The Sovereign Love of God

H oly Week: Sharing His Death to Rise with Him Palms of Welcome, the Passion of Suffering, the Pain of Crucifixion, and the Power of Resurrection For believers, Christ crucified is both the power and wisdom of God. This is the period where followers of Jesus enter the high point of our spiritual formation in observance of the Church Year: our participation by faith in the Passion of our Lord. Holy Week is the last week of the Lenten season. Beginning with our Palm Sunday Celebration , and through the various activities of the week, we join with believers worldwide to recall and be transformed by the story of Jesus of Nazareth – his trial, suffering, and death which occurred so many centuries ago in Jerusalem. The three days at the end of this week represent the most serious and solemn days of the Church calendar, focusing as they do on the events of Jesus’ final hours before his death on the Cross. In the ancient church the three days [of the Paschal Triduum] started on Thursday evening and ended with the great Paschal vigil of Saturday night. These services are called the Paschal Triduum [or, the Three Great Days] . . . They are the most holy, solemn, and serious days of the entire year. For in these days we experience and encounter our own destiny in the destiny of Christ’s ignominious death and burial and in his triumphant resurrection from the dead.

~ Robert Webber. Ancient Future Time. Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 2004, p. 125.

153