The Journey Begins . . .

Or, at least, this phase of the journey begins.....

I sit here, at my computer, in the wee hours of the day we celebrate the empty tomb, imagining the women who discovered the entrance -

open,
stone rolled away,
Jesus . . . . gone!

I can only imagine the miriad of questions, the anguish, the fear, that was felt on this day over 2000 years ago. I find myself asking:

Did they not remember the words he had told them?
Did they truly believe that the story would end with the theft of a body?
How could they not, after all the time they spent with him, believe?
Where was their faith?

Hmmm - hindsight is always 20/20, isn't it? Of course (I tell myself in a pretty puffed up tone) I would have recognized that what Jesus told his followers, what Jesus told me, was being fulfilled. However, as I reflect upon this scene, I find myself asking - truly, would I have been any different? Would I have been filled with any fewer questions? Would I have been filled with any less fear? I don't think so.

I think the account of the women's reaction at the empty tomb is teaching us that questioning is okay - that in our questioning, in our apparent disbelief, we eventually live into the truth. I think that questioning is a very real and valid part of life, and, of faith. I recently read the following quote by German poet Rainer Maria Rilke:

"I beg you . . . to have patience with everything unresolved in your heart and to try to love the questions themselves . . . And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps, then, someday in the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answers."

We should not be afraid to question. We should not be afraid to wrestle with things that don't make sense, and sometimes, with things that do make sense. Questioning does not make us any less of a person, Christian, spouse/partner, parent, sibling, child, friend, citizen . . . . the list could go on forever. Questioning is healthy, questioning helps us grow.

So - this is where this phase of my journey beings . . . in the wee wee hours of Easter morn, discovering the empty tomb, and pondering. I am living the quesitons and hoping, someday, I just may live my way into some of the answers.