Memory Lane

I grew up in a small Mennonite church in Northern Indiana.

Our average attendance was just over 100 adults. However, despite its small size, our Easter celebration was huge.

Easter meant a lot to our church, just as it does to most all who follow Jesus. At our church, it began on Thursday evening when we would celebrate communion, which included the taking of the elements (the bread and cup) and the practice of washing one another’s feet. There were even a couple of years when the celebration began early on Thursday as the church would read through the entire Bible, out loud, from the podium, beginning in Genesis and clear through Revelation. Church members would sign up for a half hour time slot and step up to the podium when it was their turn and pick up where the previous person left off. The reading ran straight through, 24 hours a day, from Thursday morning to when we completed Revelation sometime early Sunday morning. It was an amazing experience in which to participate.

Sunday morning continued with an Easter Sunrise service (or maybe I should call it a “Son”rise service). My parents would wake us up well before the sun rose on Easter Sunday morning, and while still in our pajamas, we’d load up in the car and drive to church. The “Sunday best” outfits and the corsages that my father always purchased for my mom and sisters, were safely packed in the car to put on later that morning… after breakfast.

Upon arrival at the church, the curtains were opened on the East facing windows to watch the sunrise as it occurred. This commemorated the Resurrection of Jesus early on Sunday morning. Matthew records in Matthew 28:1:

After the Sabbath, at dawn on the first day of the week (which would be Sunday), Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to look at the tomb.

It was as the sun rose that Mary Magdalene and Mary discovered that Jesus was no longer in the tomb, for He had risen.

So, 2000 years later, as the sun rose in the East in Northern Indiana, the men of our church would get to work preparing breakfast (always pancakes and sausages) while the women sat around and talked and the children (us) played hide-and-go-seek in the basement of the church (yes, we had a basement).

Once breakfast was ready, the men would serve, we’d eat, the men would clean up, and we’d change into our best Easter outfits for the sunrise service. The church service was always earlier than normal, as we would forego Sunday School on Easter. The focus was on the Resurrection, just as it should be (although my sisters agreed with me that, as children, we were probably more interested in the breakfast than anything else. Oops!)

Following the Easter Sunrise service, our family would load up in the car once again and make our way to my grandparents’ home on the St. Joseph River in southern Michigan, where we would conduct our Easter Egg Hunt (and there would always be a number of eggs that were not found until sometimes months later), and we would share Easter brunch together.

These memories are not only dear to my heart, but also allowed my two sisters and I to reminisce together as we walked down memory lane and sought to recall all the details that had occurred 50+ years ago. When I asked my dad what he remembered, he was a bit fuzzy on the details, but I loved it when he said, “Your mom would have remembered all of them.”

Memories are good, and it is the memory of what Jesus did for us on the cross and His Resurrection from the grave that make these specific memories some of the best we could ever have.

Pastor Ken

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