Dear Friends,

During my years in seminary, I spent a lot of time thinking about what it was going to mean for me to walk in the way of Jesus as an ordained person.  I was pretty clear that this would mean loving my enemies and serving the “least” of these.  I even discerned that perhaps Jesus needed me to pastor people in a church context. Likewise, there was no question of my need for Jesus.

But it had never dawned on me that Jesus needed me, at least not until Holy Week about 10 years ago during vespers service my parish used to offer. As I was on my knees I was imagining being in the Garden of Gethsemane as the worshipers gathered and sang the Taizé refrain "Stay with me; remain here with me, watch and pray, watch and pray" over and over. It was then that I realized that Jesus needed me to walk with him just as much as I needed him to walk with me.

That night on my knees changed my understanding of what it means to follow Jesus. Something about the hypnotic empathy that weighed on my heart as I sang the same song over and over made me realize that my words were close to the thoughts of Jesus and that his thoughts were an earnest plea for companionship during a painfully long and lonely night.

The experience also changed the way I worship during Holy Week. If the last week of Jesus' life is holy, then it is set apart from every other week of his life. That is why we need to not be apart from Jesus during this time. Jesus was always stepping toward other people, healing wounds, offering forgiving words, teaching life-changing truths. But in the last week of his life, he comes even closer to us because we see him struggling with his own brokenness; we can share the emotions of loneliness in addition to imagining the pain of his physically broken body on the cross. He breaks bread with his friends, and one of his friends betrays him. Peter denies knowing him. Holy Week is full of moments when those closest to Jesus let him down. As the ones who follow him now, we are invited to do otherwise.

We love to celebrate the peaks of Jesus' life in worship, but how often do we remain with him during the valleys of his life? "Being with" and "walking alongside" Jesus through his life is light-years beyond simply reading about his life and trying to follow its example.

In the words of one writer, “Living out our faith means not only remembering the Incarnate One but also reexperiencing what he experienced, realizing that his human experience was full of human needs - including companionship. If we believe in the living Holy Spirit, then why would Jesus not continue to need us to walk with him, if not for his sake, then to show our love and gratitude to the One who sent him to walk with us?”

As we move through Holy Week, I invite us all to ask ourselves how we might answer this question.  How might you need for Jesus to need you to share in his life? 

In Christ,

Amelie+.