When we live close to our pain, we have an opportunity to experience great joy in new ways. It may be challenging to think that joy and pain are connected in any way other than feeling like opposites, but as we examine the personal narrative of Jesus’ life and death we may find cause to sit with this challenging reality.
Today we celebrate a risen Christ. We also reflect on the recorded days that remind us of the events leading up Easter. We’ve celebrated the highs of welcoming Jesus into the city of Jerusalem with palm branches as He rode in on the back of a donkey… to the days of His betrayal, His torture, being hung on the cross, His death and being placed in the grave… All of this has led us to the day where we can claim the victory of Jesus overcoming death. The joy of the resurrection story highlights not just a victory in isolation of other events, but how tragic events were flipped into a new hope for people and a new way of knowing the depths of God’s sacrificial love for His people. As we hold the darkness and deep sorrow of Jesus’ journey to death on a cross, we also see how God’s narrative offered something so different than any human mind could conceive.
The uncomfortableness of confronting pain may have us fast forwarding to the “happy ending” of Jesus’ resurrection. Because we have the benefit of knowing the whole story, when we speak of Jesus’ death, we often speak of Jesus’ death AND resurrection. But this painful part of our Savior’s story has much to teach us.
Matthew, Mark, Luke and John each give their accounts of the days before Jesus’ death, after the tomb and the resurrection journey. If we plant our feet into the sandals of those witnessing and participating in the events of Palm Sunday, Good Friday and Easter, without knowing how the story ended, the weight of the incredible pain that Jesus suffered may threaten to break us. There is a part of me that wishes it didn’t have to be this way. That there was somehow a very different way for God to demonstrate His love for humanity. But God decided to use something SO hard to transform our understanding of His love for us.
In my own story I think back to the darkest parts of my journey after significant losses I experienced and how desperately I wanted my story to be different. I also wondered why it had to be this way. Even though I continue to grieve and walk through difficult losses of family members… connecting with the pain I see others having to venture through… as well as navigate other life challenges, I can understand how we have an opportunity to know God in a way that is deeper and different because of the suffering we face in this life.
Just like those who witnessed and were changed by Jesus’ death on the cross and His resurrection first hand, we have an opportunity to experience God in new ways when we encounter these dark times of life. I have often said, I would have never wanted to have these losses happen, but I wouldn’t want to be the person I was before those losses either. God can transform our pain into joy. Our deepest hurts can be converted into opportunities to see God’s heart in new ways and give us the desire to reflect His perfect love and hope to others who are going through trails once we discover how He helps us survive what we thought may overcome us.
On Easter and each day of our journey, we have the joy of celebrating the miracle that Jesus’ death on the cross was not the end. Despite the darkness of these heartbreaking events, God shows up and flips the story. Instead of being left with death and defeat, we are given the ultimate hope through the most difficult of paths. The story of redemption is so magnificent because death was overthrown and there was victory over what felt impossible to redeem. The resurrection story is so powerful because we didn’t have to stay in that dark place. Hope was introduced in ways that our human mind could have never anticipated.
Perhaps your heart is rejoicing today in Jesus’ victory over the grave. As you celebrate, you may feel connected to your own experience of God’s victory over darkness in your life, or maybe you find yourself longing for this kind of transformational hope in the midst of difficult circumstances. Whether you sense victory or feel as though you are facing what feels like the grave, the God of all creation is by your side and walking with you. The same God who ached with Jesus’ death on the cross, but also knew these events held the great victory that was possible because of the sacrifice. God is a God who is connected to the deep pain of our world and can transform our seasons of defeat into a new kind of victory for us and those around us.
Lord, today I thank You for Your victory over the grave. I thank you for each person who may read these words, and I ask for Your perfect love to cover them in this moment. I ask for a special blessing over their lives. Lord you are El Roi, the “God who sees.” I thank you that you see me, that You see each Beloved Child who is reading this now. I thank you that you also know, and walk in, both the pain and the victory. Lord, You are not intimidated by what threatens to consume us. You are so much bigger than what may feel like the end of our lives as we know it and I thank you that through our pain and valleys, You provide in ways that are beyond our understanding. You can make a path where there seems to be no path. You did this for Jesus, and we cry out to you and ask you provide faith and assurance as we face our pain and wrestle with the hard parts of life. Give us eyes to see You at work in the difficult places and the patience to step into our way forward with our own brokenness and the brokenness of those around us. As we wrestle with the difficult moments in life and when understanding is beyond our grasp, we ask for your provision. I thank You for Your Love that rescues us in our deeply broken places.
Amen