Last year I read the book by Kent and Barbara Hughes called Disciplines of a Godly Family. One of the many helpful things I found in it was to create traditions for the important events in our life as a family. Easter is a huge event in our life together, if it wasn't for what Christ did for each one of us (I mean specifically Andrew and I) we probably would have never met!
So Andrew and I started looking for Hot Cross Buns recipes to bake on Good Friday. We got one yesterday and went to the supermarket to get all the ingredients. It was exciting to try to figure out how we could alter the recipe now that we live 2800m above see level.
This morning we had a slow morning since our little girl was so kind in sleeping in. We got up, had breakfast and starting the baking process. You need yeast to make hot cross buns, which involves kneading and waiting. It was great to be able to cook together with Andrew again. (We used to do it a lot, but now that we have our lovely Lily cooking needs to be quick and simple!) It was great to put everything together, to feel the dough, to see it rising, and to make the little balls. It was great to smell the buns in the oven and see our pretty perfect buns when they were ready. But the best part was to show them to Lily and to sit next to her and show her the little cross on her bun, and explain to her that in a day like today, many many years ago, Jesus had died for us so we could live.
I know that the words might be too big for her now, that she doesn't understand sin and substitutionary atonement, but she does understand that we eat something special today. I want today to be the first of many Easters in which we as a family get together and bake hot cross buns, not just because it is great to have the smell of baking overflowing the house, but because it is such a tangible way to help us to remember that Jesus died on that cross so we can be alive and rejoice in the life he has given us.
Jesus, thank you for living the life I could never live and for dying the death I so justly deserve!
