An Easter Reflection…When “Jesus” is late…

I got a text with bad news at 9:45 a.m., right before Sunday morning service. I had trouble breathing from that moment forward. I led our Sunday service and led an Unplugged Acoustic Worship Service that evening.

Our opening song at Unplugged said this:

“Don’t let your heart be troubled

Hold your head up high, don’t fear no evil

Fix your eyes on this one truth

God is madly in love with you

So take courage, hold on, be strong

Remember where our help comes from.”

In that moment, every fiber of my being cried out. Everything within me, was holding onto that help! And as I write to encourage you, my fellow sojourners, I wanted to remind you that my writing comes from a needy soul. The words I share I desperately need myself, and I hope somehow to help you in your next step.

Recently, my pastor, Terry Koehn, preached about the bible story of Lazarus. It is a story about a friend of Jesus who falls ill. Lazarus’ family comes to tell Jesus that he needs to come because Lazarus is sick. And Jesus does not make haste, and Lazarus dies.

I was struck by a moment in the story, when Jesus finally arrives on the scene, and Mary falls at his feet, crying,

“Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.”

There were also some others who had gathered and saw the scene unfolding, and some of them asked,

“Could not he who opened the eyes of the blind man have kept this man from dying?”

And as I heard that question, I thought, isn’t this the question of life?

If you are “God,” why not save me from this suffering? Where have you been? If you can and are able, if I am supposed to “trust” you with my life, why would you not save me from this? Why are you late?

• Why can I not get pregnant?
• Why is my marriage failing?
• Why was I diagnosed with cancer?
• Why do I have to walk through this divorce?
• Why is my child sick
• Why did he take his own life?
• Why did I lose my job?
• Why am I in this financial collapse?

The story of Lazarus seems so silly, allow the sickness, the death, the grief, the burial, the pain, and then just go and raise him back to life? What is the point? Why allow the suffering and all this unnecessary pain?

I think the message of the Christ is laid out in this story, just like it is laid out in his own suffering, anguish, betrayal, abandonment, pain, torture, death, and resurrection.

There is NO LIFE without pain and suffering.

There will always be cycles of life. And NO one, not even the divine, gets to circumvent these cycles.

There is no escaping the suffering. Yet, everything within us wants out of this process.

As we mature into adulthood, part of being a healthy, fully alive person is to learn the integration of good and bad. To learn how the good and bad are all integrated, how one needs the other. To see how every part is “necessary”.

We don’t know healthy without knowing unhealthy, we don’t know joy without knowing sorrow, we understand healing because we know sick, it is in the polarity that new life is produced. It is what allows the human race to continue; it is ingrained into every cell, every organism, every piece of our world.

We go through these cycles: life, transformation, evolution, pressing, crushing, darkness, death, and then new life.

We will all have pain, we will be betrayed, we will suffer, we will endure hardship, we will experience death, and in all of it, LIFE is always waiting.

True, renewed life and freedom are always there to grasp, to taste, to walk into.

Weeping my last for the night, but joy comes in the morning. He endured the cross for the JOY set before him.

Just as the Christ endured, suffered, died, and experienced LIFE again, so shall I, so shall you.

This is the beauty of creation, of our earth, of our bodies, the night is here, but just wait a few hours, my dear, and the Sun is going to rise.

Light, Love, Hope, are there, just on the other side of your darkest, hardest moments, there is healing and True Life right there waiting for you.

It is there even when it feels late… life comes forth, out of the darkness of a tomb, when all seems utterly hopeless, when death’s grasp lingers, in the hardest, darkest moments… The spirit of the Christ calls out, my dear one, “Come forth!”

Come out of the darkness. Walk back into the light. Friends, unwrap her, untangle him, the stench of death and decay are no longer welcome here. Clean her up, wash him off. All things will be made new.

The breath of LIFE makes deserts of dry bones rise. The breath of life calls dead men from their slumber, brings the message of the messiah to me and to you. Resurrection Life is yours. The same power that raised Jesus from the dead lives in me, lives in you. The life impulse deep within you cannot be stopped.

So Darling,

“Don’t let your heart be troubled

Hold your head up high, don’t fear no evil

Fix your eyes on this one truth

God is madly in love with you

So take courage, hold on, be strong

Remember where our help comes from.”

From my  to yours,