And just like that it’s over.
This trip to desert beauty.
Working out details with my ‘soon to be’ relatives.
Birthday celebrations. Mine. With a little girl who loves to celebrate, just about anything, whenever possible.
Stuff and nonsense with that same little one who is all grown up and a husband who is full of just that, stuff and nonsense, whenever he can be and get away with it.
Dinners in favorite desert restaurants.
Sunsets over mountains.
Blooming flowers on top of prickly cacti.
Mama hummingbird sitting patiently outside this kitchen window and then feeding babies with open mouths.
Memories all.
And then Easter.
A song sung at this church in the desert goes like this

The Greatest Day in History
Death is beaten
you have rescued me
Sing it out Jesus is Alive

Oh Happy Day Happy Day
You washed my sin away
Oh Happy Day Happy Day
I’ll never be the same

The empty cross
the empty grave
Life eternal you have won the day
Shout it out Jesus is alive.

Oh Happy Day
…Forever I am changed

When I stand in that place
Free at Last meeting Face to Face
I am yours Jesus you are mine.

Oh Happy Day
Forever I am changed

Oh What a Glorious Day
What a Glorious Way
You have saved me.

We sang this song today, Easter Sunday.
Resurrection Sunday.

I tell you, it was impossible to stand with both feet planted on the floor while that song was echoing through the place.
Blessing beyond what I can ask or think.
Blessing pours into my very soul when I praise the one who has rescued me.
If you have never felt the joy that comes from praising God, do it. Praise Him no matter
How sad you are
How difficult your life is
How wayward your children are
How distant your husband is
No matter how much money you have or don’t have in the bank.
Do it!
He has rescued us. Oh Happy Day
Of course we should do it every day but just as we praise God for sending Jesus as a baby, at Christmas time,
And we thank Him for pouring out His blood when we share communion the breaking of bread,
Easter is that wonderful celebration time of thanksgiving for Jesus death and resurrection.
It is a designated time when we actually focus on it.
Oh Happy Day He washed my sin away.

I love Spring and Birthdays and Easter. New Life. The promises. The Hope of Life spent with Him. I call that “God Hope”.
Oh Happy Day He washed my sin away.

Jesus is Love. Real, true love. Like nothing we can conjure up or recreate. He is God and we are His creation. God tells us ~ Not told! Present tense, because we are supposed to keep reading it and listening and learning and doing. He keeps telling us. He is so patient and wise and He knew when He first told His people way back in the early days what He wanted them to do, that we would all need to read it over and over and over again. So He wrote it all down for us. That way He could tell us, over and over again, every time we read it, how to live and how to love and how to be like Jesus.
Oh Happy Day
Jesus is alive!

He was born, He lived (perfectly), He died a horrific, bloody, cruel, devastating, painful death on that cross.
He rose again. He lives now. I live in “God Hope” because of what He did.
As good as we try to be, as kind, as loving, it doesn’t compare to that.

Easter is not about being kind, or sharing what we have, or giving to the food bank, or turning the other cheek. Those things are good. So good that we should do them constantly.
But
Easter is about Jesus. Dying on a cross. Rising from the dead. To take our sins away.
Oh Happy Day
He washed my sin away.

All those years ago when I was living in the preacher’s house and he was reading his Bible and getting ready for Sundays, week after week and I was watching how he lived without even realizing I was doing it, God was teaching me.
The preacher shared constantly, daily, about Jesus and His love and my need for that love.
Our mother, Nano, listened and cared and watched over her little ones.
Easter approached and I was excited. Partly because Easter is also Birthday time and I told you a few days ago in Birthdays remembered how I felt about birthdays back then. Another reason for excitement was because Easter comes in Spring and I do love Spring.
I also loved the songs that we sang on Easter Sunday. Great old hymns.
*Up From the Grave He arose
*Christ The Lord is Risen Today
*Christ Arose

But truthfully part of the reason for my excitement was the new clothes. We did not have much money but we were always well dressed because my mom sewed all of our clothes. Dresses, skirts, jumpers, blouses.

I was telling someone this week how we always wore dresses on Sunday morning and then after rest time and tea time we would get to wear a jumper or a skirt (dressed down) to evening service.
Every Spring I got new shoes. Sometimes they were black patent. If we could find a pair to fit me. Those terrible narrow feet of mine meant we had to drive an hour to the next town to the store that sold narrow widths. My dad the preacher was very particular about our feet. He had had to wear shoes that did not fit properly, for most of his life and he had the feet to prove it.
So, he made sure we had properly fitting shoes.
Which meant that mine were usually “sensible”.
But sometimes we found beautiful black shiny ones. Never slip ons. They always had a strap over the top of my foot so it would stay put.
We would buy the new shoes a few weeks before Easter but I never, ever got to wear them until Good Friday service. To be clear, the towns we lived in when I was little usually had snow almost until Easter. I am sure I prayed before many an Easter Sunday that God would PLEASE make the snow disappear and the roads become dry, so I could wear my new shoes.
Those prayers and the subject of those prayers, along with my new Easter outfit were enough to cause me some sleepless nights before Good Friday. Excitement.

Then with hair curled up to my cheeckbones, my new clothes on and the ham and scalloped potatoes in the oven, off we went to church.
We usually sat in the fourth row from the front. Close enough to be a support to the preacher and a good influence on the other parishioners, far enough back to let others sit in front of us if they wished.
The music was not what it is these days but even then it was sung with hearts full of praise and was, I am quite certain, a sweet aroma to the one receiving it.
We loved Jesus
We were thankful for His sacrifice on our behalf and wanted to do our very best to present ourselves well (after all, if we were going to visit an earthly king we would certainly wear our best duds, so why would we not do the same for our savior?)
All dressed up, I sang my songs of praise and I remember Joy.
It was partly about Spring. It was partly about Jesus and His love for me and it was most certainly also about my new Easter Clothes.
Precious memories.

Oh Happy Day
Jesus washed my sins away