Thank You Very Sweet

“Preach the Resurrection!”   That is the one line that I remember the pastor saying during my ordination in 2008.  At the time I was just finishing Princeton Seminary and had gotten quite ‘heady’ regarding the Gospel.  I guess I’d just learned so much while I was at Princeton, I was looking for things that felt more concrete than life after death.

I’ve always loved Jesus.  And by the time I was graduating from Seminary, I was totally into the “historical Jesus;” Jesus as the revolutionary.  This man that we were still talking about more than 2000 years later  – he loved the unlovable, saw the outcast, touched the untouchable and he helped people believe that they mattered. He healed. I was into the Jesus that was so radical that he was a threat.  The government had to kill him in a public and vile way because he was empowering too many people.

This Jesus of mine was so loved that after he died people thought they saw him again, that’s how bad they wanted him back..

It wasn’t until Kesner died that I began to open. I was like a seed, buried deep in the ground.  My hard shell had to crack open so that my insides could reach up for something more nourishing. I wanted Kesner, and I could feel him.  Kesner wasn’t ever dead to me.  He isn’t.  He was there to help me find my car keys when I needed them.  When I shaved my head he whispered in my ear “natural is nice.” I felt his presence behind me when I cried.  And today when I laugh and dance he is here.

If Kesner is here – How much more is the Son of GOD!

Today I choose to wonder about all of this.  I don’t understand it and I don’t have to.  By believing that this is possible – That Jesus, this great revolutionary,  could be killed and then rise again in three days –  I remain in a state of awe over the magnificent power of God.  If this is not true, then God is somehow limited.

My God has no limits.

I WILL preach the Resurrection! And I will invite you to wonder about it with me. I will invite you to be in Awe with me- hoping that the sense of wonder and awe resurrects something in you,

as it has in me.

Several years ago I had a dream.  I don’t dream very often. I was on a stage like Joel Osteen, I was preaching the Gospel in a large open space – and I was on television too, just like Joel.  But when I looked out at the people, they were not in chairs..

They were on yoga mats.

The Holy Writings say, “No eye has ever seen or no ear has ever heard or no mind has ever thought of the wonderful things God has made ready for those who love Him.” – 1 Corinthians 2:9

A friend quoted this scripture and gave it to me in a card when I graduated from Seminary.

I choose to wonder about it all.