Dear In the Meantime Readers, I hope you all had a blessed Easter celebration! I am writing to let you know that I needed to take an unexpected one-week hiatus from the blog. Life got even crazier than usual, and I had a few meetings I hadn’t counted on and some other matters to attend...
Matthew 28:1
posted by DJL
After the Sabbath, as the first day of the week was dawning, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to see the tomb. Dawn, on the first day of the week. This is when Matthew’s account of the resurrection starts. Dawn, when the sun is just cresting the horizon after a long night, spreading...
Matthew 27:62-66
posted by DJL
The next day, that is, after the day of Preparation, the chief priests and the Pharisees gathered before Pilate and said, “Sir, we remember what that impostor said while he was still alive, ‘After three days I will rise again.’ Therefore command that the tomb be made secure until the...
Were You There
posted by DJL
Good Friday is a day of introspection and reflection. This is particularly evident in the evening service many congregations hold on Good Friday. Often called the Tenebrae (from the Latin for “shadows”) Service, we often omit a sermon and instead read various portions of the passion, interspersed by prayers and hymns, turning down the lights after each reading until we are in almost complete darkness at the end of the service and depart in silence, filled with a sense of the sacrifice Jesus makes on our behalf and longing for the hope of Easter morning. One of my favorite hymns sung at various times in Lent but especially at the...
Matthew 27:57-61
posted by DJL
When it was evening, there came a rich man from Arimathea, named Joseph, who was also a disciple of Jesus. He went to Pilate and asked for the body of Jesus; then Pilate ordered it to be given to him. So Joseph took the body and wrapped it in a clean linen cloth and laid it in his own new...