Jackson County Church League Softball starts on 16 Apr 2018. We are still looking for men and women to complete our roster. Games are on Monday and Thursday evenings. $25 per player. If interested or want more information call or text Weston Thompson at (918) 637 8106. More updates to come.
Volunteers Needed for Special Olympics
Special Olympics of Jackson County is having their annual spring games on April 18, Wednesday. It will be from 9 AM to 2 PM at the Smoky Mountain High School football field. There are eight teams participating and eight churches are needed to sponsor these teams. Volunteers and sponsors would need to provide a pop-up tent, water and healthy snacks for your team. Two or three volunteers from each partnering church are all that would be needed. Responsibilities include providing a place for the teammates to stay and relax between events. Additionally, volunteers would get a free T-shirt and lunch. The team sizes range from six athletes to 20 athletes. If you are interested in volunteering, please contact the church office ASAP.
The Way of Sorrows
I was a child when the Shroud of Turin exhibit came to Atlanta. My family had made plans to go downtown and to experience an in-depth exposition on Jesus’s burial cloth. It was the Saturday before Easter, I believe.
In the mid-fourteenth century, a long cloth was discovered in Europe that had the faint image of a man imprinted upon it. The fabric appeared to be the kind of cloth that would be used to wrap a body in for burial. Tradition holds that the person whose image had been mysteriously reproduced on the cloth is Jesus of Nazareth. The likeness--and the details that suggest an individual’s violent end—was uncanny in its similarity to the crucified Christ. Kept in a sealed case in a cathedral in Turin, Italy, many faithful Christians have regarded it as a genuine relic from Jesus’s grave.
Studies, investigations and well-regarded research have, however, made its authenticity unclear. The exhibit that my family attended in Atlanta so many years ago revealed the differing theories and ideas behind the shroud’s history.
The exhibit, with its high walls, massive images, and displayed artifacts, wound through a cavernous convention center. The path through the exhibit was like a labyrinth. The lighting increasingly dimmed—so as to prepare the visitor for the illuminated images that had been reproduced—and eerie music filled the hall. Along the way, the exhibit told the story of Jesus’s final hours. It described the crucifixion in starkly gruesome terms. It told about Jewish burial customs. It was fascinating. My attention was rapt. I was also terrified.
As a child, and up to that trip to the Shroud of Turin exhibit, I could testify that I was very familiar with Jesus’s violent death and his subsequent resurrection. But I was unprepared that day to see the unique horror that Jesus must have experienced that Good Friday. With each step that I took along the path to Jesus’s final breath in the exhibit’s storytelling, a feeling of inescapable dread washed over me. I remember that I wanted to retrace my steps and to retreat from the reality in which I had been immersed. I wanted to erase the feeling of dread and sorrow that I felt. I wanted to run and hide from a world that crucified God.
These many years later I still want to escape the reality of Jesus’s terrible death on the cross. The story of Jesus’s Passion feels too hard to handle, and certainly too heavy to bear. I don’t want to hear the details of Jesus’s crucifixion. I don’t want to see and touch a thorny crown, nor consider the nail-scarred hands. The image of Jesus on the cross still haunts and frightens me.
So, I can certainly empathize with followers of Jesus who wish to leapfrog over Jesus’s passion to a celebration of the resurrection on Easter Sunday. Why spend any more time on the road with Jesus to the cross when we know that’s not how the story ends? Since Jesus overcame death on the cross, perhaps we can omit that dark chapter from the broader story that we tell.
Protestants do not typically have crosses that depict the crucified Jesus. The crosses that we have in our own sanctuary are a case in point. Jesus is not on our crosses. Our Catholic brothers and sisters, though, have crucifixes that reveal the crucified Christ. These differences in tradition mean something. Catholics tend to emphasize the salvific power of Christ’s suffering—that is, his Passion—whereas Protestants place more emphasis on the empty tomb. And since an empty tomb is hard to symbolize, an empty cross usually suffices.
Neither tradition has it right or wrong. And yet, our starting place in our thinking about Jesus’s death and resurrection can have both strengths and liabilities. For protestants, we may prefer to sanitize the story of Jesus’s death in an attempt to quickly reach Easter Sunday morning. This is certainly revealed in my own experience and thinking about Jesus’s death.
I don’t want to dwell long in Jesus’s final hours. It hurts too much.
But Jesus calls his followers to take up their cross and to follow him. Since Jesus walked the Way of Sorrows out of obedience to the Father and out of love for us, we cannot allow our own sorrows to become barriers to journeying alongside Christ to his death. We remember Jesus’s brokenness because he has commanded us to do so. We follow in Jesus’s footsteps because that is what a disciple does. We become an observer with Jesus in Jerusalem on that Good Friday out of a desire to be in solidarity with our Lord and to bear witness alongside other faithful followers some 21 centuries in the making.
Early on, followers of Jesus went on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem to walk the Way of the Cross. But as travel to the Holy Land became more and more difficult, if not impossible, churches in Europe began to offer their own pilgrimages on church grounds. A path, then, was laid out in sanctuaries and cathedrals where the faithful could go station to station remembering Jesus’s final steps on the way to the cross.
This Good Friday, I invite you to our church sanctuary to experience a solemn pilgrimage to the cross with Jesus. It will not be easy, and you may be inclined to quit the journey before it is completed. Just the same, I pray that you will choose to accept this challenge and to recall Jesus’s final hours even in its difficulty. The path, though ghastly, is also filled with grace and with mercy. We see an obedient Christ, full of love and full of strength, seeking to bring about the salvation of the world. I pray that you will say yes to the invitation to journey the last few steps with Jesus to the cross.
The church sanctuary will be open to you from 9 AM until 5 PM on Friday, March 29th. Upon arriving at the sanctuary doors—whether from the hallway in the back, or from the foyer off of Main Street—you will find a guide with directions for your journey. It reveals that the Stations of the Cross experience is a self-guided trek that you may take at your own pace. Beginning in the foyer and up the stairs to the balcony, you will be guided sequentially through the 11 stations of the cross. You will read a passage from the Passion narratives in the Gospel at each station. Additionally, you will have the chance to be silent and to consider what it must have felt like for Jesus and for his disciples that Good Friday so many years ago. Some stations will invite you to hold a particular question, and to touch sharp thorns, and to feel the weight of a hammer, and to physically trace the arc of Jesus’s life and ministry. The experiential journey is appropriate for your family—especially for children ages 8 and up.
I know. It’s a heartrending trail. There are many other things you could be doing with your time. The story of Jesus’s death is scary, and it is terrible.
But it’s also the Path to our own Redemption.
Flowers for Easter Cross
Easter Sunday is Sunday, April 1st! As a tradition, on Easter Sunday, we decorate the cross on our front porch steps with beautiful flowers brought in by our congregation. If you would like to bring flowers to decorate with, please bring them to the foyer of the church before Sunday School on April 1st.
Church Office Closed
The church office will be closed on Monday, April 2nd for Easter.
Holy Week Activities
March 25th - 31st is Holy Week! Here are some activities we will have going on that you can participate in:
Wednesday, March 28: Wednesday Night Activities - We will have our usual Wednesday night activities this week, including dinner, Adult Bible Study, and Children/Youth activities.
Thursday, March 29: Maundy Thursday - Join us at 6:30 PM in our church sanctuary for a special Maundy Thursday service.
Friday, March 30: Stations of the Cross - Our sanctuary will be open all day for you to have an experiential journey with Christ to the cross through stations that will include scripture readings and object lessons.
Sunday, April 1: Easter Sunday - Celebrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ with us at First Baptist Church in Sylva on Easter Sunday morning, April 1st at 10:30 AM. An Easter Egg Hunt for children will take place on our playground immediately following our service. Bring your family to worship and hear the story of Easter with us.
Missions Night Guest Speaker - Siv Ashley
"Siv Ashley started her life as a normal child in Cambodia. Her family was loving and caring and had a great love for God. On April 16, 1975 everything changed."
So begins this true story of a young girl who overcame work camps, enslavement, and constant threats of death by relying on her faith in God.
On Wednesday, night, April 4th, at 6:00 p.m., Siv Ashley will visit Sylva First Baptist Church and share her inspiring story. WMU invites you to come to the MFC that evening and hear Ms. Ashley's amazing testimony. Learn more in next week's Church Chimes, too!
Mission Bite
Bite 76: A true mosaic ministry
"Last summer we held a week of sports camps in different parts of the Paris, France region for people ages 15-30. We had 300 participants from 25 different churches -- a true mosaic of cultures, languages, and different styles of worship. From this diverse group we created sports teams that were composed of young people from different churches. It was a beautiful thing to see them reaching across language and cultural boundaries to work together, pray together and learn that we are stronger when we are united. The future of the church is multicultural and our young people are leading the way. Pray that connections made between the youth at the sports camps continue to bear fruit."
- David and Julie Brown, CBF field personnel in Paris, France
Thank You Note from Battle of the Books Partners
To the Congregation of First Baptist,
Thank you for allowing us to use your facility this week. You so graciously welcomed approximately 75 middle school students from all over Western North Carolina into your church for a friendly book competition that can be a very serious matter in the heat of the competition. Thank you for opening your doors and hearts. Your kindness is greatly appreciated and a role model for us all.
Sincerely,
Linda Potter and Jackie Methven
A Hard Thing
“So Jesus got up from the meal, took off his outer clothing, and wrapped a towel around his waist. After that, he poured water into a basin and began to wash his disciples’ feet, drying them with the towel that was wrapped around him.” John 13:4-5
The mere mention of this text raises our anxiety.
We are humbled and in awe at Jesus’s expression of servanthood. The story is unambiguous in meaning. Jesus takes on the role of a servant and offers a physical expression of his love, affection and commitment to his closest followers. He washes their feet.
And every fiber of our being screams out in unison, “Oh dear Lord. Don’t make us do this.”
No, I am not going to make you wash one another’s feet during our Maundy Thursday service. I’m not that daft—no one would show up. I am however, going to invite you to consider washing one another’s feet. There will be no mandate. But you will have the chance if the Spirit moves you.
Now. You can breathe again.
I understand. Truly, I do. Foot washing feels alien to us. It feels deeply personal. There is an intimacy that accompanies this ordinance that many of us find terrifying. We are all well-aware that our bare feet are mangled, gnarly, knobby and crusty. They smell. They are misshapen and hairy. For most of us, they represent the least appealing parts of our bodies. We don’t want others to see them, let alone touch them. And certainly, not wash them.
So, let’s just wash one another’s hands, right? Some churches choose to have their cake and eat it too. These churches’ pastors acknowledge the power of this passage and desperately want to be faithful to Christ’s command that we wash one another’s feet. But they clearly have no intention of actually doing so. Washing feet seems distasteful and not appropriate for worship. Hands, therefore, become a suitable alternative. It feels like a gentle and far less invasive experience of anointing.
Although I respect this move and understand the motives behind it (we pastors actually want people to attend our church’s services), I feel like it misses the mark. It’s supposed to be hard. That’s why Jesus commands us to do it.
We have good company in our adamant refusal to participate: Peter said to Jesus, “You will never wash my feet.” (John 13:8)
Jesus answered, “Unless I wash you, you have no share with me.” (John 13:8)
So there. Unless Jesus models for his disciples what service to others looks like, they cannot be one with him. Solidarity with Christ hinges on our willingness to do the hard thing.
And washing feet is a hard thing, because it’s far more than just washing feet, of course.
It’s hard because we don’t want to make ourselves that vulnerable. We desire Christian fellowship with others, but we’re not keen on the accountability that fellowship demands. We want to be church, but we want it on our terms. We want to have a robust offering of services to our church and our community, but we’re not willing to actually do the work of service. We are, in truth, one collective mass of contradictions.
“Can’t we just wash one another’s hands?”
Jesus: “No.”
“So if I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet. For I have set you an example, that you also should do as I have done to you.” (John 13:14-15)
Maundy Thursday, during Holy Week, is a time set aside for us to remember Christ as he prepares to give his life for us at Calvary on Good Friday. The word Maundy comes from the Latin word Maundantum, which means commandment. It refers to Jesus’s instructions to his followers the night before he died.
Just on the heels (pun intended) of his foot washing, Jesus says: “I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.” (John 13:34-35)
Jesus demonstrates firsthand what love looks like. God’s love for us in Jesus is about sacrifice and service, vulnerability and humility. And this love is no easy thing.
On Thursday night, March 29, we will remember in worship at 6:30 PM that Jesus asks us to do a hard thing—love. We will recall that final night he had with his disciples. We will remember that Jesus calls them his friends. We will share the Lord’s Supper together, and you will have the chance to observe and, or, participate in a foot washing experience. It’s a hard thing. I know. But I think you’re up to the challenge, First Baptist.
Besides, if we’re not willing to wash the feet of our brothers and sisters in Christ, then how in the world do we expect to do the other hard things that Jesus requires of us? If we can’t wash one another’s feet, how can we ever begin to love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us?
It’s hard, this life of faith. But it’s the way of the cross. It’s the way of Jesus.
And he thinks we’re up to the challenge.