I wrote this devotional the first Easter after my father's death and shared it with the Chaplain's Department at Spartanburg Regional Medical Center.
It was
Sunday. My mother and I were driving
home after church discussing all of the usual after-service matters. We caught ourselves voicing several
criticisms of the worship service we’d just attended. I quickly realized that behind our criticism
was the pain that worship holds for both of us in the wake of my father's
death. Church and family overlap a great
deal in my memories and feelings. Daddy was so much a part of what church life
is to me that I swear I can still hear his voice in the choir. As the car
turned into the driveway of our home, mother and I were met by a deluge of
color from the blooming azaleas in front of the house. Though I recognized
their beauty with a passing glance, mother specifically called my attention to
them asking, "Son, do you see the
azaleas that Orin and I planted?"
As I heard the awed tone of her voice and looked more intently at the
blossoming plants, I was not so sure that I really had seen them. When I looked at the flower boxes more closely, I
saw that in place of the numerous flowers which usually formed their border,
these azaleas were flanked only by weeds.
The meticulous pruning and careful cultivation daddy gave those plants
was missing as their shape was rather spindly and the dirt around them was hard
and full of clods.
Seeing this
state of disrepair brought me pain because I realized that the hands which had
cared for these plants only a year ago were gone. But while I was still in
the grip of the pain of loss I looked again and saw the beautiful blooms that had blossomed, seemingly in spite of everything. The
purple, pink and white were so full of life. I experienced a profound joy
knowing that even in death my father's work continues to bring joy and beauty
into my world. That strange mixture of pain and joy was my experience as I took
the time to really look at the blossoming azaleas.
The Easter
season is upon us and everywhere we look we see the cross of Christ, but I
wonder if we really see it? If we can look closely enough to see the
rough wood and the nails, we come face to face with the pain that self-giving
love requires, the hurt that shook the very heart of God as His own Son laid
down his life because of the hard-heartedness and hard-headedness of humanity. Seeing
how far perfect love has to go to reach mankind silences our every claim to
self-sufficiency. It is only with eyes stained by the tears of that loss that
we can rightly see the resurrected Christ and experience the joy of the
redemption which burst forth from the tomb like living blossoms from azaleas
stained by neglect.
See, from His head, His hands, His feet,
Sorrow and love flow mingled down;
Did e'er such love and sorrow meet,
Or thorns compose so rich a crown.
Isaac Watts
It is that
paradoxical mixture of agonizing pain and profound joy which is the Easter
experience and the Easter message. Amen.
Ronald D.
Vaughan
April 6, 1982