After Resurrection
So... that happened... now what?
I have a love affair with Thursdays. Like I wake up with a palpable joy. Sometime around 10th grade, I decided it was my favorite day of the week, and I never looked back.
In high-school, Thursdays had it all: almost no tests, volleyball practice was light because of Friday’s big game, and I was so deliciously close to the weekend I could taste it.
This appreciation has followed me over the years. In college, my Thursday walks to class had more oxygen, more color, and more promise. It’s been our date night through dating, early marriage, babies, pandemics, and hard years. My most courageous decisions have been made on a Thursday. All these years, all the weeks, my love has not waned.
Thursdays, even the bad ones, are better simply because they’re Thursdays.
Why?
Because it’s the day of the week I find the most hope. Everything worth looking forward to is ahead. And then the weekend comes, and worse- Monday. I never did quite get the hang of appreciating the events I’ve looked forward to more than the anticipation.
So what happens after the things you have fixed your eyes on is behind you? After you get the thing you’ve been longing for, or the answer you’ve been waiting for, or the miracle beyond your imagination?
I lost sleep wondering about this all week - I’m not kidding. I can’t stop thinking of everyone who followed Jesus to the end. When I woke up this morning I immediately started pouring over the end of each of the Gospels, desperate to know what happens in the “after” of the resurrection. We know, I guess, historically what came of the elation and worship post- resurrection (hello, early church). But I am also interested in the details we may never know.
What a week for them. One day they’re drinking wine and eating together, the next they’re crying in their beds because the unthinkable just happened. Left with no tangible answers, but potentially a ton of grief, and moments of doubt. They had to rub the sleep out of their eyes in the morning and try to explain to their families what happened. All while thinking in the back of their head… did that just happen?! And then the dude they LITERALLY WATCHED DIE shows up at breakfast? Shows up on walks on the road? How do you ever top that?!
I wonder: did they question their sanity, even in their awe?
They all went back to their same houses, but with different hearts?
They had dinner with their family, but were they understood?
Did they have a twinge of grief any time they saw a fish or a cup of wine?
Did they laugh as they shared stories?
Did they live with nostalgia until they met a similar fate, or was the after Jesus even better than the during?
Did it feel like the pinnacle that we see it as now? Did hope feel accomplished, or did it feel like it was still ahead of them? And when they were alone again with their thoughts, did it feel like Thursday? Or is the week after resurrection Sunday the Monday-est week in all of history?
I’m writing this on a Thursday because after mediating and wondering the last few days, I am hoping I can experience something new this week. I’m hoping I can carry some of the inspiration and wonder into the weekend, into the coming weeks. That what I bring with me from Easter maybe is more than a family picture or even a sweet celebration.
I’d like to bring some of the awe into the after.
Maybe there’s as much for me to witness today as there was yesterday. Let there be hope ahead, even when I’m reeling. Give me the courage to welcome joy in the before, the during, and the after. Help me share the miraculous moments without reservation. Help me believe you are there in the disorienting grief and unbelievable joy. Let the hope ahead be evidence of what has already been done.
Amen
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