You’ve got to read this email we received from Australia of the impact of our Easter Sunday tradition of everyone in the congregation ‘dressing the cross’ with spring flowers.

Emma, working over here as medic last year, got ‘revived’ as she took part in our 40 DAYS IN THE WORD and then got blown away by our Easter celebrations , especially the way we transformed Good Friday’s stark, bare cross  by bringing it back to life on Easter Sunday morning by dressing it with hundreds of flowers.

She writes:

‘Since returning to Australia I am quite out of the loop what’s been going on in your life and All Nations – I’m sorry I didn’t realise you are unwell and receiving radical therapy for cancer. I will keep you in my prayers and hope you are recovering well – radiation therapy is a terribly brutal treatment (the hormonal therapy is new since I worked in oncology but I’m guessing it’s no picnic either).

I wanted to say I shared with my church back here in Brisbane  at our communion service the beautiful picture I took Easter Sunday last year at All Nations of the cross all overlaid with flowers. The process of watching the cross transform from an empty reminder of Jesus’ death into the vibrant and beautiful image of His life and resurrection has really had a very profound impact on me and has really changed the way I conceptualise the cross.

From the comments people made after church I think it resonated well with them too… I’m only sorry Easter in Australia is always in Autumn so we miss the beautiful similarities between the Easter story and the seasonal changes in the northern hemisphere that added such meaning to it for me last year. God has certainly crystallised many things for me during my year in the UK. 🙂

Easter. Spring flowers. New life. Hope. Transformation. Has the penny dropped for you yet???