Easter on the Road

Usually we spend Easter morning celebrating the resurrection of our Savior after keeping watch during the long, somber, but hopeful season of Lent. Easter Sunday also means gathering with one or the other of our extended families to enjoy the gift together. Let’s just say this Easter was a little different.

Prestonwood Baptist Church was a growing presence in North Dallas in the 80s; by the time I graduated from high school they were in a new, bigger, mega-church building nearby. Fast forward a few decades, and there are now 3 different, huge campuses that are all part of the same church. We went to the main campus in Plano, which seats 7,000 people, for the third service (11:00). The only other service today would follow ours, and it is in Spanish. The overflow of the crowd sat in the chapel nearby and watched on a screen. This is not unheard of for the Prestonwood community, since the other two enormous campuses watch church on the big screen every week! Pastor Jack Graham is simulcast in those campuses.

If you blindfolded me, brought me into the lobby, took off the blindfold, and asked me where I was, I’d have guessed a) a convention hall or b) an airline terminal. Possibly a mall. As we wandered around, eventually finding the way to the worship center, Natalie pointed out the stained glass windows  around the very top of the high, high windowed walls, suggesting that was the one thing this building shared with our home church building.

I’m telling you, our fearless ushers would have gotten everyone in the main worship center. Dick VanderKamp, you would have been horrified at the several inches, sometimes a full foot, of extra space between worshippers. I know you could’ve done it.

Andrew described this service as an extension of Winter Jam, the Christian music extravaganza that recently stopped into the Van Andel Arena. Natalie thought it more a combination of the Winter Jam experience and the Symphony Chorus experience. A beautiful, enormous choir sang powerfully—this was one of the high points. One of the lower points for us personally was the extended video played of the highlights of Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection. It hit somewhere between being emotionally affecting (i.e. get the Kleenex out for Kristy, again) and making us cringe at the cheesier shots of the man dressed up as Jesus doing various reaching out motions with his arms. The pastor gave a personal testimony telling why he believes, rather than the more typical sermon that he usually preaches.

Cadillac with a "God Bless Texas" bumper sticker--Pure Texas

There was a slightly low-key altar call at the end, wherein people were asked to stand to publicly profess their newfound decision to follow Jesus, but not pressed to move forward because of the Easter crowds. They could instead go find the people in orange t-shirts in the lobby, who could be found at various booths draped with orange balloons, to get a free Bible and some things that would help them in their new decision. This is one of the bigger differences between our church tradition and this one—we encourage a lot of education before making the decision, while this tradition encourages a decision and then education. While I’m more comfortable with the way my church family does this, as it seems more based on a long-term commitment, there’s something very beautiful about watching people answer this movement in their hearts in the moment. I just remember my teenage days in this community when each time there was an altar call I silently agonized over whether or not it had really done the trick last time or if I needed to do it again.

And then it was time for Easter dinner. After some driving around, we decided on the traditional Easter dinner of French toast and eggs at the Corner Bakery. Isn’t that what everyone has?

Following the Easter toast, we drove past the house I lived in during our first years in Dallas. It looks the same but slightly smaller than I remembered. The enormous empty field between our home and our old church is now a shopping center. The church has been replaced by a library, and the parking lot became the site of another home.

We were near another landmark; we took a drive by the alley wall that I backed into after an unexpected goodnight kiss from my date. This may just have been the highlight of the tour for my kids. The blue car paint does not appear to have lasted lo these 27 years.

We returned to the neighborhood of the large homes I mentioned yesterday so we could see them in daylight. Truly amazing. Allison has found her new housing dream—I remind her how much she dislikes cleaning the one room she is in charge of now. The best part of this drive was the growing embarrassment my kids were suffering as I paused in front of houses and kept turning around to go to the next street. They were pretty sure I was going to be stopped and arrested for loitering or stalking or something.

And we saw the deserted road where someone put a flashing light on their car and tried to pull me over; Mom’s good advice to go to a public place if I’m alone when a cop pulls me over paid off, as whoever it was drove away. I still shiver when I think about it; this portion of the tour turned into a lecture on stranger danger for soon-to-be drivers.

Other moments were lessons of a different kind for soon-to-be drivers. If there are cameras on most intersections in Dallas, I might just have 4 or 5 traffic tickets heading to my mailbox at home. The combination of wanting to see things I remember, not knowing exactly where I am, and trying to tell my kids stuff made for some rather unsafe maneuvers. Pity these children. Please.

They’d had enough; I was in danger of fulfilling Andrew’s fears that the entire trip would be me driving by houses saying “this is where I used to live” and “this is where my friend lived.” Back to the hotel for some sunshine and swimming. The skies had cleared after a cloudy morning and we spent a couple of hours lounging and splashing and wondering exactly why I’d gone back to Michigan. Followed that with total immersion into what appears to be a “Finding Bigfoot” marathon on Animal Planet.  Hours of people going “squatching.” Who could wish for more?

So we had a mix of old life and new life. Retracing the steps of my old life reminds me how those experiences prepared the way to new life, in so many ways. How can I be anything but grateful to God for that?