Special Days in April
What
is Passion / Holy Week? 13th - 19th April 2025
The
events of Easter took place over a week, traditionally called Passion Week.
It
began on Palm Sunday. After all His teaching and healing, Jesus had built a
following.
On
the Sunday before He was to die, Jesus and His followers arrived at Jerusalem.
The city was crowded. Jewish people were arriving to celebrate Passover. This
commemorates how they had escaped from slavery in Egypt nearly 1,500 year
earlier.
Jesus
rode into the city on a young donkey. He was greeted like a conquering hero.
Cheering crowds waved palm branches in tribute. He was hailed as the Messiah
who had come to re-establish a Jewish kingdom.
The
next day they returned to Jerusalem. Jesus went to the temple, the epicentre of
the Jewish faith, and confronted money-changers and merchants who were ripping
off the people. He overturned their tables and accused them of being thieves.
The religious authorities were alarmed and feared how He was stirring up the
crowds.
On
the Tuesday, they challenged Jesus, questioning His authority. He answered by
challenging and condemning their hypocrisy. Later that day Jesus spoke to His
disciples about future times. He warned them about fake religious leaders; the
coming destruction of Jerusalem; wars, earthquakes and famines; and how His
followers would face persecution.
By midweek the Jewish religious leaders and elders were so angry with Jesus that they began plotting to arrest and kill Him. One of Jesus’ disciples, Judas, went to the chief priests and agreed to betray Him to them.
Jesus
and the 12 disciples gathered on the Thursday evening to celebrate the Passover
meal. This is known as the Last Supper. During the evening, Jesus initiated a
ritual still marked by Christians – Holy Communion – which commemorates His
death. Jesus broke bread and shared it and a cup of wine with His disciples.
Judas
then left to meet the other plotters. Jesus continued to teach the others and
then went outside into an olive grove to pray. He even prayed for all future
believers. He agonised over what was to come but chose the way of obedience.
The Bible book, Luke, records Him praying, ‘Father if you are willing, take
this cup from me; yet not my will but yours be done’. Minutes later Judas
arrived with soldiers and the chief priests and Jesus was arrested.
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13th April: Palm Sunday, Jesus at the gates of Jerusalem
Holy
Week begins with Palm Sunday, when the Church remembers how Jesus arrived at
the gates of Jerusalem just a few days before the Passover was due to be held.
He was the Messiah come to His own people in their capital city, and yet He
came in humility, riding on a young donkey, not in triumph, riding on a
war-horse. 
As
Jesus entered the city, the crowds gave Him a rapturous welcome, throwing palm
fronds into His path. They knew His reputation as a healer, and welcomed Him.
But sadly, the welcome was short- lived and shallow, for Jerusalem would soon
reject her Messiah, and put Him to death. On this day churches worldwide will
distribute little crosses made from palm fronds in memory of Jesus’ arrival in
Jerusalem.
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Sunday
by Canon Paul Hardingham
It must have been a dramatic sight on Palm Sunday when Jesus approached Jerusalem to the adulation of the crowds. The Bible tells us that ‘A very large crowd spread their cloaks on the road, while others cut branches from the trees and spread them on the road. The crowds that went ahead of Him and those that followed shouted, “Hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord! Hosanna in the highest heaven!’’ ‘(Matthew 21:8,9).
But not everyone in Jerusalem welcomed Jesus; in the very next verse we read, ‘the whole city was stirred and asked, “Who is this?”’ (10). But by the end of the week, the crowds had turned against Jesus and were demanding His crucifixion. (Matthew 27:22).
Why did they turn against Jesus so quickly? Perhaps they were disappointed because He refused to fulfil their expectations in establishing a new political kingdom. Instead, He came to change our hearts and save us from our sins by His death and resurrection. As He said during that week, ‘My kingdom is not of this world.’ (John 18:36). This deeply disappointed those who hoped that He would throw out the hated Roman occupiers.
Where would we have been on that first Palm Sunday? Among the disciples who welcomed Him or among the sceptical crowds? It’s easy to judge those who condemned Jesus, but would we have acted differently? We too can be disappointed when Jesus fails to meet our hopes and expectations of Him?
The message of Easter is that God still loves and accepts us, and because of Jesus we can be forgiven. He came for one simple reason: ‘For Christ also suffered once for sins…to bring you to God.’ (1 Peter 3:18). May we welcome Jesus afresh into our lives this Eastertime.
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17th April: Maundy Thursday, time to wash feet
Maundy Thursday is famous for two things. The first is one of the final acts that Jesus did before His death: the washing of His own disciples’ feet (see John 13). Jesus washed His disciples’ feet for a purpose: “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another.” His disciples were to love through service, not domination, of one another.
In Latin, the opening phrase of this sentence is ‘mandatum novum do vobis’. The word ‘mundy’ is thus a corruption of the Latin ‘mandatum’ (or command). The ceremony of the ‘washing of the feet’ of members of the congregation came to be an important part of the liturgy (regular worship) of the medieval church, symbolising the humility of the clergy, in obedience to the example of Christ.
But Thursday was also important because it was on that night that Jesus first introduced the Lord’s Supper, or what we nowadays call Holy Communion.
Jesus and His close friends had met in a secret upper room to share the Passover meal together - for the last time. And there Jesus transformed the Passover into the Lord’s Supper, saying, ‘this is my body’ and ‘this is my blood’ as He, the Lamb of God, prepared to die for the sins of the whole world. John’s gospel makes it clear that the Last Supper took place the evening BEFORE the regular Passover meal, and that later Jesus died at the same time that the Passover lambs were killed.
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18th April: Good Friday: the day the Son of God died for you
Good Friday is the day on which Jesus died on the cross. He was crucified at 9.00 am and died six hours later at 3.00 pm. It is the most solemn day in the Christian year and is widely marked by the removal of all decorations from churches. In Lutheran churches, the day was marked by the reading of the passion narrative in a gospel, a practice which lies behind the ‘passions’ composed by Johann Sebastian Bach (1685 – 1750). Both the St Matthew Passion and the St John Passion have their origins in this observance of Good Friday.
The
custom of observing a period of three hours’ devotion from 12 midday to 3.00 pm
on Good Friday goes back to the 18th century. The ‘Three Hours of the Cross’
often take the form of an extended meditation on the ‘Seven Last Words from the
Cross’, with periods of silence, prayer, or hymn-singing.
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18th April: Good Friday: Jesus and the thieves on the Cross
Luke’s account of the crucifixion (Luke 23:32-43) emphasises the mocking of the crowd, ‘If you are the king of the Jews, save yourself’ (35,37,39). In their view a Messiah does not hang on a cross and suffer. In considering the two men who were crucified with Jesus, we are also confronted with the issue of how Jesus secures salvation for us.
The words of one of those crucified with Jesus reflected the crowd’s taunts: ‘Aren’t you the Christ? Save yourself and us.’ He highlights the question of Jesus’ identity: how can He save others, when He cannot save Himself from death? He failed to see that the cross itself was the means of salvation.
So - what kind of Messiah was Jesus?
The other criminal’s response in his last moments is a moving expression of faith. When challenging the other man, he spoke of the utter injustice of the crucifixion: ‘this man has done nothing wrong.’ He perceived the truth that Jesus was indeed the Messiah. In a wonderful picture of grace, ‘remember me when You come into Your kingdom’, the second thief confessed his guilt and secured Jesus’ forgiveness and mercy.
In reply, Jesus promised the man life from the moment of death; ‘Today you will be with Me in paradise.’ Jesus used the picture of a walled garden to help the man understand His promise of protection and security in God’s love and acceptance eternally.
Each one of us has to choose how we react to Jesus on the cross. Do we want Him to ‘remember’ us when He comes into His kingdom, or not? If you were to die tonight, how confident would you be of going to be with Jesus? ‘For Christ died for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God’ (1 Peter 3:18).
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20th April: EASTER Sunday
Easter is the most joyful day of the year for Christians. Christ has died for our sins. We are forgiven. Christ has risen! We are redeemed! We can look forward to an eternity in His joy! Hallelujah!
The Good News of Jesus Christ is a message so simple that you can explain it to someone in a few minutes. It is so profound that for the rest of their lives they will still be ‘growing’ in their Christian walk with God.
Why does the date move around so much? Because the date of Passover moves around, and according to the biblical account, Easter is tied to the Passover. Passover celebrates the Israelites’ exodus from Egypt, and it lasts for seven days, from the middle of the Hebrew month of Nisan, which equates to late March or early April.
Sir Isaac Newton was one of the first to use the Hebrew lunar calendar to come up with firm dates for the first Good Friday: Friday 7th April 30 AD or Friday 3rd April, 33 AD with Easter Day falling two days later. Modern scholars continue to think these two Fridays to be the most likely.
Most people will tell you that Easter falls on the first Sunday after the first full moon after the Spring Equinox, which is broadly true. But the precise calculations are complicated and involve something called an ‘ecclesiastical full moon’, which is not the same as the moon in the sky. The earliest possible date for Easter in the West is 22nd March, which last fell in 1818. The latest is 25th April, which last happened in 1943.
Why the name, ‘Easter’? In almost every European language, the festival’s name comes from ‘Pesach’, the Hebrew word for Passover. The Germanic word ‘Easter’, however, seems to come from Eostre, a Saxon fertility goddess mentioned by the Venerable Bede. He thought that the Saxons worshipped her in ‘Eostur month,’ but may have confused her with the classical dawn goddesses like Eos and Aurora, whose names mean ‘shining in the east’. So, Easter might have meant simply ‘beginning month’ – a good time for starting up again after a long winter.
Finally, why Easter eggs? On one hand, they are an ancient symbol of birth in most European cultures. On the other hand, hens start laying regularly again each Spring. Since eggs were forbidden during Lent, it’s easy to see how decorating and eating them became a practical way to celebrate Easter.
20th April: Easter morning: 
The 'Other’ Mary
As the traditional Easter story is rehearsed again this month, you may notice that there is one name that frequently occurs. It is that of the ‘other’ Mary – not the mother of Jesus, but Mary Magdalene, who stood by her at the cross and became the first person to actually meet the risen Christ.
That’s quite a record for a woman who, the Gospels tell us, had been delivered by Jesus from ‘seven devils’ – New Testament language for some dark and horrible affliction of body, mind or spirit. As a result, her devotion to Him was total and her grief at His death overwhelming.
In church history Mary Magdalene became the ‘fallen woman’ a harlot who was rescued and forgiven by Jesus but there is no evidence to prove she was a ‘fallen woman’ but the contrast is sublime, Mary the virgin mother, the symbol of purity. Mary Magdalene, the scarlet woman who was saved and forgiven, the symbol of redemption. Surely, we all fall somewhere between those two extremes.
The dark cloud from which she was delivered may have been sexual, we are not told. What we do know is that the two Marys stood together at the cross, the Blessed Virgin and the woman rescued from who knows what darkness and despair.
The second great moment for her was as unexpected as it was momentous. She had gone with other women to the tomb of Jesus and found it empty. An angelic figure told them that Jesus was not there, He had risen – and the others drifted off. But Mary stayed, reluctant to leave it like that. She became aware of a man nearby, whom she took to be the gardener. She explained to him that the body of ‘her Lord’ had been taken away and she didn’t know where to find Him.
The man simply said her name ‘Mary’ and she instantly realised it was Jesus. She made to hug Him, but He told her not to touch Him because His resurrection was not yet complete. She was, however, to go to the disciples and tell them she had met Him. She did – but they wouldn’t believe her.
Her words – ‘I have seen the Lord’ – echo down the centuries, the very beating heart of the Christian gospel.
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The
empty tomb and the Risen Christ
by
Ven John Barton
‘So they (the women) went out and fled from the tomb, for terror and amazement had seized them; and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.’
That’s how some early manuscripts of Mark’s Gospel finish. It’s an unexpected twist, when you consider the confident announcement at the outset: “The beginning of the good news of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.” Good news? Afraid?
Mark doesn’t embroider his writing. His Greek language is that of the street, and he uses short, abrupt sentences. So, he tells it straight when the women, who had remained faithful to Jesus right up to the end, were confronted with an empty grave, and the first intimation that Jesus was no longer dead. Nothing like this had ever happened. What had seemed like a tragic and inevitable finale was now flatly contradicted. These women had stumbled across something unique that God was doing. It was to be the beginning of a new era for the human race, encompassing past, present and future.
They were afraid. You bet. Matthew’s Gospel tells it slightly differently: ‘the women hurried away from the tomb, afraid yet filled with joy.’ Later, when the other disciples encountered the Risen Christ, we read of their joy, doubt, disbelief, gladness, wonder. Luke encapsulates these confused emotions in a single phrase, ‘While in their joy they were disbelieving and still wondering…’
After many weeks of what we summarise as ‘resurrection appearances’, Luke rounds off his account with Jesus blessing the disciples: “While He was blessing them, He withdrew from them and was carried up into heaven. And they worshipped Him, and returned to Jerusalem with great joy; and they were continually in the Temple, blessing God.’
A 21st Century disciple will contemplate the presence of the Risen Christ with wonder, adoration, and joy. Surely with trembling, too? The same Jesus, seated at the right hand of the Father, will come again to judge the living and the dead.
Though hopelessly inadequate, we are enveloped by His sacrificial love, released by the crucifixion. We dare to look up, “afraid, yet filled with joy”.
Jesus’
appearances after His Resurrection
The following list of
witnesses may help you put all the Biblical references in order.
Mary Magdalene Mark 16:9-11; John 20:10-18
Other women at the tomb Matthew 28:8-10
Peter in Jerusalem Luke 24:34; 1 Corinthians 15:5
The two travellers on the road Mark 16:12,13
10 disciples behind closed doors Mark 16:14; Luke 24:36-43; John 20:19-25
11 disciples with Thomas John 20:26-31; 1 Corinthians 15:5
7 disciples while fishing John 21:1-14
11 disciples on the mountain Matthew 28:16-20
A crowd of 500 1 Corinthians 15:6
Jesus’ brother – James 1 Corinthians 15:7
Those who saw the Ascension Luke 24:44-49; Acts 1:3-8
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