The Water festival called Thingyan (pronounced as Ta-Gyen) in Burmese is the most significant annual festival on the Myanmar calendar; it marks the start of the New Year, the beginning of the Myanmar lunar calendar and celebrates life and rebirth.
The 2022 Thingyan holidays begin on the 9th of April and ends on the 16th of April and the next day is the Burmese New Year.
Annually, during the Thingyan festival holidays, the Myanmar people enjoy water throwing along with music and dancing. Large crowds on foot, bicycles, motorbikes and in open-top vehicles will roam to different festival gatherings where they join the water throwing party there. Traditionally and in rural areas, scented water in a silver bowl is sprinkled using sprigs of thabyay (Jambul) to metaphorically “wash away” a person’s sins of the previous year. Some Myanmar people feel that the Thingyan water will wash away their old self and thoughts, making them afresh to enter the new year.
Similarly, the Psalmist in the Bible prayed after he had sinned like this: “Wash away all my iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin…cleanse me with hyssop, and I will be clean; wash me and I will be whiter than snow.” Many of us today remember our past and present sins and desire to be cleansed from those sins. We are not happy to live with guilt. Like the Psalmist, we want to be cleansed and free from the guilt of our sins.
The Bible shows us a way that we can be cleansed from our sins and live in freedom.
“If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:7). We have to repent and confess our sins before God sincerely. Then God will cleanse from all our sins by the blood of Jesus (Hebrews 13;12). He will make us a real new person. Today, you can be free from sins and guilt by accepting Jesus as your Savior and Lord who died on the cross for your sins and rose again from the dead.
Wish you a Happy New Year
