Today’s #LentArt is probably a welcome change of tone and subject matter after a number of days of quite sobering posts. Those who know me well and have followed my previous #AdventArt and #ChristmasArt posts will know by now that the painter Frederic Edwin Church is one of my favourites, and this is one of his, but unusually it is not taken from one of his typically massive canvases but rather is a small oil sketch which he made on a two week trip to the Holy Land with his wife in March 1869. It was part of his preparation for his more typically grand seven-feet-wide panoramic painting of the Old City sacred buildings topped by the Dome of the Rock and the al-Aqsa Mosque. But what I like better with this sketch is, the sense of the city being bathed in light, which in the sketch is ironically achieved by leaving the paper untouched. What first attracted me to Church’s canvases was his use of light within them, but in this case whilst the larger canvas offers a similar point of view it, the city in it lies under a threatening storm-filled sky.
I chose this picture because we have reached the point where Lent is leading inexorably towards Jerusalem and the gathering stormclouds that finally break towards the end of Holy Week. And yet, in todays Lectionary readings there are signs of hope. First in Ezekiel:
“But you, mountains of Israel, will produce branches and fruit for my people Israel, for they will soon come home. I am concerned for you and will look on you with favor; you will be plowed and sown, and I will cause many people to live on you—yes, all of Israel. The towns will be inhabited and the ruins rebuilt. I will increase the number of people and animals living on you, and they will be fruitful and become numerous. I will settle people on you as in the past and will make you prosper more than before. Then you will know that I am the Lord. I will cause people, my people Israel, to live on you. They will possess you, and you will be their inheritance; you will never again deprive them of their children."
Ezekiel 36:8-12 (NIV)
The mountains of Israel will be fruitful… including the Mount of Olives one would hope, although the olive tree in this picture from that mountain seems a little scraggy… and we tend to associate the Mount of Olives with the Garden of Gethsemane and the agony and betrayal of Jesus that took place there… but even that was ultimately to produce good fruit.
But then in the Gospel reading we are unexpectedly taken beyond the events of Holy Week to the ascension narrative in Luke, which again would have taken place not far from where this picture was painted.
He said to them, “This is what I told you while I was still with you: Everything must be fulfilled that is written about me in the Law of Moses, the Prophets and the Psalms.”
Then he opened their minds so they could understand the Scriptures. He told them, “This is what is written: The Messiah will suffer and rise from the dead on the third day, and repentance for the forgiveness of sins will be preached in his name to all nations, beginning at Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things. I am going to send you what my Father has promised; but stay in the city until you have been clothed with power from on high.”
When he had led them out to the vicinity of Bethany, he lifted up his hands and blessed them. While he was blessing them, he left them and was taken up into heaven. Then they worshiped him and returned to Jerusalem with great joy. And they stayed continually at the temple, praising God.
Luke 24:44-53 (NIV)
We’ve got to get through the rest of Lent, the darkness of Good Friday, the confusion of Easter Day and a further 40 days before we arrive back at this point in the church year…
And in the current crisis who knows what lies ahead for all of us… but this picture and the prophecy from Ezekiel speak of light breaking through the darkness, hope of new life in the face of desolation and destruction… While the Gospel suggests that some will come through this with a new impetus to take good news from the place were we have been closeted away, to the very ends of the earth…
PRAYER
Promise keeping God
You have repeatedly redeemed and restored
Your fallen, wayward people.
You bring fruitfulness where there was once family
Renewed beauty where there was ugliness and decay
A sense of purpose where there was pessimism and confusion
Lord you invite us to share in your work of redemption
To bear witness to your saving power, by word and deed
To bring hope to the hopeless, comfort to the sorrowing
Light in the darkness and a song of joy that cuts through
The clamour of recrimination and despair.
Grant us the power of the Spirit that raised Jesus from the dead
Promised to us that we might live up to our calling,
In and through Jesus AMEN
Shalom
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