This Is It

How do you wait when the promise of hope and healing you’d nurtured for months and years has died?

The women who had cared—literally—for Jesus had seen him die. They’d watched Joseph and Nicodemus take his battered body down, wrap it in fine cloth, and gently place it in Joseph’s tomb. No more hope. No more healing. Yet, despite that, they’ve returned, one last time, to anoint his body with the spices they’ve prepared.

“Why do you look for the living among the dead?” two strangers ask them. He’s risen just like he told you in Galilee, the two strangers continue.

It’s only then that the women remember what Jesus had told them about his dying and his rising to life. He had told them! Just as he tells you⎯both the big Story (he loves you with an everlasting love; you have been made new: all things are possible; nothing can separate those who love him from his love; one day all tears will be wiped away) and the role in that Story that only you can play.

What has he told you...that you’ve forgotten in the face of all that conspires in this world to make you believe that the hope and healing for which you long is both improbable and impossible?

It’s easy, in the interminable hours between dusk and sunrise, after the dust and noise and horror of death have settled, to think, “This is it.”

Even so, remember.

As you wait, remember the song he sings with delight over you (Zephaniah 3:17); the promises from Scripture that are all for you; the facets of his character he’s shared with you. Wait. Remember. Then step out at sunrise into the miracles that wait for you.

Respond in Prayer

Light of the world, our wired existence bombards us with 24/7 words and images that tell us hope is a dangerous thing and healing a myth. Please tell us again what you’ve already said to us and over us. We’re listening. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Renee James