The Other Weekend I Went West.

A month has passed since I last blogged. Since then, my car has died, new friends have been made, new foods have been tried, and adventures have been had. In the following, I will attempt to uncover, at the very least, the events of Easter Weekend. Ah, Easter.

It was Good Friday. Waking up early, I put on my favourite dress, then grabbed my "new" canvas coat (which is cool if you like old, secondhand stuff), and walked out the door to take my host mum to the gym before setting off down the motorway to church. Mt Albert, the section of Auckland where I go Sundays and Wednesdays to church and house-church, had organised a Good Friday walk. Beginning at the Catholic church, we walked for a  while between the Methodist church, the Presbyterian church, and the Anglican church before concluding at our church. Each stop took about fifteen minutes, and each church presented a portion of the Good Friday story. From the Last Supper at the Catholic church to the Mourning of Jesus' death at our Baptist church, we walked through the rain as we remembered what Jesus did for us. Remembering it like this, it was obvious how relevant the events of that day a couple thousand years ago were to us in this rainy day.

When I was a little girl, I remember vividly seeing a Sunday School picture of Jesus on the cross for what I suppose was the first time. This man that I had always known to love me (as I was told by my parents and my grandparents and by everyone else in my life) was dying. What is a little girl supposed to do with something like that? I couldn't go to the service that day after seeing the picture. Someone had to sit with me outside while my dad preached. The memory of the cross and the pain of Jesus having to die has never left me, and I remember that day as the day I really knew that I loved Jesus back. Maybe it was the day I really discovered what it felt to love.

You probably have a story like this as well - when you first realized Love. When you first realized Jesus and the reality of the story. To this day, I can't look at photos of Jesus on a cross. I look away in houses that have the little ceramic Jesuses on the cute little pastel crosses. Yesterday, I re-watched Louie Giglio's "Indescribable" and closed my eyes when he showed an aged photo of my God bleeding for me.

We sing the songs like "Oh, the Wonderful Cross" and "The Old Rugged Cross", and there were times when I tried so hard to mean the words that say things like "I love that old cross", and "I'll cherish the old rugged cross", "O that old rugged cross, so despised by the world, has a wondrous attraction for me". The tears would squeeze out of my eyes with the pain in my heart that wanted to love the cross, but there was always a bitterness of some sort perhaps. Maybe it was the bitterness and the anger toward myself - you know, that I was so bad that someone had to die so that I could live. I don't want someone to die for me. Especially someone I love. How can I love something that caused so much pain to the one person I know will always, always love me? I hope you can relate to this - that I'm not rambling simply because I can't go to sleep. May these words be relevant to you.

Good Friday was precious this time around. It wasn't a day that I spent hunched over, feeling guilty, closing my eyes, and straining to recognise every detail of the story as a mirror of my failures. If you've read the "Pan Pilgrimage" book I wrote a few months ago, you'll probably know now that this was a special Easter for me. About six months ago, a friend sat down with me and re-told me the simple gospel. He told it in two sentences. That gospel changed everything. That simple truth - the truth of what Jesus covered for me - has brought healing into my broken life. It has brought confidence and courage. It has brought peace and security. My friend told me that Jesus was my sacrifice. He told me that I didn't have to sacrifice anymore.

Six months ago, I had struggled with self-mutilation for six years. This Easter, all I wanted to do was sit in Jesus' lap and pour out to him endless "thank you's" for covering my blood with his. All the pain I've ever felt, he felt for me on that wonderful cross. The wrists that were pierced for me are symbols of the sacrifice that I don't have to give anymore. They are symbols of the burdens he never wanted me to carry. They are pictures of the love that will never die, but will teach me to live. I'll never be the person I was. And it's because of the old rugged cross that made a difference in this little girl's life.

After the Mt Albert Good Friday Walk, a friend's family invited me over for lunch. We ended up driving west to the sand dunes and the beaches. And then they ended up inviting me for a three-course dinner. And then we ended up going to our other friend's house to say goodbye to Bro Lai, a pastor from Fiji who flew home the next day. 

giant black sand dune

parkour!

jumpin' in the sand

me and footprints 

 at Bethells Beach

yoga on water

cave jumping

me trying to pull the sword out of the stone

tons of tiny mussels along the rocks

Saturday night, I took my sick friend some peppermint tea and received lovely conversation in return. Easter Sunday, I stayed for both services just because I could, then had lunch again with my friends from house church. Monday was much the same (four day weekends are great). I went to a giant thrift store, bought some souvenirs for Gunnar, Ryan, and Dad, and then ate dinner and enjoyed conversation at my friend's sister's house. 

A beautiful weekend, indeed. 

The best weekend.

*So, I have started to write several times in the past month, and only wrote part of what wanted to be blogged. This one is a fairly completed post that began March 30.*

Nana's birthday was last Thursday night, and it rocked. It involved catching scrambled eggs in our mouths. 'Nuf said.

No really. It was one of the most fun parties I have ever attended. We went to this really nice Japanese restaurant, and the guy cooked in front of us (like at Samarai for those of you in Holliday), and we had several courses. The adults all caught whole eggs in their bowls, and most of us caught pieces of scrambled eggs in our mouths. Even the kids. This family that I get to be a part of for a year is great.

The next night, I got to go to the party of a German au pair that has been helping me find things to do and people to do them with in Auckland. It was a really nice Persian restaurant, and I got to wear my new fair-trade dress. It was nice to see people I had met on my first evening out to a Catholic young adult function, and to see other people I had met through bowling or cricket. On the way home, I got to discuss Robert Frost with one of them. Not a bad deal.

The next next day, I spent the morning painting an elephant on a library mural. One of the reasons why I really like the church I'm going to is that they do a lot to channel relationships in the community. Saturday and Sunday, they spent their time worshipping  by fixing up a school a few kilometers away from the church building. Service is a form of real, true, pure worship, and I love that the entire church came and used their separate gifts to do different things around the school - gardening, painting, building, cooking, etc. It was wonderful. That afternoon, I spent a bit of time on my favourite street in Auckland - K Road. One of the people from my house church texted to see if I wanted to grab dinner before we stopped by our other friend's birthday party on the same street. Talking to my friend, it occurred to me that I was starving for conversation. And my friend allowed me to have a wonderful amount of quality time. Post-sushi, we stopped by the third birthday of the weekend, then tried to wipe the lipstick someone had smeared on of a replica of Michaelangelo's "Moses" statue. It's a beautiful thing, trying to preserve art - caring about it so much that you climb up in Moses' lap to wipe the red off his lips with your bare hands, then finding traces of perfect marble underneath. I think I would want someone to do that for me. Wipe off the mess that life throws at me. I suppose that's what Jesus did, though - wiped away the blood-stained mess to show me the beautiful person he created me to be. He does that every day. Sometimes gently, and sometimes ferociously. Some of the mess is hard to get off. But he rubs it away no matter how long it takes, and pursues the art beneath the dirt that my life becomes.

My friend walked me to the train station, and we listened to a street musician play a good song. Getting off the train, I walked in the rain to an end-of-season cricket bbq. Someone from the first birthday party had invited me, and they were still going when I stepped off the train. Cricket players drink a bit apparently, so a friend and I played ping-pong, made sure our friend was driven home, then left.

The next day was Sunday. The best day of the week. But this day was spent at the school we were fixing up instead of in a church building. After working on a dragon's wings for the library mural, I got to pick up tree limbs in the mud. And I was barefoot. Most definitely a perfect end to a great weekend.

me at the only place I remembered to take my camera.