Read: John 20:1-18

Then Peter and the other disciple set out and went toward the tomb. The two were running together, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first. He bent down to look in and saw the linen wrappings lying there, but he did not go in. Then Simon Peter came, following him, and went into the tomb. He saw the linen wrappings lying there, and the cloth that had been on Jesus’ head, not lying with the linen wrappings but rolled up in a place by itself. Then the other disciple, who reached the tomb first, also went in, and he saw and believed; for as yet they did not understand the scripture, that he must rise from the dead. Then the disciples returned to their homes (John 20:3-10, NRSV).

Resurrection. It’s a word we don’t use very often—except, perhaps, on Easter Sunday.

Literally, it means “stand up” or “stand again.” But none of the people who showed up at the tomb that first Easter morning expected to see Jesus “stand again.” A corpse just doesn’t do that.

Jesus, of course, is the main character in this passage, but the story is told in such a way that we see it unfold from the perspectives of three people who were close to him: Mary Magdalene, Peter, and “the other disciple, the one whom Jesus loved,” (aka John). As we see the story again through their eyes, I invite you to ask: which character do I identify with most closely? Who would I be if I could step back into the story of that first Easter morning?

Mary Magdalene sets the story in motion. She gets up at the crack of dawn. (One wonders if she’d slept at all.) She goes to the tomb while it’s still dark. What were her plans? To mourn, certainly. To weep, obviously. Perhaps, as two of the other gospels suggest, she brought spices with which to anoint Jesus’ body. That was a traditional practice back then, but Jesus’ burial had been so hasty, there had been no time to perform that last act of love.

How had she planned to roll away the heavy stone blocking the door to the tomb? Perhaps—like most of us when we are lost in grief—she had no specific plan. Maybe this was one of those “I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it” situations. In any case, when she got there, she saw that the stone had already been removed.

But for Mary, this was not good news. Her first thought is that graverobbers have been there before her. That’s what she tells Peter and John when she runs back to tell them the news. “They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we do not know where they have laid him.” Oh, no, she must have thought. I didn’t think things could get any worse, but now they have!

Now let’s follow Peter and “the other disciple” as they run to the tomb. John outruns Peter. He stoops down and sees the linen wrappings from Jesus’ body. Perhaps that sight is enough to confirm Mary’s story. In any case, he can’t bring himself to go in.

Peter finally catches up and, leaving John at the entrance, strides into the empty tomb. Empty, that is, except for the linen wrappings that John had seen. Oh—and this is curious. He sees “the cloth that had been on Jesus’ head, not lying with the linen wrappings but rolled up in a place by itself” (v. 7). What did he make of that?

As he is pondering this, John finally summons the courage to enter the tomb. He sees the exact same things that Peter sees, but for him, something “clicks.” I wonder if it was that carefully rolled up piece of linen that had been on Jesus’ head. It must have been important somehow, since the gospel writer saw fit to include it in the way he’s told the story.

What could it have meant to John in that moment? I wonder…did it seem out of place? It doesn’t fit with the “graverobber” theory, does it? What graverobber takes the time to carefully roll up the piece of linen covering the face of the corpse? That just doesn’t make sense. Unless…unless it wasn’t graverobbers. What if—no, it couldn’t be. But what if it was Jesus himself who rolled up that piece of linen. It would be the first thing one would do, after all, if….

We can’t know for sure that this was the detail that turned John’s despair into hope, but this is the point at which “he saw and believed.” And then—almost as an explanation of why he and Peter had been so slow to assume Jesus’ resurrection—the gospel writer adds these words: “For as yet they did not understand the scripture, that he must rise from the dead” (v. 9). In spite of all the hints from the psalms and the prophets, in spite of Jesus’ own candid predictions about how he would be killed and would rise again after three days (Mark 9:31-32), they were still surprised.

Can you blame them? No—I don’t think we can. And the fact that they were not expecting the resurrection gives credence to the story. It was a lot to take in. So, they did the only thing they could do in the wake of such a surprise. They went home to think about it.

Mary Magdalene is still there, however, weeping outside the tomb. Eventually, she works up the courage to bend down and look in. Two angels look back at her and ask, “Woman, why are you weeping?” They may be angels, but from Mary’s perspective, this must have seemed like a really stupid question. So she tells them, “They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him.” Notice that she’s still working off the “graverobber” theory.

Even when she turns around and sees Jesus himself standing there, she doesn’t know it’s Jesus. To see Jesus “standing again” is so far from her expectations that she doesn’t recognize him. When he asks her why she’s weeping (again with the dumb question!) and whom she’s looking for, she assumes he must be the gardener. Then she wonders if he—the gardener—has taken Jesus’ body, so she tries to convince him to give it back.

It’s not until Jesus—very much alive—says her name that she recognizes him. “Mary” he says—and she finally realizes that she has to entertain a new theory. Not graverobbers, but resurrection.

So, which character are you most drawn to in this surprising story?

Is it Mary, loyal to the last, but so lost in grief that she needs two angels and the risen Lord himself to awaken her hope?

Is it John—the beloved disciple—who is quick to run to the tomb, quick to assume the worst, but also quick to consider what the evidence is telling him—that Jesus might actually be alive.

Or is it Peter—slow but steady. Maybe it takes him a little longer to get to the tomb, and maybe it also takes him a while to arrive at the same conclusion John comes to. But we know he eventually believes. He gets there eventually.

Or perhaps you are simply yourself, standing somewhere on the edges of this story, wondering what to make of it all.

Wherever we find ourselves in relation to this story of the first Easter, we should not downplay how shocking it is. Resurrection is not something one expects. It is not “natural.” It is not “status quo.” If we have come to see it as such, it’s simply a sign that we have become numb to the central shock of the story: Jesus, who was dead, is alive again. And because he lives, we—and all creation—have the hope of “standing again” with him.

Today, as you consider the story of the resurrection, feel the shock of it. Consider the wonder of it. Celebrate the hope in it. And then, live the rest of your life in light of it. Because after resurrection, nothing can ever be the same.

Ponder: Do you believe in the resurrection? What difference does/will that make in your life?

Pray: Don’t give up on us, Lord Jesus, even when we are slow to understand that you are very much alive.

Read: John 12:9-19

The next day the great crowd that had come to the festival heard that Jesus was coming to Jerusalem. So they took branches of palm trees and went out to meet him, shouting, “Hosanna! Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord—the King of Israel!” (John 12:12-13, NRSV).

“Hosanna!” is one of those words that we only use once a year—and then only if we happen to be in church on Palm Sunday. Most of us assume that it’s some ancient synonym for “Hallelujah!” Of course, we’ve forgotten what that word means, too, so maybe it’s time we looked into what all the shouting is about.

“Hallelujah” is actually a mash-up of two Hebrew words that mean, “Praise God!” If you’re a stickler for accuracy, it’s a plural imperative, so it literally means, “Praise God, y’all!”

“Hosanna!” also traces back to two Hebrew words, but they mean, “Please—save!” In other words, this is an ancient way of crying for help. I guess that’s why you never see it without an exclamation point.

When you’re learning a new language, it’s usually wise to start with a handful of words or phrases that you might need in an emergency. Even before “please” and “thank you,” one really ought to memorize things like, “Where is the bathroom?” and “Help!” Even Google Translate may not be fast enough to meet your needs in some situations, after all.

The story of Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem is included in all four Gospels. In all of them, the episode follows stories of Jesus healing the sick. Only in the gospel of John does it also follow the story of the raising of Lazarus. I point this out because it gives John’s version of “Palm Sunday” even greater urgency. No wonder people were flocking to meet him and shouting, “Please, help!” Who wouldn’t want to get help from someone who had the power to raise you from the dead?

Of course, they also thought that he had real potential in other ways. They didn’t stop with “Please, help!” Drawing from Psalm 118 (a messianic psalm if ever there was one), they also shouted, “Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord!” Then they went on to call him the “King of Israel.” None of this went over well with the local authorities, who felt their power slipping away.

I find myself wondering what Jesus was thinking and feeling as he rode that borrowed donkey through the throng. I’m guessing he felt compassion, first of all. (These people needed even more help than they knew.) But I suspect he was also frustrated at how far off the mark many of them were as to his real identity and mission.

We also need more help than we know. Sickness, war, famine, and death still stalk the world, of course. But we have other things in common with that ancient, palm-waving crowd. We’re quick to see strong men as saviors—people we think will solve all our social and political problems. We even try to conscript Jesus into serving vile agendas that have nothing whatsoever in common with his actual life and teaching. I’m talking racism, prejudice, greed, and hate.

There’s a word for this situation, and we need to shout it to heaven it with all the urgency we can muster. That’s right. It’s “Hosanna!”

Ponder this quote from author Anne Lamott: “I worry that Jesus drinks himself to sleep when he hears me talk like this.” How might this apply to certain current manifestations of Christianity? How might it apply to your preferred brand of Christianity?

Pray: Hosanna! Hosanna! Hosanna!

Read: Genesis 2:15-25

Then the LORD God said, “It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper as his partner” (Genesis 2:18).

What on earth does it mean for woman to be created as man’s “helper? Even if you don’t take the creation stories literally, this is an important question.

For years Genesis 2:18 has been used to put women “in their place.” By this people (read: some men) generally mean that they interpret the verse as a divine mandate that women are created to be in a subservient role to men.  It will surprise no one that this is not a view I favor either as a woman or a biblical scholar.

Again, I ask: What does it mean to be a “helper”? And why do so many interpreters assume that it implies subservience?

Translation is important here, although it doesn’t tell the whole story. In Hebrew, the word ezer can indeed mean “helper.” Yet, there are a couple of things we ought to consider before we draw too many conclusions from this.

First, the full phrase in Hebrew means “a helper as his partner” (NRSV). Another possibility would be, “a helper as his counterpart” (my translation). When we consider the full phrase, it’s much harder to come away with the impression that the woman is created as some kind of second-class citizen.

The other consideration is how the word ezer is used elsewhere in the Old Testament. Most often, this is a word that used to describe God. Yes—God!

Psalm 33:20 says, “Our soul waits for the LORD; he is our help and shield.” In Psalm 121:1-2, the psalmist lifts up his eyes to the hills and asks, “from where will my help come?” Then he answers his own question: “My help comes from the LORD, who made heaven and earth.”

So, why are we assuming that being a “helper” is a subservient thing?

I think it says something less than flattering about us when we try to downgrade the role of helpers. I call as my witness Fred Rogers, who once said:

When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, “Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.” To this day, especially in times of “disaster,” I remember my mother’s words and I am always comforted by realizing that there are still so many helpers – so many caring people in this world.

Can I get an “amen,” anyone?

Helpers are not only sent from God, they are imitators of God. If we can’t get that through our heads, then—well—God help us.

Ponder: Why do you think so many interpreters have read Genesis 2:18 to imply that women should be subservient to men? How does the reminder that God is a helper change your view of this verse? How does it change your view of your calling?

Pray: Help me to be a helper, O God.

Read: Job 42:1-6

I had heard you with my ears, but now I see you with my eyes. Therefore, I recant and relent, being but dust and ashes (Job 42:5-6, JPS).

“Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return,” we hear as ashes are smudged on our forehead on Ash Wednesday.

If that’s not a stark enough reminder of our mortality, let’s move to the cemetery. “Ashes to ashes, dust to dust” the officiant says, and we toss a symbolic handful of dirt onto our loved one’s coffin.

Most of us don’t like such reminders. In fact, we go out of our way to avoid them. And if you think it’s uncomfortable receiving the ashes on Ash Wednesday, try stepping into the shoes of the one who is imposing them. Imagine reminding your favorite teacher, your child, your grandchild that “they are dust.”

Yet, like it or not, we are dust. Genesis 2 gets it right in depicting humans as humus. There’s a similar word play in the Hebrew. Adam (human) is from the adamah (earth). Ellen Davis points out that in the Bible, the soil is less of a resource than a relative.

All of this is important background for our verse du jour from the book of Job. The trouble is, most translations obscure our ability to get its point.

For instance, the NRSV reads: “…therefore I despise myself, and repent in dust and ashes.” This makes it sound like an expression of self-loathing—or worse—an admission of the “secret sin” that Job’s friends have been making such a fuss about. It is neither of those things, but only a better translation will help us to understand why.

Here’s one from the Jewish Publication Society that I find helpful: “I had heard you with my ears, but now I see you with my eyes. Therefore, I recant and relent, being but dust and ashes.”

Bear in mind that Job has just been on a whirlwind tour of, well, a whirlwind. After demanding an explanation for why bad things happen to good people—namely him—Job braces himself for an explanation from the Almighty. He seems to assume he will understand such an explanation. To God’s credit, God responds, but not with the explanation Job (and we) are hoping for. Instead, God spends chapters 38–41 with a whirlwind of “where were you when” questions designed to put Job’s question into perspective.

If you’ve ever experienced the power of a hurricane or a tornado, you’ll understand why the whirlwind is such an apt metaphor for Job’s reality check. We’re powerless to control it. Completely out of our league. Just so, the God who made the morning stars sing together and leads Leviathan around with a fishhook has a level of wisdom that is exponentially beyond human understanding. In short, God is God and we are not.

It’s in the wake of this reality check that Job “reconsiders.” Sure, he still has questions (don’t we all?), but he now understands the limits of his own wisdom in a way he didn’t before. He understands that he is “dust and ashes”—a phrase that is used to describe the human condition. In Genesis 18:27, for instance, Abraham dares to dicker with the Almighty over the fate of Sodom, but he does so knowing that he’s doing so at his own risk. “Let me take it upon myself to speak to the Lord,” he says carefully, “I who am but dust and ashes.”

We’re only human. Yet, as Job discovers, there is some real freedom in that. At the end of the day—and a whirlwind of a day it has been—God asks us to live without having all the answers. Job does just that, reinvesting in a new family knowing full well that no amount of “let’s make a deal” obedience can guarantee their safety. Faith is about trust, not calculation.

It’s a lot to ask. But that’s what the life of faith is. And that’s part of what it means to be “dust and ashes.”

Ponder: Being “dust and ashes” doesn’t mean we aren’t worth anything. What does the incarnation tell you about how God values our humanity? The crucifixion? The resurrection?

Pray: Frail children of dust and feeble as frail, in Thee do we trust, nor find Thee to fail. Your mercies how tender, how firm to the end—our Maker, Defender, Redeemer, and Friend.*

*From the hymn, “O Worship the King, All Glorious Above!” by Robert Grant.

Read: Psalm 145

The LORD is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love (Psalm 145:8, NRSV).

Have you ever found yourself thinking, “There ought to be a word for that!”? Half the fun of learning other languages is discovering such words. For instance, iktsuarpok is Inuit for “that feeling of anticipation you have when you’re waiting for someone to show up at your house and you keep going outside to see if they’re there yet.” Or there’s the German word, kummerspeck, which refers to “the excess weight one gains from emotional overeating.” (Literally, it translates as “grief bacon.”) Or there is the Scots word, tartle, for “that panicky hesitation just before you have to introduce someone whose name you can’t remember….”*

I don’t know about you, but I need all of these words.

Whenever it takes more than one English word to capture something from another language, it’s a sign that there might be more going on than we realize. And wouldn’t you know it, that’s exactly the case with the Hebrew word that I would argue is the most important word in the whole Old Testament.

I’m talking about the word ḥesed. In the NRSV it’s usually translated as “steadfast love.” Other times you’ll see it as “mercy” or “kindness,” or even “goodness.” If you grew up with the King James Version, you’ll know it as “lovingkindness.” But all these translations are attempts to capture something we don’t really have a word for in English.

Ḥesed (pronounced chĕsĕd) is love that goes above and beyond the call of duty. It’s selfless, covenant love. Sacrificial love.

Most of the 248 times this word is used, it is used to describe the way God loves. When God comes to Moses on Mt. Sinai in Exodus 34:6, for instance, it says that “the LORD passed before him and proclaimed, ‘The LORD, the LORD, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love (ḥesed) and faithfulness….’” The fact that God shows up at all just two chapters after the golden calf incident is the perfect illustration of a love that goes “above and beyond.”

The psalmists are understandably fond of this word. In Psalm 51, for instance, the psalmist knows that it will completely change the calculus between his sins and their consequences. “Have mercy on me, O God, according to your steadfast love (ḥesed); according to your abundant mercy, blot out my transgressions.”

The prophet Jonah is the only one who has the temerity to complain about God’s ḥesed, but that’s precisely because he doesn’t want God to show it to people Jonah doesn’t like (see Jonah 4:2). There you go again God, he whines, loving extravagantly. I hate when that happens—unless, of course, it happens to me.

Petulant prophets aside, ḥesed is sometimes a human quality. Ruth and Boaz, for instance are both people who go above and beyond the call of duty—acting with love and loyalty even when there’s nothing “in it” for them.

The fact that the English language has no precise equivalent for ḥesed makes me wonder about how this has shaped those of us who use that language. Maybe it’s time we learned a new word.

Ponder: How does the Hebrew word ḥesed lay a foundation for what we learn about God in the New Testament?

Pray: May our own ḥesed reflect your own, O God.

*Taken from 51 Wonderful Words With No English Equivalent

Read: Psalm 23

 Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, and I shall dwell in the house of the LORD my whole life long (Psalm 23:6, NRSV).

I am not a fan of zombie movies. I don’t even like chase scenes. Life is too full of anxiety as it is. I don’t need to top it off with manufactured pursuits that will only work their way into my dreams.

There is one special exception to this aversion, however, and I’m guessing you might appreciate it as well.

Tucked onto the end of Psalm 23 is a familiar line that most of us take for granted. We’re being followed, the psalmist says, by the “goodness and mercy” of God. (“Mercy,” by the way, is the word ḥesed—which we’ll unpack in a subsequent blog. For now, remember that it means “steadfast love”—love that will not let us go.)

Given that the prevailing metaphor in this, the “shepherd’s psalm” is of God as the Good Shepherd, it’s hard for me not to imagine “goodness and mercy” as a pair of enthusiastic sheep dogs, circling around the back of the flock to make sure the stragglers make it into the fold. In fact, if I ever own a pair of dogs, I’m going to name them Goodness and Mercy. Half the fun will be watching to see whether people get the “joke” when I introduce them to my furry companions.

The fact that God’s goodness and mercy are following us is no joke, however. It’s some of the best news we’ll ever receive. And it’s even better than most English translations suggest. Here’s why.

In almost every other instance in Scripture, the verb radaph is translated as “pursue.” People are always radaphing their enemies in the book of Joshua, for instance. In Exodus 14, Pharaoh radaphs the fleeing Israelites with his horses and chariots. In these instances, it’s clear that there is nothing casual about the action. This verb means business.

Whenever someone asks me about what “happens” in a baptism, I think of this verse from Psalm 23. The liturgy says that in baptism, we are “marked as Christ’s own forever.” Surely, this is another way of saying that we are being pursued by the goodness and mercy of the Good Shepherd our whole life long. And even if we’re lagging behind or going astray or just not paying attention, those two will make sure we make it, finally, into God’s fold.

So, smile if you want. But better yet, sing and whoop and celebrate the fact that we’re not just being followed—we’re being pursued by the goodness and mercy of God.

Ponder: Someone once suggested that whether we believe in God is not nearly as important as whether God believes in us.

Pray: Thank you for pursuing me, O God, even when I don’t know whether I believe in you.

Read: 1 Kings 19

He said, “Go out and stand on the mountain before the LORD, for the LORD is about to pass by.” Now there was a great wind, so strong that it was splitting mountains and breaking rocks in pieces before the LORD, but the LORD was not in the wind; and after the wind an earthquake, but the LORD was not in the earthquake; and after the earthquake a fire, but the LORD was not in the fire; and after the fire a sound of sheer silence” (1 Kings 19:11-12, NRSV).

Is it just me, or does the prophet Elijah strike you as someone who is seriously depressed?

I know it’s dangerous to diagnose someone from a distance—especially a distance of 3000 years—but the symptoms are staring us right in the face. In spite of the fact that Elijah has just come off what is arguably the peak of his prophetic career, this chapter finds him running for his life. Gone is the confident, sarcastic, swash-buckling prophet who defeated the 850 prophets of Baal and Asherah in the previous chapter. Here, Elijah is meek as a mouse. He has lost his appetite, just wants to sleep, and has lost all interest in his “daily activities.” While it doesn’t quite count as “suicidal ideations,” asking God to end it all for you comes pretty close.

God is not open to this suggestion, however, and spirits Elijah off to Mt. Sinai for a little lesson in perspective. Unimpressed by Elijah’s lament (“I alone am left, and they are seeking my life, to take it away”), God rustles up an impressive series of special effects. Yet God is not “in” any of them. Instead, God’s presence shows up in the least likely of places: in the “sound of a faint whisper” (my translation).

Why should we care how this obscure little Hebrew phrase gets translated? Because if we get it wrong, it’s impossible to get God’s point. And as it happens, it’s a very important point—especially now.

Everyone assumes that God’s power will come through the earthquake, wind, and fire. Those, after all, are the usual suspects in any self-respecting theophany. But this passage—when translated literally—reminds us that God’s power can also be made manifest in weakness.

While I’m usually a fan of the NRSV (I’ve made generations of students buy it), the NRSV’s translation of this phrase is spectacularly misleading. Even in the new “updated edition,” they render the relevant phrase as: “a sound of sheer silence.” At the risk of revealing my age, I think this translation is under the influence of Simon and Garfunkel. Sure, it alliterates nicely, but it completely misses the point.

So, what’s the point? Elijah thinks he’s alone and powerless. He feels like his voice is no bigger than a whisper—and a faint one at that. God’s point is that the Lord of the universe can work through faint whispers.

That, it seems to me, is a particularly important point—not just for Elijah, but for us. “I alone am left!” we whimper as our denominations shrink and our voice gets drowned out by all manner of noise. “What difference will my one vote make?” we wonder in the face of super PAC politics.

This story suggests that we need to get over ourselves. So what if we’re little more than a faint whisper? God can work through that.

Ponder: Elijah seems to miss the point in v. 14. (His answer is precisely what it was before God’s demonstration.) What can we learn from what God says to him in vv. 15-18? Are we really as alone as we think we are?

Pray: Speak through the earthquake, wind, and fire Thy still small voice of calm.