I have spent many years celebrating Easter because of the impossibility of the cross. Since I was very small, Easter was always a day of relief after the shame, guilt, and fear-based grief of Good Friday. My views are very different now and so I've been doing a great deal of thinking about how to respond to the cross and to Easter.
Interestingly, this "Holy Week" has been rather hellish for me. And so, I find myself wondering what the hell there even is to celebrate about, or even if I should. Many parts of this celebration seem trivial and meaningless--arbitrary. But tomorrow, I will be in church. And I WILL celebrate. But, I won't celebrate redemption because I am already redeemed and I celebrate that every day simply by virtue of being alive. And, I won't celebrate because my life is all pastel eggs and candy-coatings. My life is hard and I took a beating this week...this year... So, what do you celebrate on a holiday like this then? When peace is gone, and suffering is great?
I will embrace the brokenness. I won't enjoy it. In fact, I will cry many tears. But, on Easter this year, I will celebrate the fact that I can be broken and still cherished. That God doesn't forsake those He loves. That the "resurrection" isn't about whether or not Christ rose bodily. That instead, the resurrection is about the fact that there is ALWAYS hope--hope in the fact that I am able to break, bleed, age, and weaken. Hope in the beauty of a terrible, awful, grace... a grace that comes despite every hindrance, rather than because of any sort of attempts at earning it. A grace that has been mine since the foundations of the world. It's a messy grace. It's got bruises and is bloodied. It's been that way ever since the first anguish any human ever experienced--it isn't as if grace existed in lily white perfection all the way up until it was nailed to a cross! NO! Our God has been in the middle of every suffering, anguish, grief, and pain since the dawn of time. He came into this world tattered.
Glory is not without blemish. Instead, glory is light and life and color refracted through shattered bits of glass and bounced off of tear drops, and glistening off of sweat and blood. Glory is messy. Perfection is caked with dirt and grime. The shoulders of our Abba's robe are covered in the snot and tears of His kids. And, He loves it that way.
Easter will be very different for me this year. I do not feel compelled to grieve over my sins. Nor do I want to sit and reflect upon how much I do not deserve the grace of a redeeming death. I have spent so much time grieving things and people... time lost, elements of self lost... so, if Easter is truly a time for freedom and hope, which I believe it is, then I will celebrate that way. I will live in the reality of the freedom I have because of the love of God. Love that does not condemn. Love that saves and redeems, always. Love that reunites humanity with God--reunite good with Good!
Friends, Easter is often sold as a time of remembering the salvation we have from hell because of God's mercy. Salvation from a wrathful, frightening, terrible God. Easter for me will not be about fear and trembling this time. This year, Easter will be a time to remember the suffering I've endured. I will shed bitter, broken tears. And, I will sing and pray through them, grateful for the freedom to be broken and shattered and for the love of a God who is here despite it all--a God who will hold me and let me cry it out. And, a God who will be here when the joy returns to my life to run, chase, romp, and laugh. Freedom to be fully human. That is what Easter is all about!
So, yes... I will celebrate Easter. I will celebrate resurrection. I will celebrate the resurrection of broken human souls from the dust, into the arms of a loving Mama-God!
I am risen! I am risen indeed!........................................ And so are you!
Remember friends, where there is love, there need not be any fear. Love heals, cools, dissolves, and evaporates fear even while absorbing tears and blood and mess!
Happy Easter!
--A Glorious Mess
