Easter Afternoon

By Allison Hull

Everybody’s in the house. All right. We need to eat. Peanut butter sandwiches for all, and you can get your own drink. Mommy and daddy are just going to lay down for a few minutes and just shut our ey…

And they’re out.

Is this anyone else’s Easter Sunday afternoon?

After going full force through Holy Week and then getting up early for the Sunrise service, smiling, keeping the kids in check, running up and down the choir loft stairs 5 times, then trying to keep the kids’ clothes clean while they eat messily and do it all again for the second service, and finally walking out the doors wishing everyone a “Blessed Easter” while the baby is screaming in your ear…… By the time we are driving home I’m in such a haze I can’t see the lollipops being fought over in the background. Easter is such a beautiful, wonderful, exciting, and joyful time, but by the end of the services we are all too wiped out to enjoy it.

The Easter Coma — I call it.

What do you do or how do you care for pastors’ families who are going through the slump of Easter letdown? Here are a few suggestions.

First and foremost, pray for them.

A lot of the church year has been leading up to Holy Week. There’s been months of preparation from the organist, secretary, pastor and everyone in between. They all need prayers of rejuvenation, thanksgiving for their gifts and time, and prayers that they continue in their vocations joyfully. Easter morning is wonderful, it’s my favorite day in the church year. But it is exhausting.

Offer a hand…

Make a meal, buy some gift cards, watch their children, or babysit a dog (if need be) sometime in the next week. Why? It gives the whole family a little break — a little breather so they can relax with the family or even just take a nap. A little thing like that is such a blessing when you’ve been trying to run the marathon that is Holy Week.

Thank them for their service.

No, it’s not needed, and they certainly do not do it for the praise. But just hearing that they did a wonderful job and that you appreciate them can really help keep them going.

And really, that’s it. We had a beautiful Easter morning today. The flowers, lilies, music, colors blending, cross-bearing, everyone wearing their best and singing with such tremendous happiness, and all of it because Christ suffered, died, and rose for each and every one of us.

It’s emotional. It’s moving. May the Lord give every pastor and his family rest and reprieve so that he may continue the work of the ministry in the following days.

HE is RISEN INDEED, ALLELUIA!

Photo credit, Creative Commons License