Archives for April 18, 2015

Devotion

This joyful Eastertide,
away with sin and sorrow!
My love, the Crucified,
has sprung to life this morrow.

Refrain
Had Christ, who once was slain,
not burst his three-day prison,
our faith had been in vain.
But now has Christ arisen,
arisen, arisen, arisen.

My flesh in hope shall rest
and for a season slumber
till trump from east to west
shall wake the dead in number. Refrain

Death's flood has lost its chill
since Jesus crossed the river.
Lover of souls, from ill
my passing soul deliver. Refrain

I live by a few rivers, the most well-known of which is the Columbia. We've harnessed its power and, as Woody Guthrie once sang its "power is turning our darkness to dawn; roll on Columbia roll on."

The Columbia's waters are quite chilly. The water that flows in the recreation area is the bottom water from upstream. It's beautiful, but when you’re in the water you really know you're alive.

Therefore, I’m really drawn to the third verse here: "Death's flood has lost its chill since Jesus crossed the river." I hope to be thinking about something like that when my last moments of life occur: Christ has altered the nature of our move from death to eternal life. This reminds me of something Luther mused about, that our physical death is really a "little" death. The bigger one happened at the font.