The Love That Leads Us Home: A Holy Week Reflection

Our hope and expectation, O Jesus, now appear!
Arise, thou Sun so longed for, o’er this benighted sphere!
With hearts and hands uplifted, we plead, O Lord, to see
the day of earth’s redemption that brings us unto thee.

—Laurentius Laurenti, 1700

Here we are in the middle of Holy Week, 2025. I know—you’ve got massive music and worship coordination to accomplish in the next 120 hours, but pause with me for about three minutes as we think about the why of this week.

This Sunday, when we celebrate the Resurrection, we’ll be proclaiming that world-redefining moment when Jesus’ followers realized Jesus was alive—that Christ was who He claimed to be. This part of the gospel is the exclamation point in our lives as believers, so much so that we can tend to focus all our “alleluias” there. But Easter Day is just 1/365 of any year.

This Sunday, when we celebrate the Resurrection, we should also be reminded of our eschatological hope—the promise that, because Christ lives, all who believe in him also live in him. This is another cause for celebration! But the promise of eternal life can seem like a gift that will only be unwrapped at God’s appointed time in our future. What about now?

This Sunday, when we celebrate the Resurrection, we’re also proclaiming the biblical promise that no matter what’s happening politically, economically, or socially in the world around us, nothing “will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 8:39). Another hymn writer put it this way:

I’m but a stranger here, heaven is my home;
Earth is a desert drear; heaven is my home:
Danger and sorrow stand round me on every hand;
Heaven is my fatherland, heaven is my home.

—Thomas Rawson Taylor

Eternal life with Christ is not just a “someday” promise. It is our current reality. The more we understand this, the more we can claim God’s corollary promise of abundant life that is marked by a peace that nothing in this world can give, a joy that flourishes in spite of any circumstances, and the ability to be living proof of God’s love, often despite ourselves.

Before we get to the Resurrection, this week is a reminder that this reality came at an unimaginable cost. God’s desire to restore our relationship was so strong that God sent his Son to die the death we should have died so that we can live the life God intends for us to live. Maundy Thursday is all about God’s servant love. Good Friday is all about God’s sacrificial love. And Easter is all about God’s sustaining love. All this is ours because we are the objects of his love.

And so are the people whose worship you are about to inspire and lead. Before you take the cup on Thursday, or give the downbeat on Friday, or sing the first “alleluia” on Sunday, remember this love that meets you and all who believe at every moment, in every scene of life, at every turn of good fortune or temporary fear, in the eyes of everyone we love and even of those whom no one loves. Because Jesus is alive, love will guide us through every moment of this life, and love will eventually welcome us home.

That’s worth some alleluias.

Christ is risen—indeed!