A few weeks ago, in the early days of Easter season, a friend of mine shared (a delicious!) lasagna with some friends as we listened to the Resurrection accounts and together reflected on the reality of new life.
As I thought about what resurrection means, hope, of course, came quickly to mind, but hope for what? Of what variety? Hope for resurrection, sure, hope for a better world, a sinless world.
Whenever I picture resurrection, I always see dry, dusty ground suddenly give way to bright spring flowers. Usually tulips. Not like in a time-elapse-film way, but just, in a second. Bam. Flowers. Dead seeds, dead bulbs, suddenly are shocked into new life. We've waited longer than a winter, we've waited a lifetime, generations, eternities. And suddenly, color overcomes the drab desert and dry death is ruined by brilliant life.
There is no more drastic change than for a dead thing to become alive again. Dry things can become wet. White things can become black. Darkness can give way to light. But dead things don't usually come alive again. It's not that easy.
And this is why the Resurrection gives me hope for change. I don't just need night to day change, I need death to life change. I'm desperate for it. My own heart needs not just to be woken up out of a long slumber. It needs to be shocked out of rigor mortis. Stiff, dry bones need to dance again. I need my sin to change to righteousness. I need by fears to change to surety. This is the kind of change I'm so desperate for in every area of my life--change so drastic that only death-to-life can capture the contrast. Only death-to-life can accomplish the contrast.
This is the level of change I need in my world--in the driest of dirt, in the darkest of cities--not just for nourishing water or glimmering light, but for real, tangible all-of-the-sudden life. And this is the kind of change I long to see in the lives of those I love. Resurrection is something so different, yet so the same. These same bodies, these same people, need their bones to dance too. They need their sickness to end in health and their fear to end in hope. And this hope comes only if dead things can come alive agin.
And they do. Jesus did. This is where our hope comes from, hope for change: the King of the Universe would become one of us in order to die a death he never had to die in order to show us--right there in the middle of history--that real change is here, that real death-to-life change is going to be ours too.
Here is a place for Resurrection hope for change.
As I thought about what resurrection means, hope, of course, came quickly to mind, but hope for what? Of what variety? Hope for resurrection, sure, hope for a better world, a sinless world.
Whenever I picture resurrection, I always see dry, dusty ground suddenly give way to bright spring flowers. Usually tulips. Not like in a time-elapse-film way, but just, in a second. Bam. Flowers. Dead seeds, dead bulbs, suddenly are shocked into new life. We've waited longer than a winter, we've waited a lifetime, generations, eternities. And suddenly, color overcomes the drab desert and dry death is ruined by brilliant life.
There is no more drastic change than for a dead thing to become alive again. Dry things can become wet. White things can become black. Darkness can give way to light. But dead things don't usually come alive again. It's not that easy.
And this is why the Resurrection gives me hope for change. I don't just need night to day change, I need death to life change. I'm desperate for it. My own heart needs not just to be woken up out of a long slumber. It needs to be shocked out of rigor mortis. Stiff, dry bones need to dance again. I need my sin to change to righteousness. I need by fears to change to surety. This is the kind of change I'm so desperate for in every area of my life--change so drastic that only death-to-life can capture the contrast. Only death-to-life can accomplish the contrast.
This is the level of change I need in my world--in the driest of dirt, in the darkest of cities--not just for nourishing water or glimmering light, but for real, tangible all-of-the-sudden life. And this is the kind of change I long to see in the lives of those I love. Resurrection is something so different, yet so the same. These same bodies, these same people, need their bones to dance too. They need their sickness to end in health and their fear to end in hope. And this hope comes only if dead things can come alive agin.
And they do. Jesus did. This is where our hope comes from, hope for change: the King of the Universe would become one of us in order to die a death he never had to die in order to show us--right there in the middle of history--that real change is here, that real death-to-life change is going to be ours too.
Here is a place for Resurrection hope for change.