Dear Friends,
Springtime continues in our part of our world. Newness. Since April, the fields are strewn with new lambs and calves, baby goats, and chicks. Perennials are blossoming. Trees are visions of beauty in their new green.
It’s still Eastertime. The season liturgically goes on for 50 days. To help us realize how much more important the Easter season is, the Church maps out more celebrations of Easter than observances of the 40 days of Lent.
Newness is a pervasive theme of Scripture. At the end of the bible – the last chapter of the Book of Revelation – Jesus says; “Behold I make all things new!” (Rev. 21.5) If, indeed, we are in Christ, which I believe we are, then we are a new creation: the old things have passed away; behold, new things have come. (2Cor.5.17) May we relish the newness of this time.
In the last year, what has been new for you? New ideas, new friends, new convictions, new places to visit, new kids or grandkids? Surely there have been new losses or new illnesses as well. Sometimes we become so overwhelmed by the new losses that we forget, ignore or just miss the beautiful new realities that have come to enrich our lives.
In our minds, hearts and thoughts, where do we put the newness of the last year? Jesus in Mark 2.22 tells us not to put new wine into old wineskins, lest the old wineskins burst. Wineskins become stiff over time – having no yield. They get tired from the work of bearing wine for a long time. Jesus says, put new wine, which is still fermenting, into new wineskins where continued fermenting can take place without danger of breakage or spillage.
Someplace, deep inside us there is a place to carry new wine/newness safely and tenderly – a place where it can be nurtured into the future. Some of the newness we put into this new wineskin will stay with us forever. Some will leave only to come back in some unexpected moment in the future. And there is some fleeting. Taste it while you can.
You know that commercial that says "What’s in your wallet?” Each of us can also ask “What’s in your wineskin?”
In this very springtime, with its burst of color, its ordinariness, in its dailyness, may we be open to You, Loving God, and the newness You offer. May we treasure its value and value its place in our lives. Amen! Alleluia! Amen!
