So, how is your prep going? Easter is nearly upon us and quite a few of us have a talk to give ... the kid's club session, the youth group Easter get-together, the lunch club for the retired with the pause for thought at the end or, of course, the Good Friday reflection or Easter sermon itself.
Is it going well?
Somehow life in the run up to a big church celebration can feel a little out of control. The kids are running riot. The commentary on Matthew has mysteriously disappeared. The glue for the visual aids is proving bizarrely ineffective (except when accidentally applied to one's forehead). Inspiration on how to tell the Easter story slightly differently this year is pretty non-existant. All those good intentions to get ahead with the talk prep are fully out of the window. 16 people have decided to call you with a pastoral crisis just as you were about to start typing. The washing machine has decided the kitchen floor would look so much better if it were under 2 inches of water. Your prayer life has become about as vibrant as a bunch of watercress a week past its sell-by date. And in the middle of all this, we have to find the strength to tell people the most important thing they will ever hear ...
Sound familiar? Well, maybe not for all of us but for some. There's a distinct feeling of weakness about - we are inadequate, frail human beings but the message we carry has eternal consequences.
Which is why, on weeks like this, it can be encouraging to remember afresh Paul's words:
And so it was with me, brothers and sisters. When I came to you, I did not come with eloquence or human wisdom as I proclaimed to you the testimony about God. For I resolved to know nothing while I was with you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. I came to you in weakness with great fear and trembling. My message and my preaching were not with wise and persuasive words, but with a demonstration of the Spirit’s power, so that your faith might not rest on human wisdom, but on God’s power. - 1 Corinthians 2:1-5
May that same Spirit be at work in us all as we serve the risen Lord this Easter ...
Helen Thorne is Director of Training and Resources at Biblical Counselling UK. She formerly worked with the London City Mission and has written Hope in an Anxious World, Purity Is Possible, Walking with Domestic Abuse Sufferers and 5 Things to Pray for Your City. She attends Dundonald Church in Raynes Park, London.