Contemplative
imagination:
Mary reflects:
A celebration supper!
A THANKYOU to Jesus - though that word can never be enough! He gave us back our dear brother… stood
outside the tomb and, harnessing into himself all the unimaginable power of God
SUMMONED Lazarus back from the grip of death… brought him home…a dead man, walking
back to LIFE!!
We shuddered and retched as the foul air, foul spirits, foul
stench of death flowed from the cave’s mouth like a belch from the bowels of
the earth. We couldn’t bear to look as
Jesus, his face wet with tears, challenged hell itself.
He returned his loved friend to mend the hole torn in our
family. And to show God’s power and
glory! Still people come to stare, and
ask, and touch, and wonder. Many are
here this evening - they wonder who?
How? And then when words fail, they
worship in wonder at God’s grace… So
this party is for Him, for Jesus.
It’s bitter sweet, though… we should be so full of joy, and we
are, but with undertones of fear. Tears
of joy, tears of grief, remembering our shattering loss and our new hope, but knowing
loss will come again. We know death will
one day again claim Lazarus, and each of us, in the natural course of
things. But we also know that Jesus too
will be taken from us. The days are
short before the festival begins, the climax of Jesus’ hopes and fears. Our dear, most loved friend, Master, Rabbi, Messiah,
brother-of-our-hearts has set his face on the road to Jerusalem only pausing
here, to show the true signs of God’s power, and to tell us that He, so full of
life and love and joy and grace, has DECIDED.
To fulfil his life’s mission where the prophets go – into the hotbed of
hate - Jerusalem.
So we look back to grief and forward to grief, balancing
tonight on that tipping point of our present joy… tears and shadows, tears of
gratitude, tears and fear so deep they hollow out my insides and leave me
chasmed.
Can I show him? I
take from my dowry chest the precious alabaster jar, the ointment worth so very
much. Precious perfumed oil that speaks
of love, and grief, and relinquishing. I
kneel quietly beside his feet, hoping they won’t notice, and my tears bathe his
feet, my hands gently smooth the dirt of the world from them, feel the shape of
him, cradle his feet as I sob into my hair, and gently, so gently, wrap them
dry… The perfume, of course, gives me
away…
I am done. I am
disgraced. I have given my best, and I’m
met with rejection and censure as men surround me… and I don’t care… yet, yes I
do care… everything I know and love is unravelling… life-changing,
heart-breaking…
Yet He… Jesus… He laid his hand on my head, and let me hold
him… He stands up for me, says ‘Leave
her alone, she’s done a lovely thing for me’.
He knows I prepare him for his death, pouring out my
unspoken love… and holding in my heart remembrance of what he has done for me, for
my family, a sign, surely, that there is life still to come… hope beyond the
heartbreak…
Now I reflect: Two
pictures: Our lady of Kyiv and Ukranian
Mother and child in the underground
How can I show Him such love? In this Lenten journey how can I ‘go public’
with my love for Jesus? (apart from
being a Pastor!)? When all around is
‘War in Europe’?
I shed my own tears in vicarious mourning for their loss.… glimpse love in the tears on the faces we see
in the news. Elderly women, shepherding
grandchildren out of harms way… hobbling beneath the loads they bear. Disabled people pushed along in barrows,
clutching a bundle and a cat. Love in
the palms pressed to windows of a train as women and children leave to an unknown
future while their men battle for their homeland. In the courage of the men’s words ‘We can
fight better if we know you are somewhere safe’… Women cradling babies, lost
and adrift in an ocean of strangers…Tears gathered into the folds of old
scarves and borrowed blankets…Russian and Ukranian women grieving for sons,
husbands, fathers.
Glimpses of love as people travel across Europe with lorries
full of goods so kindly meant, distributing them amidst rubble and chaos…and as
people in countries far away open their homes to unknown refugees…willing to embrace
them, offer them a room and a shower, a home-away-from-home, comfort and
shelter…
Grief is the price we pay for
love…And hope – in the Risen Lord, in the Grace of God, in the Holy Spirit’s unimaginable
power - is the promise to which we, as Christians, both here, and there, cling.
And here is a little precious offering we ourselves can
make… Pray for Ukraine.