Religious Traditions!!!

I am in the process or preparing a Sunday School lesson for this Sunday and I thought I would blog a little bit about it. I love to learn and have no problems being told something new and saying that I didn't know that. During my preparation for this lesson I found out something new.

The lesson is talking about Palm Sunday and the triumphal entry of Jesus into Jerusalem. What i learned from this lesson was some history behind Ash Wednesday. I have never been a student of traditions within the church, but found this little piece of knowledge interesting. Historically, the ash that is used on Ash Wednesday, was gotten by burning the branches that were used in last years Palm Sunday.

As I got into my lesson and began researching it, some of the articles I read about this tradition really made me think about how I have and do celebrate the Easter season. Sad to say, the week hasa never really been anything special to me. Not because I don't believe the events or their significance, but I guess more because I have done it most of my life. I guess I would say that I have almost become immune to the power of the season. I can say this by the pure fact that this is the week we celebrate the death and resurrection of Jesus and our forgiveness of sins. How can we not celebrate that? How can I not celebrate that?

Every day I feel that I grow closer to where God wants me. So many things I have taken for granted, I am not seeing the ultimate importance. As Christian we need to continue to celebrate our history and the events that brought us to where we are. We need to study the traditions of the people who came before us and understand why they did what they did. We (I) need to stop treating the Easter season like Halloween or just another holiday. This is the time of year where we celebrate the death of Jesus Christ and His resurrection for our sins.