Resurrection

We arrived at the beach this Easter morning just before sunrise, just a dozen of us. We spread blankets on the ground, talked a little about the resurrection and the power thereof, shared communion and prayed together. The beach was on the bay, rather than out on the open ocean, so there were only the gentlest of waves lapping up on the sandy beach, and we could see land on the horizon beyond the water.

For some reason I thought of the story of Jesus grilling fresh fish on the shores of Lake Galilee for the disciples, and I wanted that, too. Do you reckon Jesus had a good recipe for grilled fish fillets? As we took communion and celebrated his submission to death and his utter, absolute, unquestionable conquest and mastery over it, I really wanted to eat what he ate and drank what he drank. I’m on a really restrictive diet right now, hoping it will help in some small way, at least, to fight the cancer, but fish is one of the mainstays of the diet. Karen and Emmy both do a really good job of making it interesting, but I really like the idea of tasting what Jesus has prepared.

And of course, how can you watch the sun rising and the waves lapping and hear even the most abbreviated version of the resurrection story while wrapped up in your own prospect of imminent mortality and not desire right now a taste of his power over death and the grave?

When Jesus rose, it didn’t right then end death for all of us, of course – not in the literal, physical sense that it ended death for him. But it was a proof and a promise that his victory over death does ultimately mean our victory over death as well. He proved it by healing the sick, by raising the dead and finally by raising himself up from the grave, eating fish with his friends, and rising triumphantly into the clouds with a promise that he would return. He promised that death is the final enemy that shall be destroyed. All the healings and resurrections recorded in the New Testament are just samples, foretastes, appetizers, temporary reprieves here and now to remind and encourage us that what we have here only as an appetizer will there be a glorious gourmet buffet without measure or limit.

Somehow, sitting there on the countless grains of sand, watching the perennial rising of the sun over the endlessly lapping waves on Easter morning, it’s easy to believe that God is the quencher of anything that threatens to quench the eternal life he has given me, and it’s easy to believe that he will offer me now, like he offered the lepers and Lazarus, a foretaste of his death-quenching life.

Now, to totally break the mood, for those of you who recall my youngest son Jake as a blond, here’s the latest picture of him. He got a friend to dye his hair black this week, just for a change of pace.