Sunset's Story: an Easter Memoir

I once was told a story as the sun set.

Not a story told with words or song. Not something read or recorded.

Rather, it was a story I watched unfold before my eyes.

As the sun set before me, blazing orange colours sprawling across the sky, the whole world seemed to draw its breath to focus solely on this fiery light.

It seemed as though the light of day was at its pinnacle, painting with broad stroked hues of yellow, red, and deepening indigo which burned like embers at this eventide.

But then it began to sink, dipping slowly down into the clear waves which reflected its dwindling colours as if they were an abstracted version of the darkening sky.

It's fiery light seemed to burst in sparks of dying sun rays like a last proclamation of the day as it finally dipped below the blue line of the horizon.

And then the sun was gone, the shadows pressing around its fading colours which were like wavering embers that struggled to keep alive after the fire died down... and then snuffed out.

The night ensued, creeping over the land.

The light had disappeared, leaving darkness to cloak the world in shadows. It seemed as though darkness had won, for the sun had gone- sunk into the watery grave of the waves.

It was night.

But yet I remembered, there was a promise: a promise that though the sun set and night ensued, in the morning... it would rise.

Night lasted for hours, seeming to never let up.

But then its thick inkiness seemed to lighten. The sky began to pale. And a gentle light began to creep across the horizon.

The darkness trembled as the light seeped in, beginning to push it away with soft tendrils of morning rays that slowly rose with glowing pastel colours.

And then it happened: the sun rose.

All at once, it burst up into the sky, flooding golden light across this new day and pushing back the darkness with triumphant flaming beams.

And all Creation seemed to gasp, trees awakening and swaying as they caught the happy breeze dancing by, birds flitting about and striking up a joy-strung chorus, the waves rising up to toss spinning droplets to the sky.

The night no longer had its hold.

And that's when the darkness fled, for the sun had risen up again.

And the golden light of the sun spread into the day, sending flaming beams to alight upon Creation and raising with it all life that would join with it to partake in this new day it offered.

In the beauty of the sunset was told the story of Easter... the story of the gospel.

Like the sun setting, as Jesus died in our place on the cross, he paid the price for our sins, bringing the slavery of sin to death. The old faded away, buried in the tomb for three days.

But like the sun rising again, when Jesus rose, the grave was robbed, death was defeated, the grip of sin fell away, the old was left behind, and he rose!

And He calls us to rise with him: to step out of the old into the new that He offers. He invites us to join in his resurrection!

And he offers this every second, every minute, every hour of every day.

In the setting and rising sun every day, He calls you to leave behind your sins and follow his better way.

In the setting and rising sun every day, He calls you to lay down your old life to enter into the new and better life that he offers.

In the setting and rising sun every day, He calls you to lay down your shame and your guilt, your fears and your anxieties, your sins and your pride, your brokenness and your emptiness at the foot of the cross at his feet.

And when you do, his promise is always to resurrect.

From the setting sun of shame and guilt he redeems, he makes you pure and new. From the setting sun of fears and anxieties, he pours on you his peace and his unshakable hope. From the setting sun of your sins and pride, he gives you a new start, His Spirit and His strength. From the setting sun of your brokenness and Your emptiness, he fills you and makes you whole.

And he calls you into the new day of this sunrise, the new day of His resurrection.

He calls to take up your cross and follow him.

And in following him into this sunrise he offers, what astoundingly, immeasurably more you will find in Him.

So perhaps next time you look at the sunset, you'll see it a different way.

Perhaps you'll remember the wondrous promise of Jesus' resurrection that He's always holding out to you, told in the sunset's story.

And perhaps you'll remember His words as you watch the sun set before you proclaiming come resurrect with me! Saying, step out of the old into the new. Calling you, take up your cross... follow me.