 Greetings, friends. Welcome to CTUCC Conference Cast for April 17, 2014, the regular podcast of the Connecticut Conference of the United Church of Christ. Whoever you are and wherever you may be on life's journey at this very moment, you are welcome here. We begin this Monday, Thursday, and Holy Week conference cast with this meditation from the Reverend Dr. Tom Clough, Eastern Regional Minister. The 30th and 31st chapters of Jeremiah are often called the Book of Consolation, when the prophet's words turn to reassurance and to hope. These verses from chapter 31 are as translated by Eugene Peterson in the message. This is the way God put it. They found grace out in the desert, these people who survived the killing. Israel, out looking for a place to rest, met God out looking for them. God told them, I've never quit loving you and never will. Expect love, love, and more love. Every year about this time, Easter arrives and laughs at my attempts to be realistic, prudent, and responsible. Having recently emerged from the state of dread induced from December through March by those angels of anxiety we call meteorologists, I find myself annually surprised to find that behaving like a mature adult does not necessarily involve sucking all reasons for hope out of the days you have left so that we might be properly prepared for the worst that may come our way. You would think by now I would have seen it coming, this joy, but I never do. The disciples should have seen it coming. Perhaps if they had only read their holy scriptures, they might have remembered how at a time when God's people had just been disastrously defeated by the Babylonians, their princes murdered, their king led away in chains, their holy temple utterly destroyed. At such a time the prophet Jeremiah remembered the stories of hard times that his people had endured previously, the hard times when they had wandered in the desert, thirsty and starving, and Jeremiah remembered that in all these hard times suffering never proved to be the end of the story, often a significant part of the journey, but never the end. Instead there was always the rediscovery of God's loving presence. At some point the scriptures say, the Lord always appeared to them, saying, I have never quit loving you, and I never will, expect love, love and more love. What if we were to listen to those true angels who said to the women at the tomb, do not be afraid. I know that you were looking for Jesus who was crucified. What if we anticipate that this is not the end of the story? What if we were to live instead, even through the darkest days, with the expectation that we can count on meeting God out looking for us? What if we were to live with the expectation of love, love and more love? Is that what it means to be an Easter people? Here is a prayer for this week. God of Moses and Jeremiah and the women at the tomb, find us this day and bless us with your loving presence. May these days of ritual and celebration inspire us to learn habits of hopefulness, so that we might see your joy in the gift of every new day, in the name of the one who has been raised from the dead and is going on ahead of us. Please hold the family of Martha Eshelman Brown in your prayers today. The wife of First Congregational Church in Stamford's long time pastor, the Reverend Gary Brown. She was a dedicated high school special education teacher, community activist, singer and even some time actor. She died peacefully at her home on Palm Sunday with her family gathered around at the age of 70. In the news this week, last Friday, Conference Minister of the Reverend Kent Solati offered a vantage point for Holy Week, in which he reflected on the stories of Jesus last week in Jerusalem. We are a people bound together by a story, God's story. Whether you're hearing these scriptures for the first time or if you have these texts embedded in your heart, the scriptures of this week called Holy shape us, form us and connect us together as God's people. Would you join me now in prayer? Your word, O God, is a light to our Lenten journey. We are bound together by the scriptures of this season of Lent. As we walk through Holy Week, we remember this incredible account of Jesus' final days. Open our hearts and our minds to the hearing and living of your word. Amen. Make sure to visit us at ctucc.org slash vantage point or at youtube.com slash ctucc to see his reflection in its entirety. In March, intro ministers from Connecticut and several spots around southern New England came to First Church of Christ UCC in New Britain, where they heard about changes in the landscape of transitional ministry from the Reverend Malcolm Hemshoot on the staff of Ministerial Excellence, Support and Authorization of the United Church of Christ. Since Lauren Mead's landmark work on the period between installed pastors as a potentially rich opportunity for church growth and renewal, interim ministry has become a highly valued specialized form of ministry. Today, however, new models for transitions are emerging, calling forth new ethical questions and review of decades-old procedures. The conversation said Hemshoot is still underway, and he hopes that more of a consensus will emerge over the next year. And for this Holy Week, an imaginative report from Jerusalem coming from on or about the year 33. Tensions have been rising in Jerusalem, as the annual Passover celebration draws near. Radical anti-Romans have protested the arrest of Jesus Barabbas after his attempted insurrection this week, while others in the city have cried for help to a Nazarene-traveling healer in a parade that evoked royal prophecy. Grimm-visaged officials of the temple and of the Roman governor have declared their willingness to use all necessary measures to prevent disorder during the festival, which has swelled the local population by thousands of pilgrims. Some zealots who have declined to be named plan to request the release of Jesus Barabbas when Governor Pontius Pilate offers to free a prisoner during the festival. Tensions grew last Sunday when Jesus of Nazareth entered the city in an impromptu parade. Though he rode a simple donkey, not a horse or a chariot, a crowd which officials refused to estimate cheered him, cried save us to him, and strode the roadway with palm branches and clothing from their backs. Jesus made no royal proclamation, but some scriptural scholars have noted a link between his humble entrance and a prophecy of Zechariah saying the king would enter on a donkey. Jesus of Nazareth has stayed steadfastly in the public eye. Among the crowds who cheered him, any attempt on his person by temple or Roman officials would likely kick off a riot which even a legion would be ill-prepared to control. Sources within the authorities, both Roman and Temple, have said off the record that they would very much like to see the end of Jesus potentially destabilizing presence, and that they would welcome information about finding him alone away from large groups of people, they would pay well for it in fact. As for comment on this, one of Jesus' disciples simply said, I'm sure they would. So the city awaits the festival filled to the brim with people, upset by the recent insurrection by Barabbas and his followers, energized by the presence of the Nazarene prophet and balanced like a boulder on a mountain summit. All it will take is a slight breeze to bring the boulder crashing down, but where will it fall? For more on these stories and all the current headlines, visit us at ctucc.org slash news. This Saturday, the day before Easter, Mothers United Against Gun Violence will march and rally in Hartford beginning at 9.30 a.m. The weekend after Easter is a busy one, that spring action weekend which prepares Silver Lake Conference Center for the summer program. It's also the weekend of the Awakenings Conference in Holyoke, Massachusetts. On Saturday the 26th, the Historians workshop will be held in Coventry, and the Connecticut Conference Choir begins its rehearsals for next fall in Nagatuck. Please hold the members of our delegation to the Cungy Presbytery in your prayers as they make their visit between April 22nd and May 30th. This year's Journey to the Water's Edge Conference on Trauma Ministries is titled Joy Need Not Wait Till Morning. It will be April 29th in Madison. Learn about the science of climate change and global warming on May 3rd in Glastonbury. Silver Lake will host an open house for those interested in learning more about its summer program on May 4th. By all means, come then, but also visit silverlakect.org to find out about summer offerings and to register. Boundary training for authorized ministers will be May 6th in Tolland. This year's New England Association of United Church Educators Conference features Chap Clark, co-author of Sticky Faith, and will be held May 6th through 8th at the Craigville Conference Center on Cape Cod. A workshop entitled Jesus on the Road, Competing Gospels, is May 9th and 10th in Northboro, Massachusetts. A new Silver Lake offering this year is Clergy Camp for pastors to spend three days renewing themselves in God's backyard. Registration is now open. Clergy Camp runs May 13th through 15th. Learn about nurturing a healthy endowment for a local church at one of two workshops on May 15th in Suffield or on May 21st in Bristol. On May 17th in Clinton, we're offering creating a season of generosity moving stewardship from blah to transformational. Market calendars now form May 17th, the 4th annual youth revival. Be held this year at Dicksville Avenue, UCC in New Haven. Learn about environmental hazards keeping our churches and homes safe on May 31st in Deep River. And golfers, go get your clubs ready for the 8th annual Silver Lake Golf Tournament on June 3rd in Waterbury. You can always learn more about what's coming up in the Connecticut Conference by visiting us at ctucc.org slash events. We conclude today with a spirited Wednesday thought from the Reverend Matthew Crebin, senior pastor of the Newtown Congregational Church UCC in Newtown, Connecticut. Our conference cast custom for Holy Week has been to include two reflections, so I'll share his meditation in full. He begins with this quote from the author Frederick Beekner. Resurrection means that the worst thing is never the last thing. Good Friday writes Barbara Brown-Taylor is verifiable then and now. It is where we live, in the land of betrayal, corruption, violence and death. Easter, on the other hand, is a rumor by comparison. No one actually witnessed Jesus' actual resurrection, that moment when a dead lifeless body became a new mysterious living reality. We are left with empty tombs and somebody saw something kinds of stories. The gospel accounts tell us of angels and bits of cloth and chance encounters. Jesus shows up here and there, but much of the time his followers do not recognize him, and then just when they finally start to realize what is before them, he is gone. The resurrection faith came slowly to those first disciples. They could not seem to make heads or tails of it. They remained troubled and confused, not quite sure what to do with this fleeting rumor in a world accustomed to violence and death. For those earliest followers, that first Easter was tentative and unfathomable. It entered into their lives bit by bit, moment by moment. Slowly, a fragile little community began to discover the risen Jesus, not only in cemetery gardens and on dusty roads, but also in the face of each other. In the midst of ugliness, bitterness and brokenness, they began to recognize grace, peace and love let loose upon the world. Easter came slowly on that first resurrection morning long ago, but when it came, it changed everything. Last year, Easter arrived early for us in Newtown. It showed up on or about December 15, 2012. We got up that morning knowing all too well, that we lived in a land of corruption, violence and death. We were overwhelmed by horrific grief and unimaginable tragedy. But even in those earliest moments of a still long journey, we began to encounter fleeting bits of what I can only describe as the risen Christ. Moments of compassion and grace that testified, even in our darkest hour, that the worst thing is never the last thing. Mary went and announced to the disciples, I have seen the Lord. And that brings this conference cast to a close. Thanks to Tom Clough for his reflection and to GarageBand for our music. Primary funding for conference cast comes from your congregation's gifts to our church's wider mission, basic support, changing lives to the United Church of Christ. This is Eric Anderson, the Minister of Communications and Technology for the Connecticut Conference of the United Church of Christ, praying that your days this week may be filled with the presence, the guidance and the grace of God. This is Eric Anderson again with a program note. I will be among the delegates to this year's annual meeting of the Kyungi Presbytery in South Korea next week, so conference cast will have to take a week off. We'll be back the following week with stories from that trip and more words of care, compassion and wisdom. And to all of you, I wish a holy week that nourishes your spirit and an Easter celebration that blesses and renews you. Amen.