Mommy Blog

That Sounds Crazy…

in Thoughtful Thursdays on April 19, 2022

Every three years, the youth group at my church holds a very special, and very unique fundraiser. The goal is to raise enough money to send each high schooler to the National Youth Gathering with as little out-of-pocket cost to the families as possible.

I’m not exactly sure who had the crazy idea of using gaudy pink yard flamingos (I have my suspicions, Corri), but, regardless of its origin, this fundraiser reaches across generational lines, and is loved by just about each and every member of our congregation. Not only do people thoroughly enjoy signing up their friends—but secretly—we LOVE being the recipient of someone else’s participation.

The basic premise is that you can have one (or several) of your friends “flocked”. There are three levels: 25, 50 or 75 birds in each flock. You then donate a specified dollar amount, depending on the size of your flock, and the youth will show up at random to your house to deposit the birds. The youth are extremely crafty—doing most of their dirty work while the unsuspecting household is at work or out of town. The homeowner then comes back, to a display similar to the one pictured above.

Over the weekend, my house was flocked.

My house didn’t only get a zoo-size family of flamingos…my friend, let’s call her Jenny, requested the flocking team make a run to Dollar General and CLEAN THEM OUT of residual Easter paraphernalia. So, if you look closely at the picture, you can see a yard covered with eggs, Mardi Gras beads, various Spring critters, flower-shaped pinwheels and even ribbons wrapping my columns…in short, my friend wanted to make sure that no one, absolutely NO ONE could miss the elaborate display in my yard.

The youth coordinator LOVED the idea, and replied: That sounds crazy!

That simple phrase got me thinking about something else that just sounds crazy…

My last two posts were a bit on the heavy side. Last week was Holy Week, and some pretty heavy stuff went down that I felt really needed to be addressed. (If you missed them, read here and here)

The post on Friday, Good Friday, sort of left us hanging. Today I want to finish the story. I actually wanted to finish the story yesterday, but it was one of the Monday-ist Mondays ever.

There are plenty of accounts in the Bible that just sound crazy. Creation from nothing…parting the Red Sea…a talking donkey (I’m not even kidding about that one)…walking on water…and rising from the dead, just to name a few.

Before Jesus went to the Cross, he had a couple of “trials,” they were mock trials, the checking of boxes—but none of them were actual justice-seeking-endeavors. Jesus’s final trial was in front of the Roman governor, Pontius Pilate.

Pilate was not exactly a strong leader, and the region he governed was an outlier, and not deemed super important to the overall health of the Roman Empire; however, it was still part of Rome, and chocked full of eager and willing Roman soldiers standing at the ready to enforce the laws of Rome.

As Jesus stood in front of a wavering Pilate, Pilate asked Him point-blank if he was, in fact, “King of the Jews.” Jesus answered, “My kingdom is not of this world. If it were, my servants would fight to prevent my arrest by the Jews. But now my kingdom is from another place.” (John 18:36)

Ok…let’s take a collective pause…and all agree…

That sounds crazy.

Pilate was disturbed by this statement, but not enough to release Jesus. Instead, he had Jesus flogged and crucified.

But, what is crazier sounding than a Man’s claim to be King of a kingdom no one could see, is His claim that even though wicked and evil forces would strike Him down and bury His body; He would rise from the grave in three days time.

Not even Jesus’s own disciples—or His duh-ciples—as I like to call them, believed Him.

That all changed on that first Easter morning…but it wasn’t Jesus’s male disciples that first discovered His missing body, nor was it His male disciples that He first appeared to after His Resurrection. No.

It was His female followers.

“On the first day of the week, very early in the morning, the women took the spices they had prepared and went to the tomb…when they entered, they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus…suddenly two men in clothes that gleamed like lightening stood beside them…the men said to them, ‘Why do you look for the living among the dead? He is not here; he has risen!’…When they came back from the tomb, they told all of these things to the Eleven…it was Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James…But they [the disciples] did not believe the women, because their words seemed to them like nonsense.” (Luke 24:1-11, emphasis added).

In other words, that sounded crazy.

But, I swear with everything in me, that this is the craziest TRUE STORY I have ever known.

We see a lot of crazy things in our world today. If we’re honest, we see a lot of crazy things within the walls of our own homes. But, none of the crazy things around us, have an eternal impact on our lives like the crazy events that happened on that first Easter morning.

Sure, my yard looks like an architectural design idea from 1965 that went terribly wrong, but it brought me JOY and HAPPINESS. My Easter Sunday morning was NOT filled with the bright Easter baskets of years past, but rather a sick German Shepherd puppy, three other very curious dogs, a houseful of college kids, and two very stressed out parents.

It was crazy over here.

But none of my craziness matters.

The only thing that matters is that the tomb IS empty.

It’s true that Death will come for each of us as sure as the Tax Man appeared yesterday. And while Death feels like an ending, it is actually the beginning of something more glorious and wonderful than any of us can imagine!

So, this week, don’t be afraid of things that sound crazy, be confident in the One who broke the crazy into pieces. He defeated the grave, and He will fight for you, too.

Have a great week!

Oh…I’ll return on Thursday with something a little bit lighter!! Keep smiling.