Categories: uncategorized
Date: 27 March 2005 16:13:33
The "raw" feeling I've had since counselling this week has continued into Easter. As already mentioned, Good Friday was very moving - I was thinking today how throughout my Christian life I've had no problems relating to God the Father, God the Creator, God who's Out There as well as Right Here, and I actually found Jesus the person of the Trinity who was least knowable, least attainable, hardest to relate to. But this year, more than any other, I'm finding that I'm drawn again and again to the person of Jesus, whilst my previous certainties regarding life, the universe and God feel an awful lot more nebulous and intangible than they did before. Coupled with something that a number of people here have already blogged about regarding Easter Saturday, that the disciples didn't know the end of the story, and the hopelessness and bereavement that that would have brought, and that sense of not knowing God near, of isolation from God, that both the disciples watching Jesus die and Jesus Himself dying would have felt, have meant that Easter this year has been intensely moving, intensely personal, and I've related more to it than I have done for a long time.
So although today was wonderful, and I celebrated along with people throughout the world the resurrection and victory and grace of Jesus, I think I need to stay with Easter Saturday for a bit longer. I said a couple of days back after counselling that I wanted to move on but needed to stay for now with where I am in order to be able to more fully move on rather than leaving and then revisiting this place, and I think this is tied in with that. I don't know the end of my own story. All I know at the moment is the same disappointment, despair even, from circumstances and from unanswered questions, that the disciples must have felt when they saw their hopes, their dreams, their stories, nailed to that cross. I gain hope, even now, from knowing that, like the disciples, this isn't the end of my story, but I think I need to explore a little more those feelings of bereavement, of abandonment, and yet of still hanging on against all hope. We talked a little bit in counselling about getting angry with God - that's not something I want to do, but I do think I need to face the unanswered questions and at least ask them again. Thank God though that this isn't the end of my story, just like it wasn't the end of Jesus' story nor that of the disciples.