I live in central Indiana. It is spring time. There are thunder and lightning storms. Those three facts fit together, naturally. Really, I mean it, nature in the form of these kind of spring storms is something that is natural...if you were raised and/or live where I live.
The storms can be beautiful and terrifying. They can produce big buckets of rain or damaging downpours of hail. They scare my daughter's pet Guinea Pig every time. We have to leave a light on so that Smorz (the pet's name) won't be quite so hyper during all the nature-displays of noise and light.
My airplane-pilot son, while studying meteorology at Purdue University, home on break, said to me (some years ago) as we sat watching TV during a quite noisy and brilliant storm(and I was going over notes for a Good Friday sermon), "Dad, those storms are caused by the warm air that is pushing into the area doing battle with the cold air that has been here all winter...kinda like the forces above (hot air) battling the forces below (cold air) and something pretty violent has got to give." Pretty good theology, I thought. (His observation made it into the sermon.)
However, what bugs me about those storms nowadays is that the electricity gets cut off all too often. And all the digital clocks in the house start flashing 00:00! Resetting those things (we have 4) gets to be a pain...especially trying to get them all to sync-up. With analogue clocks "close" was good enough, but with digital clocks "precise" is what is expected.
Its almost as frustrating as trying to "reset" my life every once in awhile. You know, when the power source gets cut off and you have to deal with everything that has gotten out of whack and needs to be reset.
Yeah, like that.

Friday of Holy Week. Much time is set aside during this one week each year...at the church I serve we will observe Palm Sunday, Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, and Easter Sunday...each with a special worship experience. The week will begin with shouting and joy and a parade, center in on Jesus' intimate relationship with his closest followers, devolve into extreme cruelty and miscarriage of justice, and finally result in the incredible surprise of an empty tomb and the challenge of following Jesus Christ beyond even the darkest of life's experiences.
For pastors, and maybe for some parishioners, as well, the week can be tiring. It calls upon clergy to find several different ways to express the events of this week in our faith's history.
For several years, back in the day, I and three clergy friends would take the Monday following Easter Sunday off to go to a wooded area to play laser-tag. It was refreshing...it got us away from the responsibilities we had just exercised to lead several worship services the week prior.
This year I will most likely take some time to refresh in ways more fitting a man in his middle sixties. Whatever choice I make, it will be on this side of Easter...a reason for doing something special if ever there was one!