April 2026

Pastor Message: 

When the Story Comes to Us

Holy Week has begun with Palm/Passion Sunday. We picture the day when Jesus entered Jerusalem on a donkey, and the crowds welcomed him with shouts of praise. Each year, we read the same Scripture and hear the same story—as if it takes us back to Jerusalem two thousand years ago.

But I often wonder: What if Scripture is not taking us back to the past, but bringing the story to us—here and now? What if Jesus, crossing the distance of two thousand years, came to Waupaca?

We do not have palm trees here. There might even be snow. We might wave pine branches and lay our winter coats on the road to welcome him. And perhaps, instead of a donkey… he might even ride in on a dairy cow.

This year, like last year, our church has prepared pine branches instead of palms. Behind this simple practice are deeper questions: What does this story have to do with our lives? Why should the birth of Jesus bring us joy? What do his miracles, his suffering, his death, and his resurrection have to do with us—here and now?

The stories of the Bible reveal the full range of human experience already within us—praise and frenzy, doubt and indifference, confusion and fear, grief and mourning, joy, hope, and peace.

As I read the accounts of Jesus’ journey to Jerusalem, I find all the characters within myself: the shouts of “Hosanna,” the indifference of Pilate, the frenzy of the crowd, Judas’ betrayal, Peter’s denial, and the disciples fleeing in fear. All of these live within us.

And yet, at the same time, I also see something else within us: the love of his mother, who stayed until the end, the courage of Joseph of Arimathea, the devotion of Mary Magdalene going to the tomb, and the quiet joy of those who encountered the risen Christ. These, too, live within us.

The story comes to us. The story reveals us. It invites us to hold all that we are without collapsing into ourselves, to tend to our wounded places without being consumed by them, and to keep walking the path of faith.

The story also shows us where we are. The divisions, hatred, and injustice in our world—even the violence we witness in war and destruction—are not distant realities. They reflect the condition of our hearts and minds. Sometimes, without realizing it, the hidden parts of who we are revealed in the world around us. We cannot change the world without first honestly seeing ourselves.

And yet, there is grace. The hope of God is this: we have already been invited into this journey of transformation and sanctification, and we are walking it even now.

So I hope and pray that God’s grace may be upon all of us—as we face the hidden places within, as we walk this path with courage, and as the story of Christ comes alive in us, here and now.

The story comes to us. Even through death, it does not end. It rises. And we are invited to rise with it.

Rising from death, 

Rev. Hyunwoong Hwang