Much to my chagrin, it looks unlikely that time travel is possible.
How can we be so sure? Well, no has ever visited us from the future. Pressing the point, no one from the future has ever traveled through time to prevent the tragedies and terrors that have beset us.
The author Connie Willis has a fun take on the question of time travel. In her fictional future, individuals no longer study history as we might. Instead of learning about ancient cultures in dusty old libraries, historians physically travel through time to observe history. Of course, these historians must be careful that they do not alter the natural evolution of time and circumstances, lest their meddling might create a cataclysmic disaster.
Have you ever wondered what it would be like to travel back to Jesus’s day and age? Have you ever found yourself wishing that you could observe the significant moments in our faith history? Have you ever wondered what it would be like to observe David fighting Goliath? Or wondered what Jesus’s voice sounded like, or to witness one of his miracles, or to be at the foot of the cross?
When we read scripture, the Word of God—literally, the revelation of God—helps us to make sense of past events. Scripture becomes truth because God breathes life in to the words on the page so that we can see Jesus and feel His presence. As a church, our task is to create an environment so that we can experience God’s story in a dramatic way.
Although we cannot physically travel back to the Holy Land in a DeLorean, à la the Back to the Future movies, or observe someone’s preserved memories in a Pensieve, à la the Harry Potter epic, we can replicate the events from the past so that we can better understand them.
Thursday, April 13 is Maundy Thursday. The use of the word Maundy comes from the Latin word, mandatum, which means ‘commandment.’ It refers to Jesus’s instructions to his disciples during the Last Supper for them to “love one another.” Traditionally, Maundy Thursday is a time when the church shares communion together. It is a time where we recreate the moment that Jesus breaks bread and shares the cup. For when we do so, we do so in “remembrance of Him.”
We remember Christ when we reenact Jesus’s last meal with his disciples. We understand Jesus’s life, ministry and sacrifice when we share table fellowship.
This year, we will be offering a Passover Seder experience in order that we might better understand Jesus’s last night with his disciples. We will do so by trying to experience firsthand what his Passover meal would have been like. The Bible tells us that Jesus and his closest followers would have had a Passover meal (known as a Seder, which means “order”) before they retreated to the Garden of Gethsemane.
In an effort to better recall Jesus’s life and teachings, we will gather on Maundy Thursday in our Mission and Fellowship Center at 6:00 PM to have an experience that more nearly matches what Jesus and his disciples were doing. Although the experience will not be a meal as we know it, we will be sampling small items of familiar foods.
Luke teaches us: “Then came the day of Unleavened Bread, on which the Passover lamb had to be sacrificed. So, Jesus sent Peter and John, saying, “Go and prepare the Passover meal for us that we may eat it.”
We will be preparing an experience for you to better see, hear and touch Jesus on that Maunday Thursday evening. Let’s discover together what it must have been like to be with Jesus during those last, fateful hours.
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Our Passover Seder will take place at 6:00 PM on Thursday, April 13 in our Mission and Fellowship Center. This one-hour experience will be appropriate for families with elementary school children, grades 1 and up. A nursery will be provided for infants up to Kindergarten. Please email us (fbcsylva@gmail.com) or call the church office to let us know that you will be attending so that we can be prepared for our time together.