My mother bought me my very own elf on the shelf a year or so before she died. Kringle was not even a proper size elf. He was a mini elf. I realize that is like saying a “pygmy grain of rice.” I never knew that the small humanoid characters working for Santa come in gradations of “little.” Kringle was as big as my thumb. Every year, Kringle would appear on the first of December. Max hid him for me each morning. He got a great deal of satisfaction from keeping score of who won the daily game of hide-and-seek. We have a lot of fun with it.
One year, we decided that saying good-bye to the game for an entire year on Christmas Eve was just too sad. We acquired an army of small bunny figurines (there must be an army of them- they are rabbits, after all) and Max started hiding them each morning about thirty days before Easter. That has been going on for about three years. We decided that, if “elf on the shelf” was a thing, then “bun on the run” should also be a thing. Sadly, the idea has never caught on with the international marketplace.
This year, the bunnies have not been running. I never did get Easter decorations out this season. I don’t know if it was because Easter is so late this year and I could not figure out when to shift gears into spring, or if it was my energy investment in the Spiritual Formation Course I was teaching. Somehow or another, I never quite got around to Easter home décor. If I am being completely honest, I must admit that I still have my winter wreath on the door and my Duffy the Disney Bear (another idea that never really caught on in the international marketplace) is still wearing his Santa costume. The bunnies are still in their basket in a cabinet, where they typically reside for eleven months of the year. I guess they have put down roots.
I feel like the Easter version of the Grinch. However, if the Grinch could discover that Christmas is Christmas- even without the roast beast- then I could certainly lean into the idea that Easter is Easter, even without the running bunnies.
The past several Lenten seasons have been true desert experiences for me. God has brought me through some critical times of despondency and rebirth. I watered the seeds of new plantings within me with tears. They grew into beautiful, strong trees that are now pillars supporting new levels of spirituality. As much as these refining times have hurt, I would not change a thing because they have ultimately led me to more creative, more nuanced, and more joyful faith. My pastor preached about this experience recently in a sermon. He talked about how God periodically explodes our image of who and what He is, in order to build an even bigger, more amazing, more complex understanding. These spiritual growth spurts are often chaotic, humbling, and mysterious. It makes sense if we understand them as the incomprehensible divine creative inspiration bursting with energy. I am blessed to have been the receptacle of that divine creative inspiration in some real and dramatic ways. I am even more blessed that I could perceive the Divine igniting within me even through the destruction.
This Lent has been quieter and more solid. The ground may have been moving beneath me, but I have felt steady and rooted. My Lenten growth this year has been more about receiving, accepting, and appreciating than about burning the chaff. I have worked hard on my Spiritual Formation Course. I have given up Facebook to allow more time in my day to breathe, sleep, meditate, and pray. Both Lenten disciplines have felt more like abundance than sacrifice. It is like my own year of jubilee.
As we approach the Triduum, the holiest time of the year for a Christian, I bring myself to the cross with such a sese of gratitude, not just for the most precious gift of salvation, but for the wonderful work God has done in me. I lay my everything before the cross this Holy Week- my pain, my shame, my brokenness, my reconciliation, my love, my faith, my hope, and my gratitude for whatever process God decides to use to grow me into the person He created me to be.
This Easter, I will be standing beside a new Christian as she receives Baptism. I will be sponsoring her as she takes this next step towards God. This is a daunting prospect because I don’t know how to do this. I don’t think there is an instruction manual for being a baptism sponsor. However, I strongly suspect I don’t have to do it; I simply have to be it. And, even more, I suspect it isn’t me that must do or be anything at all. It is God being within me who will do the guiding. He may use me to do some of it… and, in guiding I will also be guided.
It is a miracle.
Happy Resurrection Sunday!
Terri/Dorry 😊