He's not there, he's here.

The tomb was empty.

The stone was rolled away from the entrance. The linen burial shroud they wrapped him in was still there, but the body of Jesus was gone.

Isn't that just like Jesus. He never seems to stay where we put him.

Good thing: if he did, we might never really see him.

That’s the important part of the Easter story to me. The tomb is empty. He’s alive. Impossible? Exactly. Even though Jesus told us to expect it, it can’t be happening. It’s just not possible.  Even the disciples, even Mary, suspected that someone had just moved the body somewhere else.

Wow. It's not even that Jesus wouldn't stay where we put him, it's that someone else moved him. That's an elephant-sized metaphor.

Still, I don't think that where he isn't is nearly as important as where he is.

As the Gospel of John tells the story, Mary turns from the empty tomb and sees him. Well, not at first. It takes her a minute to recognize him because she wasn't expecting to see him. You've probably experienced one of those moments. You know, when you pass someone on the street, or in a store, maybe, and you don't recognize them at first, just because you weren't expecting to see them there. You probably know the feeling.

Mary wasn’t expecting Jesus to be alive. He was dead. It would not be possible to see him upright and walking around.

Except. This is the Jesus who had, himself, raised Lazarus from the dead. This is the Jesus who healed the sick, rid people of their demons, performed acts that can only be described as miracles, inspired people and restored people. This is the Jesus who called people to love, to love their neighbour as they love themselves, to love even their enemy. Talk about making the impossible happen.

So, having done all that, there’s one more impossible thing to do: he would rise from the dead. Given his track record, maybe Mary should have been looking for Jesus anywhere and everywhere. Rather than mistaking Jesus for the gardener, maybe she should have assumed that everyone was Jesus until she could see otherwise.

Maybe that’s a learning from the Easter story. Whether you hear this story of death and resurrection as literal or metaphorical, maybe it’s okay to acknowledge that it’s about the impossible happening. And then remember all that seemed impossible in the life of Jesus and remember, too, that things are really only impossible because we haven’t done them yet.

I think that’s a key part of Jesus’ teachings about love and grace. Loving your enemy and those that are difficult to love is hard, but it’s not impossible. Forgiveness is hard, but it’s not impossible. Peace is hard, but it’s not impossible. Inspiring new life in the broken and hurting is hard, but it’s not impossible. Are we ever one hundred percent perfect at doing that? Of course not. We fail. A lot. But Jesus never asked for perfection. Jesus asked for love. And when we love, we bring life and create possibility. We just need to let it out. Keeping love to ourselves doesn’t protect us and it’s not being safe. It just entombs it.

That’s the Easter story, too. We can’t contain Jesus, in a tomb, on a cross, in a book, in a tradition or in a church. Jesus lives. Everywhere. He is love and love is not ended by death. If we first looked at everyone around us as if they were Jesus, wouldn't that change the world? If we were to see Jesus - first - before all the assumptions and biases of appearance, status, culture and religion, if we were to love one another as if we were loving Jesus, just as Jesus loves us, wouldn't that breath new life into our world? Wouldn't that let us out of the tomb, too?

Is this what you were expecting?

Palm Sunday’s a big deal in most churches.

It should be, it’s the beginning of what’s called Holy Week, the week that also includes Maundy Thursday and Good Friday, leading to Easter. It’s pretty much the only time we can chronologically follow Jesus’ story day to day. Sunday, Jesus rides triumphantly into Jerusalem on a donkey while the crowds shout “hosanna” and wave palm branches (hence the name); Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday (depending on the gospel) include Jesus throwing the money changers out of the Temple, teaching, altercations with the Temple authorities and other interesting things; Wednesday may also include the story of Judas selling out Jesus to the Temple authorities, earning the name Spy Wednesday in some traditions; Maundy (meaning “commandment” from the story in John’s gospel) Thursday includes the Last Supper, Jesus washing the disciples feet, praying and the arrest in the Garden of Gethsemane; Good Friday is the trial, crucifixion, death and placing in the tomb; Saturday’s the Sabbath, leading to Easter, the day of resurrection.

Busy week. And that’s just an embarrassingly brief synopsis. So you should read the story in the gospels, day to day. No, really, you should. It’s a profound and amazing story, made all the more so by the four different views of the gospels.

From our 21st century perspective, one of the questions most bothersome to people about this story is how the people turned against Jesus so quickly. There was cheering and celebrating his arrival on Sunday and by Friday, they demanded his death. To quote Pilate, of all people: “what evil has he done?”

Of course, the Temple authorities had been working for some time to get rid of Jesus. He was a threat to their power. Herod also saw Jesus as a threat. Pilate doesn’t seem to have thought Jesus was a threat to the Empire, but even if the Romans did, Jesus preaching about peace and loving your enemy would not have been as significant as the numerous armed rebels and zealots like Barabbas. Still, the Temple  and Herod could be persuasive, especially if the people could be convinced that someone foolishly claiming to be King of the Jews would bring only trouble, not freedom.

And I don’t think that would have been too hard for them, either. That brings me back to Palm Sunday and how Luke tells the story.

The story I summarized above with the most familiar features of what we named “Palm Sunday” isn’t how Luke describes it. In the gospel of Luke, it’s not a donkey, it’s a colt that Jesus rides, there are no palm branches being waved and no one shouts “hosanna.” Even the crowd isn’t a crowd of average citizens on the street happily welcoming Jesus into Jerusalem, but rather a crowd of disciples, followers who, well, follow him in, cheering on the way.

In Luke’s story, Jesus rides a colt into Jerusalem from the direction of Mt. Olivet and the crowd of disciples lay down their cloaks and coats to make a path in front of him, a “red carpet” fit for a king. That’s exactly what the story is meant to portray: the prophet Zechariah foretold that this is how the messiah would arrive at Jerusalem (Zech. 9 and 14). “Your king,” says Zechariah, will come to Jerusalem from the direction of Mt. Olivet, riding a colt, and bring peace, ruling from sea to sea and restoring double what they had. That’s right, double.

The other gospels tell this story, Matthew even mentions Zechariah by name, but Luke leaves out the hosannas and a wider crowd waving palms (the only thing handy) in celebration. Instead, the disciples following Jesus shout “Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord!” and “Peace in heaven and glory in the highest!” That’s reminiscent of the angels announcing Jesus’ birth back in Luke 2:14.

Here’s why I think it’s important that Luke tells the story this way. For Luke, it’s not just about announcing the arrival of the king that was promised, it’s also that Jesus isn’t at all what was expected.

It’s a conversation we often have at Christmas: the kind of messiah the people expected was a warrior king with mighty armies that would overthrow the oppressors by force and re-establish the power and glory of mighty Israel. The people would be rich and prosperous again, enemies would be vanquished and the king would reign over all, from sea to sea.

What they got was a baby in a manger, the child of poor parents from a backwater town in an occupied country. Not a great prospect for fulfilling their idea of the prophecy.

And here’s that same king, preaching love for all (even enemies), healing for the sick, compassion for the broken, care for the poor, calling for justice, inviting relationship.

I imagine that by the end of the week there might well have been more than the eleven chosen disciple that would speak for Jesus. But it couldn’t have been difficult to convince people that he simply didn’t deliver what he promised and that should be the end of him.

But it wasn’t. And it isn’t. Even though we have walked this same journey over and over again - and still do - the darkness of the end of the week still gives way to the light of the resurrection morning. Love wins.

It's a matter of life and death

I think that one of the greatest gifts of the Bible is the capacity of the stories it holds to reveal truth far beyond an obvious meaning.

Maybe I’ve been reading too many parables lately. Parables aren’t just stories with an obvious point, they’re meant to offer insight into Jesus’ revolutionary way of looking at the world. The Good Samaritan, for example, isn’t just a story about someone helping someone else. That’s a good idea in itself, but look a little closer and you’ll see the truth is that the person who stopped was someone the first audience for that story wouldn’t have expected, someone who their society says shouldn’t have stopped. That’s the kind of love Jesus was teaching: everyone is your neighbour, especially those you’re not supposed to love. Dig deeper and you might have more questions about the other characters in the story, too. Look from a different angle, a different perspective, and maybe you’ll find more than you thought.

I think all the stories of Jesus are like that. This week, I’m looking at the story of Jesus being anointed with expensive oil by a woman. That sounds like a bare bones summary because it is. The story appears in all four gospels, but each telling has different features and there’s even some debate as to whether it’s the same incident. That’s worth looking into another time, but I’m looking at the Gospel of John right now, where the story is placed in a very unique context (John 12:1-11).

There’s a dinner “in Jesus’ honour” in Bethany. The disciples are there, too, perhaps others, and Mary, Martha and Lazarus. That’s the recently dead Lazarus that Jesus brought back to life in the previous chapter. It’s the day before Jesus will go into Jerusalem, celebrated by a crowd on the day we call Palm Sunday, and six days before his crucifixion. While Martha serves, Mary brings some costly oil which she pours on Jesus’ feet, wiping them with her unbound hair. Judas complains that it’s being wasted and they could have sold it and used the money to feed the poor. Jesus tells him that she’s anointing him for burial. “You will always have the poor among you, but you will not always have me.”

The two obvious points to this story seem to be the anointing and the place of the poor. The latter may sound like Jesus is condoning poverty (he’s not - he’s once again pointing out a societal flaw) and the former shows Mary foreshadowing Jesus’ death. Somehow, Mary knows what’s ahead next week and makes this extravagant gesture of love and devotion.

Sure, and that’s important. But, hang on a minute: let’s look the other way. Let’s look back for a moment.

It’s Jesus who interprets Mary’s actions. She doesn’t say why she’s doing it. And “it” was something truly outrageous: not only did she poor costly oil on Jesus’ feet, but she wiped them with her unbound hair. Touching a man and undoing her hair in public were things that were just not done. Yes, that’s an extravagant, even outrageous, act of love, but maybe it isn’t just about death.

What if Mary was expressing her gratitude for the return to life of her dear brother Lazarus? That story immediately precedes this one, separated only by the pharisees planning to kill Jesus and Jesus retreating from the public eye. The dinner itself might even be honouring Jesus for giving them Lazarus back. Mary’s actions would then be about celebrating life, not honouring death. Mary thanks Jesus with her own radical act of love, just as Jesus’ own radical act of love raised Lazarus.

Here’s the thing, though. I’m not suggesting for a moment that this is an “either/or.” It’s an “and.” Lazarus was dead and is alive again, Jesus will soon be dead and alive again. Perhaps a further thought here is reflecting on how death is a part of life, that death and life are part of our everyday. Each day we encounter experiences of beginnings and endings, the end of a life and the birth of another, the natural inclination of creation to grow and to die, the movement of the seasons, even the day itself. There are moments of grief and celebration coming in all shapes and sizes.

And how will we handle that? Do we avoid the one that makes us uncomfortable and just try to push past it, living only in the one that seems easiest? Life is not simply preparation for death and the life to come. Nor is death and grief something we can avoid. Jesus embraced both with love and experienced them to the fullest. There’s more to life than death. Ask Lazarus.

Is it "like this?"

I love it when Jesus tells a parable.

Parables are those little stories that have a message and illustrate a point or a lesson Jesus is teaching. They’re his “it’s like this” stories. 

At least, that’s the way they seem to appear in the gospels. Jesus tells a story and moves on. Point made. Except even the simplest parable is way more complex and deep than that. So I like to think that Jesus thought of them as more “it’s like this. Now, discuss.”

See, I think the gospel writers, for their narrative, were mostly interested in what Jesus had to say, with occasional responses that helped the point he was making or furthered the story line. I don’t think, for the most part, that they were too interested in recording any discussion or back and forth between Jesus and the listeners.

So, for example, in Luke 15, Jesus is talking to a crowd that are identified as “tax collectors and sinners.” Jesus knows the temple authorities are listening so he tells a series of parables with a “lost and found” theme. Lost Sheep: shepherd with a hundred sheep loses one so he leaves the ninety-nine to look for the one. Great celebration when he finds it. Lost Coin: woman loses one of ten coins so she lights a lamp and sweeps the house until she finds it. Great celebration when she does. Prodigal Son: son asks for his inheritance early, takes it, leaves and squanders it in a foreign land. When he runs out of money, he realizes he’s better off at home so he returns, ready to beg for help. His father welcomes him with open arms, doesn’t even let him finish his apology speech and calls for a great celebration because the lost is found, the dead is alive again, hallelujah. His other son, though, is a little put out. He stayed and worked for his father while his brother squandered what he was given. But his father says yes, you’ve always been here, but, again, your brother was lost and is found, dead and is alive again.

The end. Jesus moves on with other stories to challenge those temple authorities.

But hang on. Here’s the moment where I think something might be left out. I don’t imagine that everyone, whether tax collectors and sinners or temple authorities just sat there, nodded wisely and said “oh yeah, I get that.” I think some might even have had questions.

Like, say, sure, Jesus, we can see that each of those parables has a “lost and found” theme. But there’s a “prodigal” theme to them all, too. “Prodigal” simply means to be wastefully extravagant, to be reckless with resources, especially money. Wasn’t the shepherd a little reckless abandoning the sheep? Or the woman a little wasteful lighting a lamp to look or the coin? Who know how much oil she burned through looking for it.

And in that last story it’s not just the one son - the one who squandered the inheritance on reckless living - who’s prodigal. What kind of a father would have handed over the money in the first place? And what about the other brother? Some people might consider that he missed his chance and squandered an opportunity to go and experience the world like his brother did. And what about the father when the son returns, ignoring the opportunity to say “I told you so,” punish or ignore his son, simply loving him and throwing him a party? That’s some seriously prodigal forgiveness and love.

Yes, I think Jesus would say. Yes, precisely, that’s what love is supposed to be like: more prodigal than the loss, hurt or brokenness that it forgives.

Wow, his listeners might say.

And Jesus would go on and say I’m not just talking about God’s love for you, I’m talking about your love for each other. You, too, can love like this.

Think about the two things that most challenge our ability to forgive. First, we’re conditioned for retribution. There must be punishment or payback: you hurt me, I want you to hurt; you broke me, I want you broken; you took a life, I’ll take yours. Forgiveness demands that we let go of that.

Second, we think there must be more than change, there must be exchange: my forgiveness is conditional on your repentance or, at the very least, my forgiveness must result in your repentance. But it’s not and it doesn’t. Forgiveness is our love in action. The transformation or change it brings is in one who forgives, just as repentance bring transformation to the one who repents. One doesn’t force itself on the other.

That sounds hard, his listeners might say, and complicated. Let’s look at that story again. Who are we in it?

And Jesus would say, good, let’s keep working at it. Who do you think you are in the story?

Full and Fruitful

It’s been my experience that God gets blamed for a lot of things.

I’m sure that God gets credit for lots, too. Surely no one says “Thank God!” as just a random expression of appreciation, do they? God’s included in many many things we say, but, before I get off on a “don’t take God’s name in vain” tangent, that isn’t my point here. Nor am I interested in the expression “act of God” which is, frankly, just wrong. It’s an act of nature, but I’ll kind of come back to that.

I also don’t mean to address how often, when something bad happens, we might ask “why did God do that?” or “why did God allow that to happen? or “why didn’t God do something?” In moments of intense grief, looking for answers, we might ask those questions and wonder just where is God in that moment.

Wiser people than I have written at length about this, but let me say that God doesn’t need defending or excusing in that moment. I’m pretty sure God’s okay with accepting people’s grief as they express it, because I think God is sharing that grief, just as God shares our joy, and it’s God’s presence that inspires compassion and love around us.

I don’t for a moment think that the God of love, grace and life would do anything to hurt any part of creation and, more importantly, that’s not how it works. I look at it like this: just as we have free will, so does the world in which we live. It’s complex and random and things happen and we constantly search for a reason in that mystery.

Which brings me to how often we still hear people say that something happened because God is punishing us/them for being sinful. Not just the big “that hurricane was God punishing people for their immorality” or that flood was punishment for “those people,” but the more individual, personal things that we might sometimes even do to ourselves.

So, no. Just no.

I believe that God is love and life and creativity, inspiring us to live into the good that is in each of us. When we don’t because of the choices we’ve made, I think we’re distancing ourselves from that love. But God doesn’t abandon us or punish us. God forgives and encourages, always seeking a life-giving relationship. That’s why John the Baptist, Jesus and all his followers since keep talking about repentance: it means, literally, to turn away from sin and back to God, patiently waiting for us to return to that relationship and grow in it. That’s what a God of love is about.

I think Jesus says that, too. Luke’s gospel records some people talking with Jesus and they ask about some others who were killed by the Romans and their blood used in sacrifices (Luke 13:1-5), wondering if they were punished in that way because they were more sinful. No, says Jesus, and he reminds them of another incident of people killed when a building fell on them, an accident. Again no. People aren’t punished for being more or less sinful than others, Jesus seems to say, we’re all sinful and all die. That’s why we need to repent, to turn to good and live well so that this life may be full and fruitful before we return home to God.

Jesus then tells a story about a landowner who has a fig tree that hasn’t produced fruit for three years. He tells his gardner to cut it down and get rid of it, but the gardner ask for one more year, during which he’ll fertilize it and nurture it. If it bears fruit, great, if not, then cut it down. The End. Yes, that’s where the story ends, with no resolution, only the possibilities.

We traditionally interpret this story with God as the landowner, we’re the tree and Jesus is the gardner. And that makes sense, by itself. God put us here to be fruitful, we’ve not done that and Jesus comes to help us so that God won’t cut us down and throw us into the fire for not producing. Except go back to the scene right before this, the discussion that inspired the story. Does that fit?

What if we looked at it differently. What if we looked at it as a story of relationship. What if we were the impatient landowner and saw God as the tree that wasn’t meeting our expectations and giving us what we want? Jesus is the gardner still, trying to nurture the relationship between us, feeding it with what we have (yes, that’s the fertilizer) in order that we might both flourish and be fed.

What if we were the gardner, the tree were God - that is, love - and we’re nurturing that so that it might feed the world, which is the landowner? What if we’re the gardner, the tree is our community, the landowner is the world and God is the, well, God is the fertilizer that nourishes and nurtures our relationship?

The thing is, the story, as Jesus tells it, has no resolution. Just like life, the possibilities are many. But we have a part in it, individually and in the community of our world.

Deal or No Deal

It feels to me sometimes like we live in a world of “the deal.” So much of what we do and how we live seems to rely on what kind of a deal we can get. Or make. I give x, I get y in return. I invest (money, time, resources), I expect a return on my investment. And “a great deal” is one in which I get more in return than the value of what I put in. Or at least the illusion that I got more. We’re not always sure - or we don’t care to find out - what the true cost of something is.

Sure, there’s such a thing as a deal where it seems like it’s good for all parties: the value of the product and what’s offered is equitable or there’s a good return on an investment that’s equitably shared. That system of exchange is how we operate. And there’s nothing wrong with that, it’s fair trade.

But, more and more often, getting the best deal seems to involve being able to gain an advantage or even over take the other party in a way that brings reward to one and less, nothing, or next to nothing, to the other. There needs to be a winner and a loser and we start to idolize the winners. And when winning becomes that important, all sorts of tactics we might otherwise think are unfair and wrong become reasonable, even desirable. Egos become bigger, personalities more aggressive and exercising power over others, even bullying them, becomes okay. We must get what we want. It’s just good business.

But good for whom? Like I said, I’m not arguing against our way of trading and exchanging for goods and services, it’s a pretty fundamental piece of how we are. But. Some things are bigger than just you and me and that’s when we need more than an agreement or contract. I think we need a covenant.

Here’s how I see the difference. In a contract, we put in something, we get something back. It’s an agreement designed to benefit the parties involved in the exchange. Something as simple as buying a chocolate bar, for example. You give the seller a dollar they give you a chocolate bar. They get money, you get the chocolate bar. There’s the manufacturer, of course, the shipper, and the people who provided the raw ingredients, perhaps even more, but they, too, have been compensated. That’s a little simplistic, perhaps, but I think it’s essentially the intent. It’s a deal.

In a covenant, I think there’s more. I should be more specific, here, and say that I’m referring to a practical aspect of how I understand biblical covenant. I don’t mean to minimize the historical and theological issues and interpretations, but here’s the thing: in a covenant, what the parties contribute creates a new thing which is not only mutually beneficial, but has a much bigger influence and impact.

There are a number of covenants in the Bible, from Noah, Abraham and Moses to the New Covenant in Jesus, but I think they all have this in common: God offers love and life, we offer faith and we create this new thing, a community of grace, care and compassion to which all the children of God belong.

Or, at least, we could. We have a long history of not always living up to our part of the covenant. Which is why it’s also so important to remember that neither God or Jesus ever asked for perfection in this life.

But just think about how different things can be in the context of a covenant. Covenant values the individual, but builds community. Covenant shares equitably and creates opportunity. Covenant inspires and lifts up. Covenant empowers and encourages teamwork.

That’s not to say that there’s no cost to covenant. We’re human beings. There are a multitude of challenges and struggles. The story of Jesus reminds us that there can also be sacrifice. But covenant reminds me, most importantly, that there is something bigger than me. It’s something that I’m a part of because of what I bring to it and what I gain from it, but it also means that I’m part of the fabric of what has been, what we’re creating and what will be. I can’t be that alone. I can’t do that competitively and I can’t get that from the best deal for me. I think I want a covenant.

Welcome to Lent!

I hate to mention the weather again, but, good news! Environment Canada says that this is the last week of winter and spring is coming. And if you can’t believe Environment Canada, who can you believe? Well … maybe now’s a good time to wonder about that and a lot more.

The seasons have certainly changed for most churches. It’s the season of Lent. Beginning on Ash Wednesday (which has its own story, too - ask a pastor) and ending the day before Easter, the forty days of Lent represent the time Jesus spent in the wilderness being, as the gospels say, “tempted by the devil.” It’s the season traditionally observed by Christian churches as a time of giving up something, of fasting and sacrifice in preparation for Easter.

Lent was intended to be a time of reflection and preparation based on three principles: prayer, fasting and giving to others.  For many, the focus of Lent became the “giving up” part, giving up of time, food and goods.  Originally this meant general abstinence and giving up festivities as well as food, but in later years there was often a more specific focus on giving up more obvious vices such as smoking, drinking, coffee and chocolate (okay, those last two are pretty much essentials …)

The goal was to identify with Jesus’ time in the wilderness, a time when, according to the gospels of Matthew and Luke, Jesus went into the barren desert, fasted for 40 days and was “tempted by the devil.” So Lent became a shadowy time, it’s church colour is purple, the hymns are all dark and sad, we focused on the struggle, the temptations and, most importantly, the fear of the devil and all the devil represents.

Okay. Can I offer a couple of thoughts about that?

Lent begins with Ash Wednesday, when many christians mark their foreheads with the sign of the cross in ash with a call to repentance and the words “remember that you are dust and to dust you shall return.” Alright. Repentance and a sound reminder of our humble, fragile mortality. But you should also remember that earth contains the building blocks of life and a recent scientific survey offers proof that you - and the earth - are made of stardust. Literally. That connects us to the universe, too. And speaking of connections, the dust reference is meant to remind you of Adam and Eve. You could focus there on their “Original Sin” - I have thoughts about that for another time - but you could also remember that, like them, we are created in the image of God and therefore inherently good.

By the way, the word Lent comes from the Dutch word for “spring” and the German for “long.”  The name was adopted in the Middle Ages because the season occurred in the spring when days were getting longer.  And brighter. And warmer. And things were starting to come alive and grow.

You might also want to consider why and how Jesus goes into the desert. I think we’ve tended to focus on the hardship and temptations in the story, fearing the devil and perhaps even fearing our own ability to resist temptation and stand by our beliefs. We have this mental image of Jesus being lost in the desert, weak and alone. And there may well be times we can identify with that.

But I don’t think Jesus was either of those things and I think he went to the wilderness with a purpose. Look at how Luke, for example, frames the story: Jesus, fresh from his baptism by John, “was led by the Spirit into the wilderness” (Luke 4:1). And when the experience is over, Jesus goes into his ministry “in the power of the Spirit” (Luke 4: 14). Jesus was never truly alone: God was with him. The “devil” didn’t stand a chance.

In that same sense, we’re never alone either and that’s particularly important when it comes to the purpose of Jesus’ wilderness time and our own. I think Jesus went into the wilderness to find himself. Yes, sure, that’s become a cliche, but it’s also true. I was just reading Georgia Geary’s blogpost “Finding Yourself Through Travelling: The Cliché that Actually Happens,” and I think she’s right. I think Jesus certainly found that.

Fresh from his anointing with the Spirit and the voice of God claiming him as the “beloved,” here’s Jesus trying to figure out what that means and just how he’s going to go forward into ministry. So he wanders and he wonders, he faces some temptations, but some moments of revelation, enlightenment and empowerment, too. Sure, he confronts “the devil,” but maybe he talks to God, too. He’s hungry and thirsty at the end of it all, but maybe he’s been fed and refreshed, too.

So we could try that. Set aside some time - whether you take this on or give something up to do it - reflect and wonder, talk to God, tackle some issues and dust off some questions. Spring is coming and new life is on the horizon.