Ebenezer Ridges Butterfly Release

Each summer the Ebenezer Ridges Campus releases sixty new butterflies into the campus butterfly garden.  The butterflies arrive overnight delivery from Florida and are released after a worship service at the end of August to mark the closing of the summer and the “sending off” of the kindergartners to their first day of school.  Some of the children have been a part of this campus since they were six weeks old.  So their departing is a significant event of them and the residents who live here.  The butterflies mark their transition from this community of Ebenezer to the new school communities of which they will be a part.  The butterflies symbolize that transition and “taking to flight.” 
 
It also helps the grandmas and grandpas on campus to share in prayers of blessing for these young people that have grown up in our midst.  There is a wonderful Native American legend that says when you catch a butterfly in your hand you should whisper a prayer to it.  Since the butterfly can hear the prayer but not speak it to anyone, when the butterfly flies up into the heavens the prayers are taken up to the Great Spirit.  It is a great thing of beauty to watch the children and the senior adults “whispering their prayers” for each other to the butterflies before they take flight.
 
For Christians the butterfly is also an ancient symbol for the Resurrection.  The cocoon resembles Jesus’ tomb.  Out of the seemingly lifeless tomb springs forth the new life of Resurrection.  So the next time you see a butterfly symbol at Easter or encounter a Monarch alongside the road offer up a prayer of blessing and watch as the butterfly carries your prayer into the heavens.
 
Chaplain Chris Beckman
Ebenezer Ridges Campus
Burnsville, MN
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