Tagged: passover
Palm Sunday – Come and join the parade!
Tomorrow is a big day. No – I’m not referring to holy week, but to the fact that from tomorrow we can gather in groups of 6 or two households outdoors. And just in time the weather is changing so we can actually see people outdoors without freezing! Some outdoor activities can begin to start. The Easter Monday bank holiday beckons – what will we do with it? Well, unfortunately the temperature drops again by the end of the week, and though it’s traditionally a day for trips out, there’s not a great deal we can do anyway. Perhaps a garden visit and a chilly barbecue with one other family.
And it’s going to be a while before we can start to think about the kind of lack of social distancing that the people who headed to Jerusalem for the Passover encountered.
Continue readingBasking in the sunshine of God
This is the day – Pentecost – when the Holy Spirit takes centre stage. This great feast in the Christian Year, when we celebrate the Holy Spirit coming upon the disciples on the Jewish Festival of Pentecost, which came seven weeks after Passover and celebrated both the wheat harvest and the giving of the Torah, the Law, on Mount Sinai. It was one of three pilgrimage festivals when Jews came to the Temple in Jerusalem – Passover, Pentecost and Tabernacles – in Hebrew Pesach, Shavuot and Sukkot. Pentecost is the Greek word for this feast and is derived from the Greek word for 50 – the feast of 50 days – seven weeks after Passover, and for us 50 days after Easter. For me using my seven times table it comes to 49, but if we count Easter Sunday as Day 1 then you will find that this is Day 50 after Easter! I know some of you like to know this sort of thing.
Continue readingDonkey riding!
What to do on a bank holiday Monday? What will the weather be like? Will it be sunny? Or will it be traditional British bank holiday weather? Will we be able to go out and have a really enjoyable day, or be consigned to staying in and watching TV? Well – to help you make your decision I’ve checked the forecast for Easter Monday – 90 per cent chance of rain!
People have always looked forward with anticipation to bank holiday celebrations. And people at the time of Jesus were no different – except they didn’t call them bank holidays, of course. But their celebration of Passover – itself a very serious religious occasion when the people recalled and re-enacted their rescue by God from Egypt – was also a time of celebration. People flocked to the big city, to Jerusalem. The city’s population of about 100,000 was added to by 3 million visitors! and there was a massive party atmosphere as the crowds gathered to get ready for the great feast. Continue reading
View from the Valley 