It is a little hard to focus on the fact that this weekend is Easter. In Japan there are no reminders. No eggs, no holidays. No Good Friday service (at our church) - and anyway, with it being a usual school day (we find this quite a strange American custom - to have school on Good Friday, always assuming that America is more "Christian" than Australia...), it is difficult to get to church anyway. In Australia this is a long weekend when people go away and do things like camp or visit family or have retreats.
Here, nothing much will be different. However, it is good to take time, even small pieces of time to meditate on the significance of this weekend. I find music a great way to focus my mind. Recently we've been singing a lot of Easter hymns to our boys at bedtime - there are so many great ones.
But here is a more contemporary song that speaks to my heart:
We think of America as a Christian country, but it's really an American country. I first learnt this several years ago on CompuServe. I was a section leader in the Christian Fellowship Forum and noticed that there was a drought of goodwill messages from Americans at Easter and a flood of them at Thanksgiving. They are just themselves. If you expect to share anything with Americans you will end up being disappointed.
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