride on those few occasions when I do get something right. Nevertheless, God has given me joy.

But moving on from Lent to Holy Week, I need to shift my focus from myself and my failings to God and what He's done about it my need for Him. It's hard to imagine how a Spirit loves us. So the Old Testament is full of anthropomorphizing imagery regarding the Father's love for us. In the New Testament, however, it's not just through our language that God takes on human form; He takes our form in real, flesh-and-blood fact. And He holds nothing back; He loves us to his last drop of blood. On Holy Saturday we sing:

Let all mortal flesh keep silent and in fear and trembling stand, pondering nothing earthly-minded. For the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords comes to be slain, to give himself as food to the faithful.

Before him go the ranks of angels: all the principalities and powers, the many-eyed cherubim and the six-winged seraphim, covering their faces, singing the hymn: Alleluia! Alleluia! Alleluia!

It is only after singing this solemn hymn (merely reading the words in a blog doesn't do justice to their emotional impact) that we can experience the fullness of the joy of the Resurrection on Pascha as we sing:

Christ is risen from the dead, trampling down death by death; and upon those in the tombs bestowing life!