"Sun Rising Through the Clouds" is what I would call the picture if I ever get round to painting it. I missed the Easter Sunrise service because I was too late getting up, or was I just being lazy and lying in bed. Instead I walked up to Treglohan and looked out over the sea. It was a rather cloudy morning so seeing the sunrise was not going to be on the cards even if I had been early enough. However there was a narrow break in the clouds stretching from behind me out to sea. A narrow patch of blue and green showed through the gap and there was a wonderful shimmer of light cast on the sea out to the distant horizon. Near the horizon the break spread out into a narrow horizontal band thinly edged in gold and red. The sound of the bell on the buoy was faintly heard over the singing of the birds and the slapping of the surf on the beach below. Then I noticed that the sun was beginning to show in that horizontal gap in the clouds. As it rose a new band of colour was added to the blue and green shades from the sky above. The sun continued to rise until it filled the space between the edges of the clouds and was too strong to look at. A great disc of yellow, not far above the horizon, reflected by the sea as a red band drawn directly towards me, flecked by the shimmering ripples of the tide. It did not last in its full glory for long because as the sun rose higher it disappeared again into the upper layer of cloud. Soon it was gone, but now the golden edge to the clouds was much more prominent and brighter, so that as I walked home with the sea behind me I kept looking back at the ever lightening sky, hoping that the sun had come out of hiding once more.

This made me think of the period between Easter and Ascension. Gloriously Christ rose from the tomb that first Easter morning, the disciples and the women were amazed and overjoyed to see him again, it must have been wonderful to have the risen Jesus joining them in their fellowship and meals together. However like my vision of the sun rising through the cloud Jesus had to leave them again at the ascension. But in a way he did not leave them, like the bright edging to the clouds and the increased daylight the presence of Jesus was felt, so the disciples did not just go back to their former tasks, they went on to Pentecost and were changed from timid followers cowering behind locked doors to bold Evangelists, shouting out the message of the resurrection and Jesus' saving grace to all who would hear. This change convinces me that the narrative of the New Testament and the life and resurrection of Jesus is no made up story, it is real, perhaps more real than anything else.