In gratitude for Easter realizations
I spent time visiting with Jesus March 24, 2016. It was Holy Thursday, and as we usually do, we had adoration time set aside until midnight, to spend an hour with Jesus and not to fall asleep like the disciples.
The weather was cooperative. The snow and ice kept many away. So it was that I was relatively alone in church with only a kindred spirit or two respecting our space as Jesus and I visited. I will share some of the thoughts we shared.
The first thoughts were about a book I am working on about dying. God thought it would be good to have this around funeral homes to console people who had just lost a loved one. I got excited about how Easter impacts on this particular scene.
What consolation and joy for a family to reflect on. Jesus left his followers so that He could send the Spirit and work wonderfully with this new love. After His Resurrection Jesus could appear to us through closed doors. He could be everywhere we were and we could better understand the greatest mysteries of His presence.
The Holy Eucharist on this day, Holy Thursday, was a game changer. That’s why every year my mother had us wear our best suits to the celebration on this night when the Mass and the priesthood and the Holy Eucharist were instituted.
We shared about our angels who look after us when we are approaching death, like Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane. And then the messages started coming through to me. As I said, we had a good meeting.
Our guilt and fears are gone. “I have come so that you may have life and have it more abundantly” John 10:10. The devil tries to steal our lives away, but he is no match for Jesus and the life of Jesus in us. The Eucharist is a game changer.
Easter is the end to all longing, loneliness, angst, wanting – God has kissed us, creation, and left His mark. His kingdom will come. We will meet face to face with God (I call Jesus God, but that’s OK). Then we will thank God for the gifts of children, spouses, friends, family, love, creation!
Thank you God for innocence, for all the times Jesus is there for us. Thank you for angels, and for creativity. Thanks for creativity and thousands of ideas; for Art and music. For prayer and visiting with Jesus who strengthens and inspires us and blesses us in countless ways.
Thanks: For letting us touch the hem of His garment and the healing we receive – spiritually and physically. For letting us be Christ to others. For giving us hope that God’s Kingdom is coming. For the understanding of mysteries and the Communion of Saints.
For the oneness of being in love in marriage. For Jesus in us. For celibates who experience oneness with God in a special way.
For the efficacy of pain and suffering which redeem us and in turn help us redeem others. For sickness and wasting away in terminal illness which makes us ready to leave this wonderful earth.
Easter lifts us from the despair of death. Our death is our Easter experience, our remaking into new life where darkness is replaced by light, by the Light of Christ. Let the angel of God roll back the big stone in our lives so that we can see the empty tomb where our despair used to dwell.
“To see a World in a Grain of Sand
And a Heaven in a Wild Flower,
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand
And Eternity in an hour.” (William Blake)
(614 words)
