What do Cupcakes have to do with it?

Well by the looks of this blog you would think I fasted from the on-line world for Lent ;-)

Not true.  However, this Lent seemed to fly by and Eastertide is already upon us.

Holy Week (combined with my kids Spring Break) kept me hopping (pun intended).  I tried to watch The Passion this year, but I couldn't.  I had nothing left in me after Good Friday services.  I literally read the Passion Gospel 15x.  I have to say it was worth it when just 1 parishioner came up to me on Easter Sunday and said "I have to tell you how God spoke to me after Good Friday", she had been a part of our Lectio Divina group - where I read the Passion Gospel 5x.  It is funny I LOVE Lectio Divina - but after the 3rd reading I started to wonder how the participants felt.  The Passion Gospel is 11.5 minutes long.  I ended up just reading the last 5 minutes for Lectio.  That is a long time to sit and listen - and it is really long for a Lectio Divina.

Then the Easter Egg hunt where we took the Easter Bunny to a new level.  You see my version of the Easter Bunny hides the Resurrection Eggs.  So I did an interactive sermon using the Resurrection Eggs and then sent the kids out to find them amongst the candy filled eggs.  It is one of my greatest joys to see the church campus filled with running, screaming kids who delight in joy at being the one who finds the empty egg - the empty tomb. 

When I arrived home after the Egg hunt and setting up for the Sunrise service - there was a beautiful box on my front porch.  It was from Georgetown Cupcakes with the most divine cupcakes you can imagine; little bites of heaven.  The card read Happy Easter.  I have dubbed the anonymous giver The Easter Bunny.  To date, the coconut and key lime pie version of the cupcakes are my favorites.  Utterly divine and inspired.

And this is the surprise.  You go through life expecting the normal, the same as it ever was, the routine.  Good Friday comes every year as does Holy Saturday.  Sitting with the empty tomb, feeling the sadness of the Beloved Disciple; Mary.  Holding on to the moment of unknowing, the how shall we live now that our Lord and Savior has been crucified and we are alone in this brutal, broken world.  And then surprise, the gift at the door of the tomb.  The stone pushed away, the linen cloth laying there empty and the words whispered, "Woman, why are you crying?  Whom is it you are looking for?"

"And Jesus said to her "Mary".

"Rabboni!"

And it is with us, Jesus calling us by name.  Asking us, who are you looking for?  Who are you searching for?  In all the ways we try to fill our lives, to fill the emptiness of our own tombs; in our own story we mirror Mary weeping and desiring our Rabboni.  It is only Jesus who can fill us, make us whole.  It is only Jesus who can call us by name and we recognize His voice.  It is only Jesus. 

Oh we try!  We try so hard to fill the tomb, the gaping unknowing with shreds of linen spread about, with angels garnering our attention.  We try to fill it with so much and in the end it is only Jesus who can satisfy.  The Hope of Easter is not just finding Jesus standing at the empty tomb - but of recognizing Him and inviting him to abide in our lives, our hearts, our soul!