Lenten Anniversary

For years I avoided the thought of marriage because living it well seemed impossible for a person like me. I am a person easily overwhelmed by hardship, sorrow, suffering and evil. The only way I could be comfortable with the enormity of the life-long commitment to have and to hold, for better or worse, for richer or poorer, in sickness and in health, was to tuck my wedding day right up close to Easter as a reminder that God raises the dead, the hopeless, the sorrowing, the repentant. 

Only in the stirrings of Palm Sunday and the triumphant "Hurrah!" of Easter could I imagine living the symbol meant to explain the mysterious wonder of Christ and His church. 

Only in walking through the Holy Week and seeing Christ's ultimate life-giving death, could I begin to trust the strange thing that is marriage... the many deaths to self that somehow bring life. 

I needed to start my marriage with the hope of Easter glimmering in the near future because only then could I promise "I do" and "I will."

And so we were married the Saturday before Palm Sunday, the Saturday before Holy Week.

Perhaps it seems strange to you that I would need to cling to the hope of the Resurrection as I vowed my life to the man waiting for me at the end of the aisle.

My beloved on our 10th anniversary.

Typically, weddings seem so robustly hopeful that the extra is thrown over the bride's shoulder for some lucky maiden to carry home and set her to dreaming.

Yet, I knew this kind of hope would not be enough for me. To pledge my life to another, I needed the kind of hope that would see me through my failures, my insufficiencies, my stubborn refusal to admit to being in the wrong.

And that explains why I walked down the aisle, on the arm of my father, to the song In Christ Alone.

Only in Christ could I find the light that would carry me through life's dark valleys and blind corners.

I did not want fear to rule or guilt to cripple. I did not want to build any life except what could be built on the Cornerstone.

And so, in front of friends and family, I stood in the power of Christ.

That was eleven years ago, and while eleven years is not usually a significant anniversary, it seems so this year because the days and dates of Easter line up just like in the year of our wedding. Unless we live to celebrate our 84th anniversary, this will be the only year of our lives this happens. A once-in-a-lifetime event is quite significant, yes?

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This Easter marks another anniversary. It's been two years since we first climbed the stone steps to the church we now call home. 

That first Sunday, I was under a tiny-wee bit of stress. We were brand new to the city, yet had somehow added a baby to the family in that brief time.

We were juggling two new sets of work expectations and the travel that characterized one. And that Sunday morning, that Easter morning, we were shepherding children into and out of a rented minivan, since ours had been totaled the week before.

And to that slightly, wee-bit-stressed mother climbing the steps with infant and entourage, they handed a fistful of flowers.

They weren't for me, exactly. They were to fill the jars and vases lining the windows. And me, juggling children and stress, added my fistful to the line up and found the first seats available, even though it meant we were split between two rows.

So that all service long, I sat in the sunshine streaming through the tulips, alstroemerias, roses, and who-knows-what-else flowers. All white. All beautiful.

And then, sweet gift of heaven, at the end of the service, they encouraged people to take a few flowers home.

And they especially encouraged children to take some to their mothers.

Which is how, come my wedding anniversary a few days later, even though my husband traveled, my kitchen window hosted a vase of flowers remarkably like my wedding bouquet.

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Perhaps it's understandable then, why when churches first started cancelling services as COVID-19 hit our shores, I looked anxiously at the calendar, counting the weeks still to come. Wondering if maybe, could we possibly please be back in church by Holy Week?

I know others did, too, as I wasn't the only person googling "cancel Easter."

Now of course it's absurd to think that Easter could be cancelled. There are even hymns about that.

Death in vain forbids him rise, Alleluia!

But this year more than ever, it seems we desperately need the reminder that is Easter.

Instead, Lent drags on, with no promising Easter morning to end our self-denial. As I hear people's stories of their time of shelter-in-place, I imagine an absurd conversation, a competition of sorts:

"This year for lent, I gave up sending my children to school."

"Yes, well, I fasted from hanging out with friends."
"Ha! That's nothing. I gave up toilet paper."

There's far harder sacrifices, of course. And as longer stay-at-home orders coincide with Holy Week preparation, it seems as though the dark waiting of Lent will continue long past its usual boundaries. 

Must our Lenten sacrifice include Easter this year?

There will be no eager, expectant gathering on Easter morning. No crescendo of back and forth calls: He is risen! He is risen indeed! There will be no rising tide of enthusiasm as we sing

Low in the grave he lay—

  Jesus, my Savior!

Waiting the coming day—

  Jesus my Lord!

Up from the grave He arose,

With a mighty triumph o’er His foes

He arose a Victor from the dark domain,

And He lives forever with His saints to reign.

He arose! He arose!

  Hallelujah! Christ arose!

and all the other favorites of that glorious day.

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Tonight we celebrated our anniversary with a fancy dinner at the epitome of exclusive restaurants: Mi Familia.

While I spent the afternoon upstairs, the man who committed to love me for better or for worse transformed the dining table into a secluded table for two. Of course, with an open floor plan and four children, a little ingenuity and bribery were in order.

Still, once the wait-staff had been dismissed upstairs with bowls of spaghetti and Netflix at the ready, we had a lovely date unlike anything we've ever had.

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Wedding anniversaries are easier to reimagine than Easter celebrations. At eleven years, four children, and enough moves I'm not sure how to count them, we've not had much time for creating traditions.

Easter, on the other hand, has quite a few more traditions attached. And nearly all of them involve celebrating with the church.

Can our Easter celebration this year be anything more than a mere shadow of what it ought to be? Will Lent stretch on and on, long past the 40 days set for it?

But then I am reminded that even the most robust earthly celebration of the Resurrection morning can only be a mere shadow of what it ought to be. Our entire earthly life is a Lenten discipline of waiting, repentance, and sacrifice.

Yes, we are instructed to turn from godless living and sinful pleasures. We should live in this evil world with wisdom, righteousness, and devotion to God, while we look forward with hope to that wonderful day when the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ, will be revealed. (Titus 2:12-13).

We may miss the resounding throng of voices shouting, "He is Risen!" this year, but we continue our self-discipline and devotion to God, looking forward with hope to that wonderful day... that eternal Resurrection Day.