Flowering Cross

The flowering cross

The projection above the flowering cross at the end of Easter Sunday service

Every year for Holy Week (the week leading up to Easter in the Christian tradition), Pascack Bible Church in Hillsdale, New Jersey partakes in the creation of a flowering cross. This artifact comes together in a three-fold process that carries from Palm Sunday to Easter Sunday.

On Palm Sunday, church elders erect a wooden cross in the front of the stage before service. While this service is typically upbeat, commemorating Jesus's ride into Jerusalem on a donkey, the cross stands in the background as a reminder of the dark events that occurred in the subsequent days. For the next several days, this cross serves as a site for deep prayer and spiritual reflection.

The following Friday, Pascack Bible Church holds a service to commemorate Jesus's execution on the cross. In Good Friday tradition, each audience member is invited to hammer a nail into the cross, as symbol of the individual sins that Christians believe Jesus died to save mankind from.For two days this cross stands in front of the church, looking like a prop from a horror film, as churchgoers reflect on the sadness that befell Jesus's followers after his death. But then, on Easter Sunday, a drastic transformation: as the choir sings of Jesus's resurrection, flowers in a kaleidoscope of colors are weaved between the nails, until all that is visible is foliage. Before everyone's eyes, this artifact becomes a representation of a life so vibrant it overpowers the death that is symbolized beneath it.

While I have attended Easter service at Pascack Bible Church since infancy, I have only recently learned that this artifact, and its creation, are not unique to this church. There are churches across the world that practice variations of the same tradition, and PBC is certainly not the first.

However, after interviewing my Christian peers and conducting online research, I have discovered one distinction that separates Pascack Bible Church's practice of this tradition from that of other churches: reserving certain elements of the creation of the flowering cross to certain age groups.

The Good Friday service at this church is held late in the evening, and is conducted with a darker, more serious tone than the typically-jubilant Sunday services. Because this service certainly does not qualify as child-friendly, most attendees are adults. This means that the people hammering nails into the cross are rarely younger than sixteen (I myself remember the significance of the first time I partook in this aspect of the tradition when I was in high school).

This exists in stark contrast to the Easter Sunday service. Half way through the service, the children of the church (who had previously been in Sunday School classes) arrive with flowers. While their parents watch from the audience, these children are the only ones who place the flowers on the cross.

Yes, after Easter Sunday service, this artifact still stands as a symbol of Jesus's salvation of mankind from sin. However, Pascack Bible Church takes this meaning one step further. For them, it is not enough for adult Christians to repent for sin; their lives take on a newer, deeper meaning when they instruct children on the word of God, and help create the next generation of Christians, who can perhaps not repeat the sins of the previous generation. This meaning parallels the Bible verse Psalm 127:3-5, which says, "Children are a heritage from the Lord, offspring a reward from him...Blessed is the man whose quiver is full of them. They will not be put to shame when they contend with their opponents in court".  

I realized the significance of the age distinctions in the creation of this artifact after reading James Baldwin's Go Tell it On the Mountain. While reading this novel, the character of Gabriel struck me as someone who had a very warped understanding of Psalm 127:3-5, despite being a person with religious authority at his church. Instead of embracing the 'full' aspect of the verse, Gabriel believes that God wants him to focus his spiritual mentoring on one individual, his only legitimate son Roy. While this motive is initially rooted in religious devotion and spiritual desires, eventually it becomes shallow: Gabriel began to use this belief to compensate for his own sins, instead of facing them head-on. In the process, he neglects his first son, Royal, and his stepson, John, while placing his burdens on his wives. For example, Deborah tells him, "I know that you thinking at the bottom of your heart that if you just make her, her [his wife Elizabeth] and her bastard boy, pay enough for her sin, your son won't have to pay for yours" (3432).

In contrast, the way that the rest of John' church embraces him as a young person dealing with spiritual dilemmas for the first time is deeply reflective of Pascack Bible Church's embrace of youths. For example, after he has a mystical experience at the end of the novel, members of the church stay with him all night, and embrace and commend him afterwards. As they celebrate, John newly feels that he is part of a community: "he moved down a great hall, full of a splendid company" (3281).

This is a great example of what Pascack Bible Church’s take on the flowering cross signifies: Jesus’s death and resurrection were not meant solely for the sake of giving mankind afterlife; they also meant giving his followers a new, more valuable, illuminated life on Earth. Helping to foster Christian values in all children, not just your own, is one way followers to find this deeper meaning.

Sources

"BibleGateway." BibleGateway.com: A Searchable Online Bible. Bible Gateway. Web.20 Apr. 2015.

Baldwin, James. Go Tell It on the Mountain. New York: Vintage, 1952. Print.