Flowering the Cross
This Easter weekend was the first time our children haven’t been home on a holiday. Anticipating this, I had made and sent Easter candy-filled bags to them. But, to be honest, Easter morning was a letdown. It felt just like every other Sunday. My children didn’t come out half awake, and we didn’t have cinnamon rolls for breakfast (a tradition I’ve continued from my own childhood). Thanks to some friends, I wasn’t even having to worry about fixing lunch. Instead, my husband and I spent the time before church doing “stuff.”
My husband and I decided to go to the traditional service, which I was secretly glad for. We usually go to the earlier contemporary service, but since leaving campus ministry, this type of service has been hard to attend. The songs usually remind me of specific students whose songs they “were.” I’m always taken back to that worship space which is no longer ours. It’s hard to join in singing, even though many of the songs still hold meaning for me. I’ve been trying to figure out how to reclaim this vital part of my faith.
On Sunday when we began the service by singing Christ the Lord is Risen Today (my absolute favorite Easter hymn) I could feel my barrier go down a little. Later, when we sang Lift High the Cross and The Doxology, I felt some of the joy returning.
But it wasn’t just in the singing that I found peace. When my husband I had entered the sanctuary, we had walked past a cross decorated with flowers. I had seen pictures of something similar to this in the past, and I had always discounted it. I believe we tend to forget just how brutal and un-beautiful the cross really is. Flowering the cross has always felt wrong, as if it’s an attempt to hide the reality of the cross behind Easter.
But as the pastor was finishing his sermon, he invited us to come forward to join our flowers with the ones those in the earlier service had put on. He explained that we were doing this not to hide the cross, but rather to acknowledge the transformative power it holds. That was, is no more. That because Jesus died and rose again, the pain and grief we carry do not hold ultimate power over our lives. That the death and sorrow which has threatened to consume us have met their match in the joyful life which the cross and empty tomb now offer. Flowering the cross isn’t hiding the cross. It’s recognizing that life is new, different, and more hopeful because of it.
As I sat and watched person after person go forward with their flowers, I realized I’d been viewing this practice all wrong. The cross is still a brutal symbol, but it’s not the last word on Jesus’ life and work. The powerful symbolism washed over me.
We all carry losses. Many of us are finding our way after the death of someone we love. We have lost jobs. We’ve had to move. We are walking alongside someone with declining health. Our health is declining. We are having to find new paths because our plans and hopes have been shattered. Our home feels empty after the death of a loved pet.
The Good News of Resurrection morning is that these losses and griefs are not the last word on our lives. They are not the whole story of who a person is, or what our worth, or another person’s worth, is.
The greater part of who we are is our identity as children of God, who are held close, and who are loved more than we can possibly know or understand. That is the power and message of the flowered cross.
