Wednesday of Holy Week, March 27, 2024
(click here to listen to or read today’s scriptures)
Jack Sandel in Austin
In Champaign Marc and Evie have been painting. They replaced two appliances and are getting ready to move into Marc’s house in a few days, when Evie’s lease runs out. The house is beautiful, and Marc is very happy. The most important things have fallen into place for him lately, reversing what had been happening in his life for the last couple of years. They are joining us for a beach vacation at the end of May in Port Aransas, on the Texas Gulf Coast.
Margaret flew back to Austin yesterday. She arrived at the airport at 10:07 pm, and I brought her back to our apartment, to baby back ribs and a warm bed on a cool Texas night.
And in a surprise development, Jack Sandel arrived at the Austin airport yesterday at 11:50 pm. He’s on spring break this week, and the rest of the family is not, so he and Chris thought (yesterday morning) why not fly to Austin? So he did. Aki picked him up. He’ll be here four nights and three days, and we’ll have a grand time with food trucks, basketball, and maybe even some nighttime bats.
Will we make it to a Good Friday service? Maybe not. But Easter matters to Jack. His quiet style was interrupted a few years ago when he was baptized and everyone shouted hosanna.
The Lord God has given me a well-trained tongue, that I might know how to speak to the weary a word that will rouse them.
Jack will be sixteen next February. Even now, technically, he can drive in the Austin traffic, although a little of that goes a long way. He is usually with the rest of his family when we spend time with him, so this visit might introduce us in a whole new way. He was just named to the Scholastic Bowl Illinois All-State team. He is driving. His lawn-mowing business has been growing in leaps and bounds. He thought he might like to visit his Austin cousins on his own, and we are all welcoming him with open arms.
Morning after morning he opens my ear that I may hear. I have not rebelled, I have not turned back.
Not this week so much, but sometimes during Holy Week I sit quietly at home, get mentally involved with the stories this week from Jerusalem. From the streets on Palm Sunday, from the Temple, from the home of Lazarus, Elizabeth and Mary, from the Garden of Gethsemane, from Caesar’s palace, from Golgotha. From the tomb as Jesus’ body is placed there on Friday, and then outside the tomb again, as Jesus speaks to Mary after his resurrection.
This is the passion of Jesus. These stories changed the world. God has come to earth, and we are made forever free to be his children once again.
I have set my face like flint, knowing that I shall not be put to shame. He is near who upholds my right.
Of course I have turned away, turned back, turned away again. But God hasn’t turned away even once.
I have become an outcast to my brothers, a stranger to my mother’s sons, because zeal for your house consumes me, and the insults of those who blaspheme you fall upon me. Lord, in your great love, answer me.
For now, Jesus’ disciples have found a room where their Passover Supper will take place. His approaching confrontation looms, and he knows it will end in death. How much did God reveal to his son on the Mount of Transfiguration, or at any other time? What will happen next? Nothing seems to surprise Jesus, as Judas betrays him, as the disciples leave the Last Supper and Jesus goes to pray in the Garden. The earth is shaking on its foundations, but Jesus is at peace.
Lord, in your great love, you have answered me.
 (Isaiah 50, Psalm 69, Matthew 26)
(posted at www.davesandel.net)
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