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Passover Us

 


I suppose we can call our trip to Nashville a tradition at this point. There might be even be a sense of "we do this every time" or "been there done that" to some parts of the trip: visiting a certain coffee shop, making a trip to Hattie B's, going to Germantown, or visiting Franklin. While we all look forward to getting together, there might even be a sense of boredom with some aspects of our trip and time together that creeps in. Hard to imagine, I know, but if we're honest, it can happen on trips like this because we're humans in an age of novelty. 

Well, we all remember Moses on the banks of the river...
And we all remember Pharaoh, he just wouldn't do it...
But the Lord he gave to Moses a word for the people...

I think about the Israelites celebrating Passover, year after year. Same place, same people, same story, same traditions, same rituals. Some might even ask: haven't we all done this before? 

They were engaging in the important act of remembering. In the gathering, the rituals, and the traditions of remembering, they were drawing themselves together around an event of the past. But that event of the past was remembered in order to shape their lives in the present. They are re-participating in an event that marked their lives and their existence as individuals and as a people. They were marked as people of God who hears their cries and delivers them. 

Lord, let your judgment pass over us
Lord, let your love hover near
Don't let your sweet mercy pass over us
Let this blood cover over us here

In their rituals and traditions, Israel remembers the Lord whose mercy and love still hovers near. As they walk through the moments and celebrate Passover, they are drawn more deeply back into the story, their identities shaped once again by the work of the Lord who delivered them and continues to rain down his love and mercy. 

I'm reminded of the current season of Advent. Every year. Same story. Same rituals. Yet, we remember. And we live between advents. Christ has died, Christ has risen, Christ will come again. So we remember with hope, rooting our lives to his story, with the hope that all things will be made new.

As we look ahead to our time together, what are the rituals and traditions of our gathering? How do these serve a deeper purpose than passing the time until the concert night? I've been pondering that lately. My hope is that, at least for me, the things we do each year are more than just passing the time until the concert night. At least I want them to be more than that! I am still sorting out how the things we do each year can be and are important formative remembering moments, at least for us. 

Here's what stirs in my mind, though. When we visit Franklin with you all, a place Jaya loves, we are drawn to remember when we first went there in 2023 with elation and joy over the fact that we were even doing it. When we visit one of the awesome coffee shops or go to a BBQ place together, or Biscuit Love or to Hattie B's, or walk around Germantown, we are drawn again into the experience of the first year we gathered. It's not just tradition. It's remembering by reenacting the moments in which hope came alive because we'd made it a year since December 2022, and you were with us. 

These are more than moments filling the time. These are moments when we remember by reenacting, and experience again how the love of the Lord continues to hover near through not merely our time together but also perhaps the traditions of what we do together.

The joy of going to that swanky secondhand shop in Germantown together, eating at Hattie B's, or Jaya walking the shops of Franklin with her dear friend Evangeline never gets old. Each time is a fresh remembering. 

For us, it brings us back to what we can never escape. It calls us back to what has happened, but not to dwell in sorrow. In these moments the bright light of God's hope shines because we do not remember alone. What things of God's faithfulness, of his love hovering, are you remembering as we look ahead to gather together this year?

When we engage in our Nashville trip rituals together -- whether it is visiting a coffee shop, Hattie B's, the shops in Franklin, talking, joking, playing a game, or just doing nothing at the AirBnB -- in all of it we are participating again in the traditions and rituals that call us back to the story of God's hope and beauty that births new life out of sorrow and darkness. 




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