Juggling ideas around in my head, wondering how I can say what I want to say without giving up too much, but just enough so that the point of my message can effectively come across.
I am still at a loss for words, but with the clock ticking and Easter fast approaching, I guess you're getting this post whether I'm ready for it or not.
I love Easter.
I love Easter because attention is directed specifically to what Jesus did in his life that made him our Savior. What made him Christ. I love Christmas, and that we celebrate that he was born- but Easter is always full of messages of hope, love, grace, rebirth, newness, forgiveness... that kind of thing-
-That because Jesus suffered excruciating pain, and died a gruesome death, we are saved through his grace.
Because He did what He did, everything will be okay.
Because He did what He did, He and The Father hear us when we cry, listen while we plead, answer when we pray.
Because He did what He did, through the betrayals, disappointments and tragedies of this life, we never have to face it alone.
Because He did what He did, through our striving and continuous effort we can live with God again; where there will be no more sorrow and no more pain.
When I was younger, more specifically-before I was married-
I went through a lot.
Call them whatever you want,
Trials, hardships, troubles, misfortunes, mishaps, trauma, set backs, problems- whatever.
Because of these trials I came to know for myself that all of those statements listed above, things that were drilled in my head since I was born- weren't just wishful thinking, empty promises or even the delusions of my parents and an old fashioned generation.
They were truths.
They were real.
But my Easter message today isn't about any of those things.
Although I have a firm testimony of all of that, I don't want to talk about how everything is okay and God always answers our prayers.
Because I've learned that sometimes-
He won't.
For however "hard" I thought my trials were then-
I laugh at myself because they are absolutely nothing compared to things I have faced since.
Not only are these new sets of hardships tremendously more difficult and involved, but I have learned that sometimes, God deals with our pleadings differently.
We're all human, we're all living our very own sets of complicated lives, and I know that all of us to some degree have gone through impossible struggles. Tiresome problems. Unfortunate set backs. Agonizing trials.
And sometimes, in the midst of all that heartbreak-
our prayers seem unheard.
we feel alone.
abandoned by our faith, in our God.
Leaving us to wonder if we really are the stupid ones- ignorant and old fashioned for believing that an all powerful, mighty man in the sky can hear us.
There was a moment, when Christ was on the cross, that God withrew himself from Him.
I love this quote by Melvin J. Ballard when he talks about what God could have done.
"...He has given us faith, and we submit to the inevitab1e, but He had the power to save, and He loved his Son, and He could have saved him.
He might have rescued him from the insult of the crowds.
He might have rescued him when the crown of thorns was placed upon his head.
He might have rescued him when the Son, hanging between the two thieves, was mocked.
He listened to all this.
He saw that Son condemned;
he saw him drag the cross through the streets of Jerusalem and faint under its load.
He saw that Son finally upon Calvary;
he saw his body stretched out upon the wooden cross;
he saw the cruel nails driven through hands and feet, and the blows that broke the skin, tore the flesh, and let out the life’s blood of his Son.
He looked upon that.
In the case of our Father, the knife was not stayed, but it
fell, and the life’s blood of his Beloved Son went out.
His Father looked on with great grief and agony over his Beloved
Son, until there seems to have come a moment when even our
Savior cried out in despair:
“My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” "
"Heavenly Father? Are you really there?"
"Where are you?"
"Where did you go?"
"Help me. Why aren't you helping me?"
One night with burning tears, through gritted teeth and I even said,
"Why. Aren't. You. Doing. Anything."
Listen to this:
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He knew.
Jesus didn't. And We don't.
But God knew.
God knew and He knows today, what will benefit us the most in the end.
And sometimes, the road to get there is painful.
Sometimes, the road to get there seems impossible.
And sometimes- we will cry the whole way.
Whenever I have prayed and been seemingly ignored, if I wait, He comes back with so much more than I ever could imagine.
God has three answers to prayers, and only three.
"Yes."
"Not yet."
"I've got something better."
Hang in there.
Keep trying.
Keep going.
Don't lose faith.
Keep praying and keep asking..
He has so much waiting for you, so many blessings and He believes you can do it, that you can make it--
.. even if you don't.
-C