The apostle Paul teaches that the resurrection confirms what the incarnation anticipates—Christ is another name for everything. Father Richard writes: 

The core message of the incarnation of God in Jesus is that the Divine Presence is here, in us and in all of creation, and not only “over there” in some far-off realm. The early Christians came to call this seemingly new and available Presence “both Lord and Christ” (Acts 2:36).  

Read 1 Corinthians 15:3–8, ³ For I delivered to you first of all that which I also received: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, ⁴ and that He was buried, and that He rose again the third day according to the Scriptures, ⁵ and that He was seen by ^[a]Cephas, then by the twelve. ⁶ After that He was seen by over five hundred brethren at once, of whom the greater part remain to the present, but some have ^[b]fallen asleep. ⁷ After that He was seen by James, then by all the apostles. ⁸ Then last of all He was seen by me also, as by one born out of due time; …… where Paul describes how Christ appeared a number of times to his apostles and followers after Jesus’ death. The four Gospels do the same thing, describing how the Risen Christ transcended doors, walls, spaces, water, air, and times, eating food, and sometimes even bilocating, but always interacting with matter. While all of these accounts ascribe a kind of physical presence to Christ, it always seems to be a different kind of embodiment. Or, as Mark says right at the end of his Gospel, “he showed himself but under another form” (16:12). This is a new kind of presence, a new kind of embodiment, and a new kind of godliness.  

This, I think, is why the people who witnessed these apparitions of Christ seemed to finally recognize him, but not usually immediately. Seeing and recognizing are not the same thing. And isn’t this how it happens in our own lives? First we see a candle flame, then a moment later it “blazes” for us when we allow it to hold a personal meaning or message. We see a homeless person, and the moment we allow our heart space to open toward them, they become human, dear, or even Christ. Every resurrection story seems to strongly affirm an ambiguous—yet certain—presence in very ordinary settings, like walking on the road to Emmaus with a stranger, roasting fish on the beach, or one who appeared like a gardener to the Magdalene. [1] These moments from Scripture set a stage of expectation and desire that God’s presence can be seen in the ordinary and the material, and we do not have to wait for supernatural apparitions. We Catholics call this a sacramental theology, where the visible and tactile are the primary doorway to the invisible. This is why each of the formal Sacraments of the church insists on a material element like water, oil, bread, wine, the laying on of hands, or the absolute physicality of marriage itself.  

Christ is the light that allows people to see things in their fullness. The precise and intended effect of such a light is to see Christ everywhere else. In fact, that is my only definition of a true Christian. A mature Christian sees Christ in everything and everyone else. That is a definition that will never fail us, always demand more of us, and give us no reasons to fight, exclude, or reject anyone.  

___________________________________

Sarah Young, Jesus List

Prince of Peace, I come to You, feeling weary and burdened. I want to spend time resting in Your Presence. I need Your Peace continually, just as I need You each moment. When things are going smoothly in my life, it’s easy to forget how dependent on You I really am. Then, when I encounter bumps in the road, I tend to become anxious and upset. Eventually, this revives my awareness of my need for You, and I return to You—seeking Your Peace. I’m thankful that You give me this glorious gift, but it’s hard for me to receive it until I calm down. How much better it would be to stay close to You at all times! Please help me remember that You, my Prince, are Mighty God! All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to You. Whenever I’m experiencing hard times, I can come to You and tell You my troubles. But I need to come humbly, acknowledging how great and wise You are. Rather than shaking my fist at You or insisting that You do things my way, I can pray these wonderful words of David: “I trust in You, O Lord; I say, ‘You are my God.’ My times are in Your hands.” In Your majestic Name, Jesus, Amen

ISAIAH 9:6 AMPC; For to us a Child is born, to us a Son is given; and the government shall be upon His shoulder, and His name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father [of Eternity], Prince of Peace.

MATTHEW 11:28; Come to Me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.

MATTHEW 28:18; And Jesus came and spake unto them To the eleven disciples and apostles; for though there might be so large a number as before observed, yet the following words were only spoken to the apostles: saying, all power is given unto me in heaven and in earth

PSALM 31:14–15; But I trust in you, O Lord; I say, “You are my God.” 15 My times are in your hand; rescue me from the hand of my enemies and from my persecutors!

Young, Sarah. Jesus Listens (p. 109). Thomas Nelson. Kindle Edition.

Matthew Fox is one of the primary contemporary theologians to articulate a renewed vision of the universal or cosmic Christ. Here, he focuses on the Resurrection’s cosmic implications: 

Who does not seek Resurrection? Who does not seek a full and fuller life? Did Jesus not promise, “I have come that you may have life, life in abundance” (John 10:10)? How am I Resurrection … [and] Life for others? 

To be Resurrection for another I need to be Resurrection for myself. That means I cannot dwell in [despair] and death and anger and oppression and submission and resentment and pain forever. I need to wake up, get up, rise up, put on life even when days are dark and my soul is down and shadows surround me everywhere…. I have to listen to the voice that says:

“Be resurrection.”… “Be born again. And again. And again. Rise up and be counted. Rise up and imbibe the good news deeply—that death does not conquer, that life, not death, has the last word….” 

Fox insists that resurrection carries both grace and responsibility:  

Resurrection is a commitment to hope and being reborn. It is a commitment to creativity, to the Spirit who “makes all things new” (Revelation 21:5). Resurrection is the Spirit’s work. It is the life of the Spirit.  

And what about Life? How am I Life? How living and alive am I? How much in love with life am I? Can anyone or any event separate me from my love of life? Paul the mystic asks (and then answers), “Who shall separate us from the love of God? Neither death nor life, height nor depth, neither present nor future” (Romans 8:35, 38). Is my curiosity alive? My gratitude? My mind? My imagination? My laughter and sense of humor? My creativity? My powers of generosity and compassion? My powers for continually generating and regenerating life?  

Many mystics … say, “God is life.” Thus to say, “I am fully alive and fully in love with life” means that I am feeling fully the God presence in me—I am in love with God who is Life; the living God. And to say “I am the Life” is to say “I am God,” or at least a part of God, a son or daughter of God, an expression, an offspring, a manifestation, an incarnation of God. Another Christ.  

How are we doing? Are we growing in God-like-ness? In God action? In works of justice and compassion and healing and celebrating? To celebrate life is to celebrate God, to thank God for life, to worship. How are we doing in expressing the “sheer joy” of God (Aquinas) [1] as well as the justice of God?  

Yes, I am, yes, we are, the Resurrection and the Life. We bring aliveness and rebirth and plenty of hope into the world, however [distressing] the news becomes. That is what it means to believe in Easter Sunday and the Resurrection. We become Resurrection and the Life. Christ rises anew.  

_______________________________

Sarah Young Jesus Listens

Mighty Jesus, When things don’t go as I would like, help me to accept the situation immediately. I realize that fantasizing about how things might have gone is a waste of time and energy. Moreover, I’ve learned that if I indulge in feelings of regret, they can easily spill over into resentment. I need to remember that You are sovereign over all my circumstances—and humble myself under Your mighty hand, casting all my anxiety on You. I can rejoice in what You are doing in my life, even though it’s beyond my understanding. You are the Way, the Truth, and the Life. In You I have everything I need—for this life and for the life yet to come. I don’t want to let the impact of the world shatter my thinking or draw my attention away from You. The challenge I face each moment is to keep my eyes on You—no matter what is going on around me. When You are central in my thinking, I can view circumstances from Your perspective. This enables me to walk with You along the path of life, experiencing Joy in Your Presence. In Your matchless Name, Amen

1 PETER 5:6–7 NASB; Therefore, humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, so that He may exalt you at the proper time, 7 having cast all your anxiety on Him, because He cares about you.

JOHN 14:6 NKJV; Jesus said to him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me

HEBREWS 12:2 NLT. We do this by keeping our eyes on Jesus, the champion who initiates and perfects our faith. * Because of the joy* awaiting him, he endured the cross, disregarding its shame. Now he is seated in the place of honor beside God’s throne.

PSALM 16:11. You make known to me the path of life; you will fill me with joy in your presence, with eternal pleasures at your right hand. You make known to me the path of life; you will fill me with joy in your presence, with eternal pleasures at your right hand.

Young, Sarah. Jesus Listens (p. 108). Thomas Nelson. Kindle Edition.

Author Judy Cannato believes we experience Christ’s resurrection through ongoing growth and transformation:  

[Jesus] engaged death with every bit of consciousness and freedom that were his, and what we all discovered as a result is that death—while inevitable, while altering our dreams and causing us to let go of everything—does not have the final word. There is always—always—resurrection. And what is resurrection for us, in the context of the new universe story? It is a transformation in consciousness, an experience of transcendence in which we live out of the connectedness that is our truth. As we continue to evolve in consciousness, continue to emerge as more and more capable lovers, we share in the resurrection of Christ. We not only walk in the Light, we become light for others. Even little resurrections that come after choosing to die to fear and egocentricity release the Spirit. When we engage in a lifetime of death and resurrections as Jesus did, we become ever more empowered to do the work God asks us to do.  

Life and death are a single mystery. That is what the Paschal Mystery teaches us. Death is inevitable—but so is resurrection. We can be sure that dyings will intrude upon our lives, and we may have some choice about how we can respond to their coming. We can be awake and watchful for the resurrections as well, for the creative ways that new life streams into our lives even in the midst of death. Like supernova explosions that shatter every recognizable fragment of life [and scatter elements for new stars], we are capable of transcendence, capable of never allowing death to have the final say. [1] 

Theologian and mystic Howard Thurman (1899–1981) poetically described the surprise of resurrection and renewal:  

It is ever a new thing, a glad surprise, the stirring of life at the end of winter. One day there seems to be no sign of life and then almost overnight, swelling buds, delicate blooms, blades of grass, bugs, insects—an entire world of newness everywhere. It is the glad surprise at the end of winter. Often the same experience comes at the end of a long tunnel of tragedy and tribulation. It is as if a person stumbling in the darkness, having lost their way, finds that the spot at which they fall is the foot of a stairway that leads from darkness into light. Such is the glad surprise. This is what Easter means in the experience of the [human] race. This is the resurrection! It is the announcement that life cannot ultimately be conquered by death, … that there is strength added when the labors increase, that multiplied peace matches multiplied trials, that life is bottomed by the glad surprise. Take courage, therefore: 

When we have exhausted our store of endurance,  
When our strength has failed ere the day is half done,  
When we reach the end of our hoarded resources,  
Our Father’s full giving is only begun. [2] 

 7  ^f“Blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, 

^gwhose trust is the Lord.

“And we know that all that happens to us is working for our good if we love God and are fitting into his plans.”

Psalm 40:2 NIV“He lifted me out of the slimy pit, out of the mud and mire; he set my feet on a rock and gave me a firm place to stand.

But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession, that you may declare the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His wonderful light.

A New Energy and Joy

Contemplative theologian Beatrice Bruteau (1930–2014) describes the profound effect that our participation in the eternal life of God can have on us: 

Now that we know that our “roots” are “immortal” … we are reconciled to taking up again the work of the world. We come again into everyday life. But the transformation is still going on, both in ourselves and in the world that we touch. It has begun in earnest and is proceeding. What is different is that we are no longer concerned to gain eternal life for ourselves. We have that, we know it, we are sure of it. And because of that confidence, “faith,” we turn our attention and concern to manifesting the divine life in the forms of cosmic reality. We are looking now from a point of view that is rooted in our sense of our own reality in God. It makes everything look quite new to us, and our new ability to offer love-and-meaning energy to our world helps it to become “new” (Romans 6:4; Revelation 21:5).  

For Bruteau, resurrection starts in our lives now and transforms our engagement with the world: 

Coming back to our small private selves in very ordinary daily life, we also incarnate the Wondrous Being. One of the most striking things that happens to us in our resurrection of the body is that tiny, trivial things seem beautiful and marvelous—which, indeed, they are, as we recognize when we take time to study them carefully. Such a humble and common thing as water is almost miraculous in its varied properties, so essential to our survival…. What artistry and orderly connections we find all about us, how astonishing the complex world is.  

When we take a little time to remember to look, to marvel, we find that there are sources of joy, of esthetic delight, of quiet happiness on every hand….  

Our joy is not confined to ourselves but radiates out to all. Just as Jesus intended to enter into us, that his joy might be in us and our joy might be full (John 15:11), so neither can we contain our joy: our peace and happiness envelop all those around us. When we interact with people—or circumstances—we do not feel drained of energy, as we did when we were still obliged to protect and defend our ego-self. Perceiving creative action and interaction as reality itself, we feel ourselves fully living, full of the richness of God’s life, the interior fountain that never fails.  

The divine life now becomes natural for us, no longer something to be compared to an alternative. We are really “saved” when we no longer think of ourselves as “saved,” because there is no alternative. This is when profound incarnation takes places. The reality of God is intensely perceived as present in everything.… The kingdom is hidden right here, even in the passions and illusions of our superficial consciousness. When we are shaken awake, we see it.  

Alleluia! Christ is risen!  

As we celebrate Easter, the Daily Meditations explore Father Richard’s teachings on the Universal Christ, which reconnect Christ to his cosmic origin. 

Understanding the Universal or Cosmic Christ can change the way we relate to creation, to other religions, to other people, to ourselves, and to God. Knowing and experiencing this Christ can bring about a major shift in consciousness. Like Saul’s experience on the road to Damascus (see Acts 9), we won’t be the same after encountering the Risen Christ. 

Many people don’t realize that the apostle Paul never met the historical Jesus and hardly ever quotes Jesus directly. In almost all of Paul’s preaching and writing, he refers to the Eternal Christ Mystery or the Risen Christ rather than Jesus of Nazareth before his death and resurrection. The Risen Christ is the only Jesus that Paul ever knew! This makes Paul a fitting mediator for the rest of us, since the Omnipresent Risen Christ is the only Jesus we will ever know as well (see 2 Corinthians 5:16–17). 

Jesus’ historical transformation (“resurrected flesh”) and our understanding of the Spirit he gives us (see John 16:7–15; Acts 1:8) allow us to more easily experience the Presence that has always been available since the beginning of time, a Presence unlimited by space or time, the promise and guarantee of our own transformation (see 1 Corinthians 15; 2 Corinthians 1:21–22; Ephesians 1:13–14). 

In the historical Jesus, this eternal omnipresence had a precise, concrete, andpersonal referent. God’s presence became more obvious and believable in the world. The formless took on form in someone we could “hear, see, and touch” (1 John 1:1), making God easier to love.  

But it seems we so fell in love with this personal interface in Jesus that we forgot about the Eternal Christ, the Body of God, which is all of creation, which is really the First Incarnation. Jesus and Christ are not exactly the same. In the early Christian era, a few Eastern Fathers (such as Origen of Alexandria and Maximus the Confessor) noticed that the Christ was clearly older, larger, and different than Jesus himself. They mystically saw that Jesus is the union of human and divine in space and time; and Christ is the eternal union of matter and Spirit from the beginning of time.  

Jesus willingly died—and Christ arose—yes, still Jesus, but now including and revealing everything else in its full purpose and glory. (Read Colossians 1:15–20, so you know this is not just my idea.)  

When we believe in Jesus Christ, we’re believing in something much bigger than the historical incarnation that we call Jesus. Jesus is the visible map. The entire sweep of the meaning of the Anointed One, the Christ, includes us and all of creation since the beginning of time (see Romans 1:20). 

The Resurrection of All Things

Father Richard invites us to expand our understanding of resurrection: 

I want to enlarge your view of resurrection from a one-time miracle in the life of Jesus that asks for assent and belief, to a pattern of creation that has always been true, and that invites us to much more than belief in a miracle. It must be more than the private victory of one man to prove that he is God.  

Resurrection and renewal are, in fact, the universal and observable pattern of everything. We might just as well use non-religious terms like “springtime,” “regeneration,” “healing,” “forgiveness,” “life cycles,” “darkness,” and “light.” If incarnation is real, and Spirit has inhabited matter from the beginning, then resurrection in multitudinous forms is to be fully expected.  

Richard explains: 

The Christ Mystery anoints all physical matter with eternal purpose from the very beginning. We should not be surprised that the word we translate from the Greek as Christ comes from the Hebrew word mashiach, which means “the anointed one,” or Messiah. Jesus the Christ reveals that all is anointed!  

If the universe is anointed or “Christened” from its very beginning, then of course it can never die forever.  

Resurrection is just incarnation taken to its logical conclusion.  

If God inhabits matter, then we can naturally believe in the “resurrection” of the body.  

Most simply said, nothing truly good can die! (Trusting that is probably our real act of faith!)  

Resurrection is presented by Paul as the general principle of all reality (see 1 Corinthians 15:13). He does not argue from a one-time anomaly and then ask us to believe in this Jesus “miracle.” Instead, Paul names the cosmic pattern, and then says in many places that the “Spirit carried in our hearts” is the icon, the guarantee, the pledge, and the promise, or even the “down payment” of that universal message (see 2 Corinthians 1:21–22; Ephesians 1:14).  

One reason we can trust Jesus’ resurrection is that we can already see resurrection happening everywhere else. Nothing is the same forever, states modern science. Geologists with good evidence can prove that no landscape is permanent over millennia. Water, fog, steam, and ice are all the same thing, but at different stages and temperatures. “Resurrection” is another word for change, but particularly positive change—which we tend to see only in the long run. In the short run, it often just looks like death. The Preface to the Catholic funeral liturgy says, “Life is not ended, it is merely changed.” Science is now giving us a very helpful language for what religion rightly intuited and imaged, albeit in mythological language. Remember, myth does not mean “not true,” which is the common misunderstanding; it actually refers to things that are always true!  

Jesus’ first incarnate life, his passing over into death, and his resurrection into the ongoing Christ life is the archetypal model for the entire pattern of creation. He is the microcosm for the whole cosmos, or the map of the whole journey.  

Resurrection is Messy

A short sermon from inside a men’s prison

NADIA BOLZ-WEBERAPR 9

When it was evening on that day, the first day of the week, and the doors were locked where the disciples were, for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you.” After he said this, he showed them his hands and his side. Then the disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord. – John 20

I’ve been thinking about scars a lot this week. And how much of my life I spent trying to hide mine. I would use concealer on the scars on my face from all the surgeries I had as a kid. Most of my torso is covered in stretch marks from gaining 70 whole pounds when I was pregnant. So, 2-piece swim-suits were not my friend. And I always thought that scar on my knee was pretty gross– the one I got before getting clean and sober when I was drunk and thought riding my motorcycle on icy streets was a really smart thing to do on a Tuesday in February.

And those are just the scars I have on the outside, if you know what I mean.

I thought of this all week when reading this story about Jesus appearing to his disciples. Because what I realized is I find it comforting that that his resurrection did not erase the marks of having lived his life or even having endured his death.

I find it comforting that when Jesus rose from the dead he was recognizable by his scars. 

The band The Hold Steady has some perfect lyrics for the messiness of resurrection, 

She crashed into the Easter Mass with her hair done up in broken glass. She was limping left on broken heels. When she said ‘Father can I tell your congregation how resurrection really feels?’

Jesus came and stood among his disciples and said peace be with you, then he didn’t try and hide the mark from the spear on his side.  He didn’t wear gloves to conceal his scars.  Jesus came and stood among his disciples and said peace be with you then he showed them his hands and his side.

He knew that he would be known by his wounds.

And isn’t that true for us as well? We can only really know and be known when we show our scars. I never really feel a connection to someone until they have shared with me the lumpy, broken, petty, parts of themselves. I may be inspired by the virtue and accomplishments of others, but I only feel less alonewhen someone shares their failures with me, the parts of themselves that have been hurt. As Beyonce says, show me your scars and I won’t walk away.

Scars are like the metabolized remains of our wounds.  And as you know, they can be physical and emotional. If your mom left when you were young, you will always be someone whose mom left when you were young. There will always be a mark on you in the place that was hurt by that loss.

I will never be someone who was not a chronically ill child.  Those scars never leave. It doesn’t work like that. And everything that has happened to you has happened to your bodies. Every act of violence, every moment of pleasure. Every hateful thing we have said or which has been said to us has happened to our bodies. Every kindness, every sorrow. Every ounce of laughter.

We carry all of it with us in some form or another. We are walking embodiments of our entire story. The scars from that aren’t optional, but the shame is.

Being an Easter people — a people of resurrection — is not to be cleansed from all harm, and it is not to have all the bad things that we have done or that have happened to us erased. Resurrection is not about rewriting our past or forgetting what happened. I wish that’s how it worked but it just isn’t. Because (as many preachers before me have said) resurrection is not reversal.

The things that happened to Jesus’ body — the state sanctioned violence, the flogging, the crucifixion — remained even after he defeated death and rose from the grave. He still bore the marks of that pain, but the pain was not what defined him.

And if you think about it, his resurrection tracks with the messiness of the rest of the ministry.  Jesus  went about the countryside turning water to wine, eating with all the wrong people, casting out demons, angering the religious establishment. He touched the unclean and used spit and dirt to heal the blind and said crazy things like “the first shall be last and the last shall be first”, and “sell all you have and give it to the poor and pray for those who persecute you”. (Or as we like to say here, pray for those who prosecute you).

And the thing that really cooked people’s noodles wasn’t the question “is Jesus like God” it was “what if God is like Jesus”.  What if God is not who we thought?  What if the most reliable way to know God is not through religion, not through a reward and punishment program, but through a person. What if the most reliable way to know God is to look at how God chose to reveal God’s self in Jesus, even in Jesus’ wounds.  

Because that changes everything.  If what we see in Jesus is God’s own self revealed, then what we are dealing with here is a God who is very different than how I would be if I were God. In Jesus we see a God who would rather die than be in the sin accounting business anymore.  A God who does not lift a finger to condemn those who crucified him, but went to the depths of Hell rather than be separated even from his betrayers. A God unafraid to get his hands dirty for the ones he loves. This is the God who raised Jesus from the grave — still wounded and who chose a woman with a past to tell everyone else about it.

I guess what I am saying is don’t believe the paintings of the resurrection — where Jesus is all cleaned up and shiny, like nothing bad really happened.

If you think that’s what resurrection looks like, if you think it looks like perfection and therefore it is out of reach, if you think the only sign of God bringing new life is the absence of pain or failure and therefore you haven’t experienced it, you might be wrong. 

That’s the point.

Our scars and our sorrow will always be part of our story but they will never be the conclusion of our story. Which means that even when you feel trapped in your pain, trapped in your past, trapped in your own story like it is itself a tomb, know this — that there is no stone that God cannot roll away.

Happy Easter, friends.

(sermon preached in The Beacon at Skyline Correctional Facility chapel in Canyon City Colorado)

Presbyterian pastor Rachel Srubas writes of the paradox at the heart of Good Friday and the three-day “triduum” of Holy Week:  

Jesus anticipated his arrest, passion, and entombment, calling this triduum “three days and three nights … in the heart of the earth,” and likening it to the prophet Jonah’s journey “in the belly of the sea monster” (Matthew 12:40). Thomas Merton, the brilliant contemplative writer of the twentieth century … also wrote of Jonah (or as Merton and others have called him, Jonas). In The Sign of Jonas, … Merton said, “It was when Jonas was traveling as fast as he could away from Nineveh, toward Tharsis, that he was thrown overboard and swallowed by a whale who took him where God wanted him to go…. Even our mistakes are eloquent, more than we know.” [1] 

A sense of sacred irony, of eloquent mistakes, has for centuries enabled Christians to call the Friday of Jesus’ tortuous execution “good.” This is not a matter of putting a happy spin on a grisly, unjust tragedy. Good Friday, and all Christian life, is about embracing paradox. Jesus’ teachings and his death reveal sacred contradictions. The truth that you and I may try to avoid, the pain we’re loath to face, point the way toward our freedom from captivating lies that perpetuate our suffering. When you and I embrace Jesus’ essential paradox—that to lose is to gain and to die is to live—we come to God, who gathers up the broken pieces of the world and makes them more complete and beautiful than they were before they broke. God integrates all fractious dualities into the wholeness of life that Christians call eternal salvation. It’s a life we get to live here and now, by grace and faith. It’s the life toward which Lent has always pointed.  

Like Father Richard, Srubas considers the cross a “collision of opposites” that leads us deeper into reality and the presence of God:  

Following his jubilant entry into Jerusalem (which Christians celebrate on Palm Sunday), Jesus told his disciples, “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. Very truly, I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit” (John 12:23b–24). Pay attention to that pivotal unless and understand: without the fatal fall, no glorious resurrected life can be lived.  

From this divine paradox, it follows that there can be no compassion without passion, no responsive loving-kindness unless there first comes suffering. Until God ultimately mends all of creation’s broken pieces, there will come suffering.…  

“You will know the truth,” Jesus said to those who trusted him, “and the truth will make you free” (John 8:32). By his clear-eyed honesty, Jesus revealed holy, ironic wholeness. Denying pain would intensify it but facing hard facts of life and death would lead people deep into reality, the only place where God eternal can be found.  

________________________________________________

Sarah Young

My Savior-God, I long for the absence of problems in my life, but I realize this is an unrealistic goal. Shortly before Your crucifixion, You told Your followers candidly: “In this world you will have trouble.” I’m thankful I can look forward to an eternity of problem-free living, reserved for me in heaven. I rejoice in this glorious inheritance, which no one can take away from me. Teach me to wait patiently for this promised perfection rather than seeking my heaven here on earth. Lord, help me to begin each day anticipating problems—asking You to equip me for whatever difficulties lie ahead. The best equipping is Your living Presence, Your hand that never lets go of mine. Discussing my problems with You frees me to take a more lighthearted view of trouble—seeing it as a challenge that You and I together can handle. Please remind me again and again that You are on my side and You have overcome the world! In Your conquering Name, Jesus, Amen

JOHN 16:33; I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world

PSALM 73:23 NKJV; Nevertheless I am continually with You; You hold me by my right hand. 24 You will guide me with Your counsel, And afterward receive me to glory.

PHILIPPIANS 4:13 NKJV;  I can do all things through [ a]Christ who strengthens me. 

ROMANS 8:31;What then shall we say in response to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us?

Young, Sarah. Jesus Listens (p. 102). Thomas Nelson. Kindle Edition.

Father Richard describes the sign of Jonah as the pattern of death and resurrection that each of us must walk, as Jesus did:  

This “hearing and keeping” of the Word of God is brilliantly illustrated by what appears to be a central metaphor for Jesus: “the sign of Jonah” (Luke 11:29–30). He says it is the only sign that he will give! (Take note, seekers of miracles, apparitions, and healings).  

He seems willing to offend the “even bigger” crowd in front of him and says it is an “evil generation that wants signs,” something I myself would be afraid to say. Yet it is clear that Jesus is now clarifying the core of his message, the mystery of faith. Augustine later called it the “paschal mystery” and it is celebrated at every Eucharist: “Christ has died, Christ is risen, Christ will come again.”  

Without the sign of Jonah—the pattern of new life only through death (“in the belly of the whale”)—Christianity remains a largely impotent ideology, another way to “win” instead of the pain of faith. Or it becomes a language of ascent instead of the treacherous journey of descent that characterizes Jonah, Jeremiah, Job, John the Baptizer, and Jesus. After Jesus, we Christians used the metaphor “the way of the cross,” though unfortunately, it became “what Jesus did to save us”—or a negative theology of atonement—instead of the necessary pattern that is redemptive for all of us. Jesus became the cosmic problem-solver instead of the teacher of the path.  

This one great path has also been honored within traditions of Eastern religions: Taoism, yin and yang philosophy, the detachment of Buddhism, and Shiva, the Hindu god of destruction and regeneration. The Jonah-Job-Jesus pattern has been hard for Westerners to recognize and accept, since we are always into ascending and continual progress. But the sign of Jonah is at the heart of the matter. [1] 

In The Sign of Jonas, Thomas Merton (1915–1968) writes of the universal symbolism of the Jonah story, revealed in the imagination of children: 

Frater John of God got a lot of kids’ pictures from a sister in a school somewhere in Milwaukee…. Most of them were of Jonas in or near the whale. They are the only real works of art I have seen in ten years, since entering Gethsemani. But it occurred to me that these wise children were drawing pictures of their own lives. They knew what was in their own depths. They were putting it all down on paper before they had a chance to grow up and forget. They were proving … that there is something in the very nature of [humans] that expects a Redeemer and resurrection from the dead. The sign of Jonas is written in our being. No wonder that this should be so when all creation is a vestige of the Creator but also contains, written everywhere, in symbols, the economy of our Redemption. [2]  

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Sarah Young

Supreme Lord Jesus, I want to trust You enough to let things happen without constantly striving to predict or control the outcome. Sometimes I just need to relax—and refresh myself in the Light of Your everlasting Love. Even though Your Love-Light never dims, I’m often unaware of Your radiant Presence. I realize that when I focus on the future, mentally rehearsing what I will do or what I will say, I’m seeking to be self-sufficient. This attempt to be adequate without Your help is a subtle sin—so common that it usually slips past me unnoticed. Lord, teach me to live more fully in the present, depending on You moment by moment. I don’t need to fear my inadequacy; instead, I can rejoice in Your abundant sufficiency! You are training me to seek Your Face continually, even when I feel competent to handle things by myself. Instead of dividing my life into things I can do by myself and things that require Your help, I want to learn to rely on You in every situation. As I live in trusting dependence on You, I can face each day confidently and enjoy Your loving Presence. In Your loving Name, Amen

PSALM 37:5 HCSB; Commit your way to the Lord; trust in Him, and He will act,

PHILIPPIANS 4:19 NKJV; And my God shall supply all your need according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus

PSALM 105:4 NASB; Seek the Lord and His strength; Seek His face continually.

PHILIPPIANS 4:13 NLT; For I can do everything through Christ, who gives me strength. 

Young, Sarah. Jesus Listens (p. 101). Thomas Nelson. Kindle Edition.

In Holy Week, we know that resurrection and hope are on their way, but not before we face with Jesus the despair of betrayal, abandonment, and death. Brother John of Taizé compares Jesus’ passion to Jonah’s experience of the deep sea:  

Jesus is brought to the lowest place, that place where the all-loving God seems infinitely distant. He enters a universe of utter solitude, meaninglessness, and fragmentation. Like the prophet Jonah, he is overwhelmed by chaos: “You cast me into the deep, into the heart of the sea, and the flood surrounded me; all your billows and waves have submerged me … The waters closed over me; the deep engulfed me” (Jonah 2:3, 5; Matthew 12:39–40).  

Does this mean that hope has been extinguished once and for all? Is the mission of Jesus a failure? [1] 

For CAC faculty emerita Cynthia Bourgeault, the passion of Jesus reveals a wisdom that enables us to “turn the tide” from despair to empowerment in our own lives: 

The passion is really the mystery of all mysteries, the heart of the Christian faith experience. By the word “passion” here we mean the events which end Jesus’s earthly life: his betrayal, trial, execution on a cross, and death.…  

So much bad, manipulative, guilt-inducing theology has been based on it that it’s fair to wonder whether there is any hope of starting afresh. I believe wisdom does open up that possibility. The key lies in … reading Jesus’s life as a sacrament: a sacred mystery whose real purpose is not to arouse empathy but to create empowerment. In other words, Jesus is not particularly interested in increasing either your guilt or your devotion, but rather, in deepening your personal capacity to make the passage into unitive life…. 

[Jesus] certainly lived in a very intense way the ordeals of betrayal, abandonment, homelessness, and death. Did it have to be like that? If he were indeed here on a divine mission, it would seem that he could have been given an easier career path: chief priest, political leader, the Messiah that people expected him to be…. But none of these opportunities materialized. Why not? Because the path he did walk is precisely the one that would most fully unleash the transformative power of his teaching. It both modeled and consecrated the eye of the needle [DM team: or the belly of the whale] that each one of us must personally pass through in order to accomplish the “one thing necessary” here, according to his teaching: to die to self. I am not talking about literal crucifixion, of course, but I am talking about the literal laying down of our “life,” at least as we usually recognize it. Our only truly essential human task here, Jesus teaches, is to grow beyond the survival instincts of the animal brain and egoic operating system into the kenotic joy and generosity of full human personhood. His mission was to show us how to do this. [2]  

Richard Rohr and CAC teacher James Finley discuss why the Jonah story has been transformational for them:  

Richard: I’m just haunted by this story. It’s true on fifty-five levels. Running from God in spite of yourself, being thrown in the belly of the beast and discovering God. It’s all of us, it’s every person. Here again is the theme of coming to God by doing it wrong, not by doing it right. For years, I collected every image of Jonah in the belly of the whale that I could. It’s amazing how many there are. How about you, Jim?  

Jim: Something that strikes me about [the Jonah story] is at the very end. He’s this reluctant prophet, and he bears witness, and all of Nineveh follows his message. And he goes up on a mountain because he went through all this trouble being swallowed by a whale and so on, and he’s sitting there waiting for God to rain fire from heaven, and God doesn’t do it. A bush comes up and grows over Jonah to shelter him from the sun and a worm comes and kills the bush. And Jonah complains to God that the sun’s so hot that the bush died. God says, “Jonah, you’re angry because the worm ate the bush and yet you want me to kill all these people who are my children.” One translation of Jonah says, “Don’t you know me, Jonah, that I’m mercy within mercy within mercy?” I love that ending: God the all-merciful. [1] 

Dominican priest and poet Paul Murray considers how Jonah’s journey of transformation is one that all of us must undergo:  

Our own minds and hearts are more like Jonah’s than we care to admit. And that is why like Jonah we need, in the spiritual life, to be shocked and shaken out of certain fixed ways of thinking and feeling. We need to begin to recognize God in places where we would never, perhaps, have suspected [God’s] presence before, and not only in the big city or in the places of our enemies, but also in the many seemingly banal and bizarre circumstances of our lives.   But to learn this lesson, really to learn it, we need, like Jonah, to undergo the grace and mystery of bewilderment. Of course, we need many other graces as well—for example, the grace to sit still, the grace to meditate, and the grace and the energy to work for peace and to fight for justice. But, sometimes, it is only in the midst of the “tempest,” in the heart of a storm of circumstances which we can’t control, that we come finally to realize something of the wonderful mystery of God and realize also how far beyond anything we can imagine or hope for are [God’s] plans both for ourselves and for the entire world.

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Sarah Young

Magnificent Jesus, You are the Light of the world! Because I am Your follower, I will not walk in darkness but will have the Light of Life. Although there is much darkness in this world, I always have access to You. So I am never in utter darkness. The trail before me often looks shadowy, especially as it disappears into the future. I would love for it to be floodlit so I could anticipate what’s ahead. But the truth is, You are enough! You are with me continually, and You also go before me—illuminating the way. All I need to do is trust You and follow the Light You provide. Even when the path before me is dimly lit, Your illumination is sufficient for me to find my way forward step by step. Someday I will be with You in heaven, where I will see Your Light in all its Glory! Darkness will be a thing of the past, and I’ll be able to see everything clearly. The Bible assures me there will be no more night. I will not need the light of a lamp or of the sun, for You will give me Light—beyond anything I can imagine! In Your brilliant Name, Amen

JOHN 8:12 ESV; Again, Jesus spoke to them, saying, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness but will have the light of life.”

PROVERBS 4:18; The path of the righteous is like the morning sun, shining ever brighter till the full light of day.

REVELATION 22:5; There will be no more night in the city, and they will have no need for the light of a lamp or of the sun.

Young, Sarah. Jesus Listens (p. 99). Thomas Nelson. Kindle Edition.

The Only Sign Jesus Offers

Jesus said, “No sign will be given except the sign of Jonah.” —Matthew 12:39 

Father Richard considers what Jesus meant when he promised “the sign of Jonah”: 

This strong one-liner of Jesus feels rather amazing and largely unheard. He even says it is an “evil age” that wants anything other than the simple sign of the prophet Jonah. He says it is the “only sign” that he will give.  

This is indeed unsatisfying. For it is not a sign at all, but more an anti-sign. It demands that we release ourselves into the belly of darkness before we can know what is essential. It insists that the spiritual journey is more like giving up control than taking control. It might even be saying that others will often throw us overboard, and that we get to the right shore by God’s grace more than right action on our part. It is clearly a very disturbing and unsatisfying sign.  

Faith is precisely no-thing. It is nothing we can prove in order to be right, or use to get anywhere else. If we want something to believe in (which is where we all must start), we had best begin as Christians with clear ground, identity, and boundaries. But that is not yet faith! That is merely securing the foundations for our own personal diving board. 

Faith is the leap into the water, now with the lived experience that there is One who can and will catch us—and lead us where we need to go. Religion, in some sense, is a necessary first half of life phenomenon. Faith is much more possible in the second half of life, not necessarily chronologically but always spiritually. To paraphrase Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard (1813–1855), “Life must be lived forward, but it can only be understood backward.” [1] Jonah knew what God was doing, and how God does it, and how right God is—only afteremerging from the belly of the whale. Until he has first endured the journey, the darkness, the spitting up on the right shore—all in spite of his best efforts to avoid these very things—Jonah has no message whatsoever to give. Jonah is indeed a symbol of transformation. Jesus had found the Jonah story inspiring, no doubt, because it described almost perfectly what was happening to him. [2] 

Much of my earlier work with men and spirituality was teaching them how to trust their time in the belly of the whale, how to stay there without needing to fix, to control, or even to fully understand it, and to wait until God spit them up on a new shore. It is called “liminal space,” and I believe all in-depth transformation takes place inside of liminal space. To hope too quickly is to hope for the wrong thing. The belly of the whale is the great teaching space, and thus it is no surprise that Jesus said this was the only sign he was going to give (Luke 11:30). [3] 

Fleeing the Call

At the CAC’s CONSPIRE conference in 2018, faculty member Barbara Holmes shared her own personal “Jonah story”: 

There is a crisis of disobedience when we choose to disobey God’s will for our lives. In this instance, I think of Jonah…. He thinks he’s right. He hates the Assyrians, and understandably so. After all, they were a marauding, land-grabbing nation, a real threat to Israel. He had national pride. He wanted to see them destroyed. And so, when he gets the call from God, he travels 2,500 miles to the southern area of Spain. He couldn’t get much further away. Why does he flee? He flees, he says at the end of chapter four, because he knows God is merciful. There is no worse situation than a merciful God when you want to see your enemies get what’s coming to them. Jonah wants to do things his way and ends up in the belly of a sea monster.   

Do you have a Jonah story? I do. From the age of ten through my twenties, I knew I had a call of God on my life. Through dreams, waking visions, and moments of surprising attunement with the Divine, I knew God was calling me. But here I am, a ten-year-old girl, with a call to something I don’t understand. I’d never seen a woman in ministry. For that matter, I’d never seen a woman leading in any spiritual capacity. So, what to do?  

Well, what I did was I went on with my life. I got married, had two children, and after a decade heard the call again even more strongly. This time I turned my head to where I thought God lived (up there) and I said, “Excuse me, sir, or ma’am”—I wanted to cover my bases—“I don’t know if you know about the divorce, but I have two children and I’ve got to feed them and ministers make no money. So, if you don’t mind, I’m going to law school.” [1] 

It took time, but Holmes eventually said “yes” to God’s call. She encourages listeners to remain open and faithful to God’s invitations to serve:  

As I was standing at graduation from law school, I heard a voice say to me, “This isn’t it.” And I kind of startled, and I said to my girlfriend who was standing in line with me to get our degrees, “I just heard a voice say, ‘This is not it.’” And she started laughing. She said, “Well, you sure have wasted a lot of time.”…

There was nothing to do but hear the whispering, continue my practices. And I now allow life to lead me to the precipice of the newness that was already seeded in my life…. 

Trust God, trust Holy Spirit to lead you into all truth. Make your intention clear, that yes, you will follow as called, without exception. Just make your intention known to God and wait for the Holy Spirit to lead you into the fulfillment of your vocation. [2] 

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Today’s Secondary Devo by Joni Eareckson Tada)

We Always Carry

. . . We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body. For we who are alive are always being given over to death for Jesus’ sake, so that his life may be revealed in our mortal body. So then, death is at work in us, but life is at work in you. — 2 CORINTHIANS 4:10 – 12

Today’s verse could sound a little morbid. We always carry around in our body Christ’s death? We are always being given over to death for Jesus’ sake?! A hearty and happy yes! Why happy? Because then — and only then — can the vibrant, joyful life of our Savior be revealed through us. And his life is revealed in us for God’s glory, our eternal advantage, and others’ benefit. We carry around Jesus’ death when we daily die to sin in the same way he died for sin. It means not taking a casual greeting like “How are you doing?” as an excuse to list every minor and major casualty of your day. Not using your prayer group time as an excuse to gossip. Not painting a picture of your marriage that colors your spouse as the culprit and you the hero. Not living like a martyr and making sure everybody else knows it. These are ordinary, yet important ways of putting your flesh to death with its itchiness to rebel. Oh, to die to sin in the same selfless, patient manner as Jesus on his cross! Oh, if we could only see that refusing sin benefits others around us (just as Jesus was thinking of us on his cross). Then his life would be revealed in us — his profound peace, effervescent joy, and enduring hope. Jesus, I need the power of your resurrection to help me “die to sin” today. Help me to see how “carrying your death” will result in a livelier life for me . . . and deep encouragement for others around me.

Tada, Joni Eareckson. Pearls of Great Price (pp. 150-151). Zondervan. Kindle Edition.