In her sermon for Ascension Sunday, Rev. Cari referred to the two “hinge” points of the two books of Luke and Acts (both written by the same hand). Jesus’ Ascension is treated at the very end of Luke (in chapter 24:44-53) and at the beginning of Acts 1:1-11.

In the sermon, Cari meets the dual movements of falling and rising – and our experience of the COVID-19 pandemic – during the Easter season, head on. “This has been a different Easter season.” She names the fact that we have been sitting in the uncertainty and heaviness of Holy Saturday, as much as the joy of Easter.

She also shows a graph that is attached below, called the Covid Curve, and talks the flow of the rising and falling of this experience through with the congregation. (Many thanks to the Rev. Susan Lukey for sharing this graph.)

Where do you find yourself on the Covid Curve? How are you grounding in hope, and in the continued presence of the God whose love is stronger than death?