Many of us didn't grow up in a traditional church background. We had heard of Jesus as children, but only remembered his figure on a felt flannel board in our few visits to church. We knew he died, but weren't quite sure how that mattered to us. When we later became followers of Jesus, it took a while to learn the new bespoke lingo. After a few years of being Christians, we felt too embarrassed to admit we still hadn't figured out the seasonal words like lent, passion week and advent. (I was a Christian 10 years before finding out lent had nothing to do with that stuff in my pocket, passion week had nothing to do with earthly desires and advent didn't sound very "adventurous" at all)
If we had dug deeper, we'd have found out that those words were just a capstone to a world of devotion that could transfix the life, teachings, death and resurrection of Christ and the celebrations of the historic church across an entire calendar year. For almost two thousand years, the church has remembered this story of Christ and his followers not just by historical writings, but by participation. This remembering by participation is the crux of Christian liturgy and the Christian calendar.
In "Rise: An Eight Day Easter Devotional", Dan Wilt (author, teacher, speaker, radio host) crafts a planned but luscious menu for the soul of the Christian, feeding them through the Passion week. If this devotional is a menu, each day is a meal- and a full meal it is! Beginning at Palm Sunday (the Sunday before Easter), Wilt lays out a daily devotional that brings you through to Easter Sunday with clear purpose and rich understanding. Each day's devotional contains an introductory paragraph, a short scripture quotation, a concise devotional teaching, a brief reflective prayer and a summary question. And while the devotional resource has an inspiring aesthetic, the beauty of this booklet is its terse format woven around such a deeply meaningful prose.
The devotional is just twenty pages in length, but begins smartly by opening the reader to an understanding of the language of what Easter is, and even an historical and scriptural sketch of its significance. Having personally walked through the devotional myself, I found each day a significant encounter for my mind and heart to engage with God. As Wilt says in his prose, "Baptism has always been the perfect visual for what happens when the Easter story becomes our own", so it is in this devotional. One becomes engaged not through the accumulation of good teaching (though that is here). Rather it is through the participation in which the believer is guided that this devotional springs to life.
Through this daily journey you will learn to see the triumphal entry, turn the table on idolatry, wait in the right way, make worship lavish, feast on the last supper, enter the cross, live between the times and rise with Christ to life! This resource is concise, and so is my recommendation- engage with this devotional! It is excellent!
If you have the privilege of reading a printed version already provided through your church (and many thousands of you already do), I encourage you to take it in daily through this week. Even if you haven't begun yet- start now! I am going to be re-using this for regular reflection times throughout the year.
If you don't have access to a printed version of the devotional, you can purchase a digital copy here:
The "Rise: An Eight Day Easter Devotional" is a produced and distributed through Vineyard Resources, but is applicable and useable for any biblical Christian or group.
Risen in Christ,
Kim Gentes