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The Sum of All Five Senses

Monday March 26 2018

A meditation for Monday of Holy Week by the Very Rev Dr John Chalmers

Try experiencing this Holy Week with all five of your senses.

See it.

• the palm branches waving
• the moneychangers wheeling and dealing
• the upper room,
• the mockery of a trial
• the stations of the cross and Calvary itself

Smell it.

• the burning flesh of the sacrifices offered in the Temple
• the animals being traded in the forecourt
• the spiced breath of the traders
• the body odour of the travellers
• the scent of Gethsemane
• the air as the sky darkens around three crosses on a hillside

Touch it.

• being jostled in a crowd
• counting silver coins to pay a traitor
• carrying a wooden gibbet on a weary shoulder

Hear it.

• the adulation of Palm Sunday
• the traders bartering for the best deal
• the crashing of tables and of money spilling down the steps
• the hostile cries of Crucify Him

Taste it

• lamb and bitter herbs for a Passover
• bread and wine for a memorial
• vinegar offered to a dying man

It is the sum of all five senses which confirms in our sixth sense that we are loved by God made known in Christ.

The Very Rev Dr John Chalmers is a former Principal Clerk and Moderator of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland

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