The Resurrection Puzzle

The Resurrection Puzzle

“They puzzled over that, wondering what on earth ‘rising from the dead’ meant.” Mark 9:10 (The Message)

Jesus had taken three disciples, Peter, James, and John up a high mountain. While they were with Him, his appearance changed, before their eyes. They saw the glory of God’s kingdom as even Jesus’ clothes shimmered, sparkling white, far whiter than any bleach could make them. While the disciples rubbed their eyes, mumbled without knowing what to say, Elijah and Moses appeared, talking with Jesus.

Peter blurted out, “Let’s build some shelters, quick! Three of them; one for You, Jesus and one for Moses, one for Elijah.” He actually had no idea what to say.

It all happened right before their eyes. This was no hallucination; the three disciples experience the same thing and heard the same words from God: “This is my Son, marked by my love. Listen to him.” (Mark 9:7) And then, as quickly as it had happened, it was over. The three men and Jesus stood alone high upon the mountain.

It is on the descent back that Jesus asked them to keep quiet about the experience. “Don’t tell a soul what you saw. After I rise from the dead, you’re free to talk.” Jesus was always cautious not to incite overly excitable crowds to try to crown Him an earthly king, or to revolt against the current rulers. But this is when the disciples really scratch their heads.

They believed in the rising from the dead, the just didn’t believe the Messiah would have to suffer and die. It is easy to forget that the first requirement for resurrection is death. Wouldn’t it be better if the Messiah appeared in kingly glory, marched right into Jerusalem and pulled the throne right out from under Herod, the present Jewish king?

Things weren’t much different then than they are now. Certainly Jesus could have whipped the crowds into a unified frenzy. Calling for Jerusalem to be inhabited only by Jews from now on, you could hear the crowd’s applause. “Believe me”, they hoped He would say, “We’re going to tear down the current scheme of things. Those career Pharisees and Sadducees need to be brought down to size!” Oh how Jesus could have played on mob mentality and led a revolt against the corrupt Jewish King and the ungodly occupying regime in Rome.

But Jesus would have none of that. This is a big reason the three disciples were so puzzled when Jesus talked about “rising from the dead.” Unfortunately, even his crucifixion, death and resurrection were not enough to rid the disciples of their desire for a political victory. Forty days after His resurrection, after spending time with them, and instructing them, Jesus prepares to ascend back to the Father.

Together for the last time the disciples ask, “Master, are you going to restore the kingdom of Israel now? Is this the time?”

“You don’t get to know the time,” Jesus responded. “That’s the Father’s business. What you’ll get is the Holy Spirit.” (Acts 1:6-8)

Eventually the disciples understood and began to share the Good News across the land. Though persecuted, sometimes imprisoned by their own people, other times attacked by Roman rulers, they continued to talk about Jesus who rose from the dead. They did not try to overthrow the current regimes because they were now members of a brand new kingdom: The Kingdom of God.

Is it possible we miss the same boat? Are we just as mistaken about how Jesus the Messiah runs His kingdom as they were? When Jesus rose from the dead, He did not summon His followers to march into Jerusalem to take down the government. Instead, He spent six weeks teaching His followers about the New Kingdom, exponentially different than any kingdoms on earth.

He pleads with us today, in the same way He did then. To state it as simply as possible, there are two primary “rules” of Jesus’ kingdom. Rule #1. Love God first, with every part of your being. Rule #2 is like it; Love your neighbor as yourself.

Stop and think about everything people are arguing about in today’s political environment. If you want to be a Jesus-follower, run every “cause” through these two filters, 1. Does this sound like truly loving God with all my being. 2. Does this sound like loving my neighbor as I love myself?

If anything, the resurrection of Jesus Christ demands we consider these questions. Come, Holy Spirit, create a new resolve among your people to love our God first and always, and to be known as people who sincerely love our neighbors, no matter their background. That is the way God’s Kingdom works!

See Her Better

See Her Better

(“If there are poor among you, in one of the towns of the land the Lord your God is giving you, do not be selfish or greedy toward them.  But give freely to them, and freely lend them whatever they need.” Deuteronomy 15:7-8)

What do I know, you know;
what have I seen behind the screen,
the half-closed eyes of the mother, (I assume)
the grandmother, (yes, once again)
those eyes, cleansed by the crying of endless
days sitting in the same spot above the boulevard
where passersby take the pedestrian bridge.
Yes, those eyes reddened by countless tears;
her face pulpy and sallow and barely seen.

On the Mexican winter she rides on the hopes
that those who know her will not miss her. We barely
see beauty of cascades tipping over rocky cliffs after
a month of walking by. So we see even less this
disturbance to our soul
after a week of crossing.

Does she pin her hopes on tourists in this fishing village
filled with spring breakers and old couple romance seekers?
Will they see her better, covered in her native best; hues
bleeding across the shawl and stopping at the holes worn by
constant wear? Or did they cut their budget so close that
dropping pesos in her cup means one night sober,
or one less souvenir?

Or perhaps, it is often true, there is enough left, but we
hear the religious impulse from our idols of self-advancement,
“You, get a job”. We are jesters in the court of
capital palaces and advancement.

But some, hearing the words of the better God, hear words
spoken to them, “Give. Do not let your left hand know
what your right hand has done.” And quietly,
they slip their hand inside their pockets, grab a wad of
what they will,
and slightly, and sleight of hand,
silent as they can, slide the bills into the cup
without breaking stride.

Milk, a roast, diapers, or one more week
with power; the hearts of an aged widow and
an unknown traveler meet once,
and only once. But again love has leapt
over hurdles and past benches of cultural inertia.

Matter

Matter

(“Tie them on your hands and wear them on your foreheads to help you remember my teachings.” Deuteronomy 6:8)

We need no further instruction, we are full, we are satisfied;
We do not need the signs along the boulevard, and please do not
bring them to my neighborhood.
My Life Matters: that’s all you need to know.

My Life Matters, but has never been mistaken for a felon.
My Life Matters, and I can trace my relatives back to tobacco and cotton farms,

bogs and peats before crossing in hope, the Great Blue.
My portage was paid, my travel discretionary.
My Life Matters: where would you be without me?

Your Life Matters? Of course, but only as it relates to me.
Your Life Matters: And your relatives crossed the same Tossing Sea, though
I grant you against their will. But the climate was better, and jobs awaited you
once you brought the right price at auction.
Your Life Matters: but I just don’t see why you are making such a fuss.
Weren’t you freed? Aren’t you living the Dream? I know the school
where you live sits like an abandoned air force base; sand in the bubblers,
weeds between the crumbling pavement cracks.

Black Lives Matter, and after letting time rush between our feet, the
river we never catch,
and after letting reason have sway over the reflexes that make our mouth
into a muttering mass of artillery rounds, we pause

And honor your suffering without cause.

We will only say All Lives Matter when we put, at the head of our line,
those forced to the back and beyond empathy’s reach. Until then

I (cannot speak for “we” now) will honor the Meaning of every
sorrow, every grief, every cloud that should not have perched above
the barrel of a gun too quickly squeezed by an officer of the Peace.

I will honor the Uniforms who embrace the best wisdom, who
sit at the feet of the inner city father long enough to hear,
who let themselves weep at another neighbor’s pain,
who, along with their tears, look humbly in the eyes
of a black man’s grief, and lead the amen, the rhythm
of brotherhood alive again, and can repeat the humble refrain,
the quiet unison above the foolish chatter;
“I understand now, and with you say, without doubt,
without deceit..

Black

Lives

Matter

And Perhaps

And Perhaps

(“Whoever wants to save his life will give up true life. But whoever gives up his life for me and for the Good News will have true life forever.” Mark 8:35)

Protective, my sentences are guarded;

defensive, my paragraphs precise;
wrestling, I accept few invitations;
guessing, my statements entice
more questions.

Few understand my occasional stutters,
unplanned conversation is quicksand.
Words are ammunition; mouths, keyboards,
pens and paper blaze with fiery offense
the surer I am

All the world is a neighborhood
and not
a conflagration of gangs and nations.

The poorer I am
of the certainties that
every earthly rubric
has a higher and conflicting rule
of peace by laying down our swords,
and taking up

Our neighbor’s plowshares, across the street,
the stream, the river, the border

And making matters worse

Expecting to speak well of life through dying,
that my best thoughts still keep me
one step inside the line

That Jesus would have me cross
in time to heaven’s tempo, at, perhaps
my own personal loss.

Beyond

Beyond

(“You are wonderful, Lord, and you deserve all praise, because you are much greater than anyone can understand.” Psalm 145:3)

It is not so much that I have waited too long,
or that you have been late in arriving (the very last thing
I would consider). It may even be that I waited to see
the unseeable. I listened like a recording technician,
faithful to the layers and bursts, the measures and rests,
as well as the melody the composer invented on paper.

And now, just as I was blind for looking too dimensional,
I must admit I was waiting as well for the unhearable.

Your light is not so dim that we only see its faint glow
against the darkest black on the market;
Your voice is not so faint that we only hear it when even
the crickets have lost their nerve.

Your light is higher, and, though the word is understood,
even the word does little good, and yet, I will say, you are

Brighter.

But it is not a matter of lumens or wavelength, it is our limited
perception. We see, and are blind. We point out the sparkle upon the river,
the diamonds overrunning the waterfall and the rainbow in the mist.
And, thinking we have seen it all, we measure glory, for which
there is no measure,
we measure glory a factor above the daylight cast upon our
favored view. We even saw what few others viewed.

Neither are you too faint for our human ears. We know by rote
that dogs can hear what we cannot. But your language comes
to be heard, sometimes by the singing bird, others the crash
of the river as it diverts its flow upon an ancient boulder in its path.

Those are surely your notes, your memos, the table of contents
for Creation’s greatest novel. And perhaps the silence is your language
full. For we confuse the silence with emptiness, and go searching for
another poet to sing our blues.

Beyond and above, greater and below, in radial love like
a circular embrace, what we do not hear may be the best of

All we have heard.