Easter Reflections

He is Risen! He is Risen Indeed!

I love Easter Sundays. I love getting up early in the morning and going to the sunrise service, reading the passage of the Resurrection and singing hymns like “He Arose.” Up from the grave He arose! And “He lives”  Because He lives I can face tomorrow. Because He lives all fear is gone. Because I know He holds the future and life is worth the living just because He lives! I always got goose bumps with those songs. What beautiful words! And I always loved how my pastor always sang those songs to the top of his lungs with the deepest conviction. He knew they were true and he yearned for all of us to know it as well. I love that man and miss him in our church deeply (even though I don’t get to actually go there often). The Sunrise service is definitely my favorite part of Easter, by far. I love it. I miss it. Even though in later years it wasn’t as early as it used to be (to my pastor’s disappointment). And I’m kind of like him- I liked getting up when it was DARK. And your body ached because you were getting up so early. You could kind of picture yourself like Mary, aching as she went to look at the tomb, saddened by what she expected to find. Yet He was not there! Hallelujah! He arose! And as she cried by the tomb and asked the man whom she thought was a gardener where the Christ was…all He had to say was her name “Mary” and she knew instantly it was the Christ. Wow. How beautiful. I love Christmas and all, but man Easter really gets me. I mean, it’s wonderful and very needed that Christ came to earth. The end of the story wouldn’t be there without the beginning. But oh the end of that story. He could have come to earth and just decided it was too much, he didn’t want to go through with the plan. The Father could have just decided it was too hard and too painful to watch his son be beaten and die. He could have called ten thousand angels to take him off the cross (or as Dawson says- Bibleman could help him get down). But He didn’t. He didn’t. He CHOSE to DIE for me. And amazingly that wasn’t the whole story- He rose again! I made the boys watch the VeggieTales Easter Carol last night. There’s a song in there that I love. Dawson told me I had to stop singing it because he was tired of the song. J But one line is “He died for us to give us life, and to give us hope He rose.” Ahh-I love that. Talk about goose bumps. He could have given us just life, I suppose. I mean, death was the price for our sins and He could have paid it and been done, but He rose again. I love that line- to give us hope He rose. What glorious hope- there IS life after the grave! I feel like hope just meets me where I am this year. I need hope.   Hope that life won’t always be like this- that the boys will one day all sleep through the night- that I will sleep through the night- that the boys will have friends, that they will come to know Jesus as their Savior and Lord, that I will one day learn bambara or French for that matter, that I will one day actually work in this hospital, that Brett won’t have to kill himself at the hospital and that his days won’t always be from 7- 6 or later, that there will be enough nurses to start peds in HIS timing, not man’s. That I can make more friends than just Sali, who lives miles away in a village and I can only see her once every few months, that when she does walk two hrs one way on foot to see me that I could actually have a meaningful conversation with her, that more people would come to know Jesus, that little babies just don’t have to die simply for lack of a little oxygen or sugar water, that parents here will value life and not let their child die solely because of money. Hope that this life is not all there is. Hope that because He lives I can face tomorrow. Because He lives all fear is gone. Because I know He holds the future and life is worth the living just because He lives!

I’ve been doing this Beth Moore study “Living Beyond Yourself.” It’s really great. Probably as life changing and good as “Lord, I want to know you” by Kay Arthur. These are my two favorite studies of all time. I love how this goes through the fruit of the Spirit and she makes clear that these attributes are not possible in our own being. I am incapable of agape love. But God is greater than our hearts! This week has been on kindness. She started talking of the kindness of God. As a Father, his tender love for us. I was reminded of the verses that He gave me when I struggled to come to Mali with Dawson the first time. “Can a mother forget the baby on her breast and have no compassion on the child she has borne? Though she may forget, I will not forget you, I have engraved you on the palm of my hands.” Isaiah 49:15-16. His love is greater for my children than even I can give them. She talked of His desire to tenderly love us as His children. As I comfort my boys when they are sad or upset or hurt, so He wants to do with me. He wants me to run to him crying and just say “Hold me, Jesus” He want s me to just rest in Him. Let Him wrap his arms around me and just feel safe in His arms. As I know how best to reassure and comfort my boys, so He does for me. He knows what I need. As I know every mark on my boys, the few scars they already have and how they got them, He knows every mark on me- much more than I know my boys. As giving the breast to Silas is often the only thing that comforts him and truly consoles him and fixes his hunger or thirst, so the Lord as El Shaddai is to me. I think of the few times that the boys when in the nursing stage were so upset or in pain or something that they refused to nurse. They just screamed. The whole time I just sat their upset and my heart ached because I knew that what they needed was the breast, and if they would just relax for a second and trust me to give it to them, they’d be ok. I wonder how often He feels that way with me, a lot I’m sure. Just trust me, Sheri. Let ME comfort you. Not emails, not chocolate, not sleep. Me. Let me comfort you. I am what you need. I’m really enjoying that image of the Lord as Father. He knows every pain and struggle I feel for my boys. He has watched His son go through terrible pain, to be on earth alone, rejected by men. He knows what it is like to feel like your kids are being rejected. He knows the pain of watching your kids be in a tough situation, one that is maybe not ideal. He let His Son suffer and die for me. And not only did He allow that, He wants a relationship with us who are responsible for His son’s death. He wants to love us tenderly, to care for us, to take on our burdens and concerns, for us to lay our worries and stresses at his feet. Wow. I think it’d be really hard for me to forgive someone if they killed my child, but to go so far as to have a relationship with them- amazing. I mean, I just want to knock people out if they are just mean to my kids and I want nothing to do with them afterwards. But we are responsible for His son’s death and yet He wants a relationship with us. A sweet relationship where He cares for me. It’s really sweet. I feel like where there is a lot of stress in life, I become much more of a worrier and little things get to me and just bother me (like I can’t stop worrying that another mouse will be in the house, or run by the boys as they sleep or something). But I’m encouraged by the Lord’s fatherly love, that he just wants to take those worries away and care for me. Thank you, Father! Thank you, Jesus. Because He lives, I can face tomorrow, because He lives, all fear is gone. Because I know He holds the future and life is worth the living just because He lives!