the    sides

It’s been a long day and I didn’t even get to blog. What the heck is up with that? I’ll hit it hard and fast in the morning but I got a huge dent done in the Easter sermon.

Can get out of my mind a Harry Potter scene for Easter. It’s the second task of the Tri-Wizard Tournament. “Something precious has been taken from our wizards.” It’s a relationship and the person they love most is at the bottom of the Dark Pond. The rescuers have to become something they are not in order to save them. I mean, how ironic is that?

Another interesting parallel - nobody would pick Harry Potter as their hero. Nobody is going to pick a nerdy looking, spectacle wearing teenage boy as the savior of the world. He doesn’t look the part and after all - he’s part ‘muggle.’

I suspect Jesus didn’t look the part either. Given a choice, would we have honestly chosen a minority, poor, blue collar worker with a suspect lineage from some no-name town in the Middle East to be our Redeemer? I don’t think so.

I don’t think Jesus was nerdy … although he was a carpenter which meant he did have to be pretty good with numbers and geometry. I don’t think he was scrawny either … but the average height of a Jewish male in the first century was around 5′ 8″. I suspect Jesus looked … well, he looked like a Jewish male who lived in the first century. Pretty ordinary. Not heroic.

The whole Gospel is like this really. Taking the ordinary and making it extraordinary. Taking the refuse and making it priceless. The scandal of grace and hope. I love Easter.