A reflection on 1 John 3:1-2, who we are, whose we are, and the hope we have in each other.

A few days ago Kathi and I started in on our summer vacation plans for the year. While we’ve tried to keep planning particulars between the two of us – the element of surprise is fun with the kids – Graham seems to have caught wind that we’re working on something.

“Can we go back to the cabin that had Chocolate the horse?” he asks, reminiscing about our trip to Southeast MN the year prior.  Each morning during that week-long trip we visited Chocolate, the brown and white mare, who lived in the field right behind the cabin. The owners invited us to talk, pet and even feed her a bit of carrots or apples.

In their own way the kids ate it up too.

During the day we read and hiked and took trips to the nearby pool, which was, to our surprise, open. Often we were the only ones there splashing around.

By night we’d cook and play board games and fire up our Nintendo DS handhelds for some four player Mario Kart or Mario Party. Some evenings we’d head back outside, having fireside s’mores to end the day.

I asked our kids about what else they enjoyed about family vacations; their responses came easily.

Both our kids appreciate adventure, the chance to explore new places, the opportunity to see the world. Hannah likes to just go, and not get cooped up in the house. With no work for parents, no school for kids, minimal outside distractions for us all, we could enjoy each other’s company and simply be.

Graham remembers first walking into the rented cabin in vivid detail, saying ohmygosh, I have to check out every room! And we get our own rooms? Whoa! Look at that huge couch! And the firepit outdoors! I can hear a horse neighing!

A year later and our first grader can recall that opening vacation scene like it was yesterday.

Ah to have a sense of child-like wonder.

Both kids also mentioned they enjoyed learning new things they might not have known before.

Our kids learned while on vacation in 2020 – true story – that there is more than one meaning, and more than one spelling for the word dam. When I ordered the local special for lunch one day, asking for the Big Dam Fritter, our kids initially gasped.

“Dad, you said a bad word!” Graham exclaimed. “No,” I replied, “dam, spelled D-A-M is a barrier that stops water. We drove over one to get here.” Their gasps turned to laugher.

They then quickly pivoted to practicing how to playfully use this newfound word.

“How is your Big Dam Fritter?” Hannah asked, giggling. It was really pretty good.

Our pandemic vacations last summer were nothing flashy. With so much still closed, and long-distance travel discouraged, the experience, for us, was somewhat muted. There were no baseball games to watch, no amusement parks to conquer, no epic long road trips to pass the time.  Normally our family enjoys these kinds of things.

But we had us. And for our family of four that was enough.
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Kids
Compared to our grown-up counterparts being a child has some advantages. It comes with a parent or two that has your back. As a kid there is space to learn, to grow, to receive guidance. Kids have the chance to try out responsibilities with pets and dishwashing and trash day, experiences that serve them well as adults. Kids have opportunities to appreciate the newness of the world around, with wild eyed wonder that become less frequent as we age.

As a kid you’re not expected to have all the answers. Asking questions is the norm, encouraged, rewarded.

And oh the opportunities to play! Children have the chance, almost daily, to play together with reckless abandon. On the playground they chat with friends, create games, learn to cooperate, play to win. Sometimes play gets rough. Sometimes kids hurt each other. Sometimes kids need to give and receive forgiveness too.

And if things get too far out of hand, and kids can’t figure out how to make something right on their own, that’s entirely ok. Just talk to mom or dad, they’ll listen. They’ll share some perspective. They’ll point you toward how to fix what has been broken. All so you can get back to playing in the sandbox of life, once again.

Adoption
But earthly parents don’t have all the answers. We can’t always make it right. Sometimes life gets broken in ways not easily fixed.

Thank goodness we can rely on someone with infinite wisdom, infinite experience, infinite love. For the Father cares for us so much we have been given a new name: child of God.

This new status is celebrated on our baptism day, an identity baked into us from the very beginning. Child of God, you have been sealed by the Holy Spirit, marked by the cross of Christ, forever. You have not just earthly parents, but Godparents, and a community there to support and care for you daily.

As a child of God we been adopted into a heavenly family. Grafted into a tree so much larger than any Ancestry.com or 23 and Me DNA chart could ever show.

Within God’s family tree there are no comparisons of who is who. There are no winners, no losers based on who you are or where you’re from. There is just identity, connection, being part of something so much greater than ourselves. For we are all part of the whole, made in the image of our Creator. Put here not by chance but design. Called to live in right relationship with our God, with each other.

To do that well we’re going to need some help. Fortunately we have a heavenly Father always there, ready to listen, ready guide, ready to love. A heavenly Father available by book, by petition, by prayer. A heavenly Father that has given us siblings we can connect with in the here and now.

As a child of God we have access to a parent offering us a lifetime of new experiences, better than any single vacation could contain. Each day we’re offered the space to learn, to grow, to confess, to forgive. Each day we’re offered the chance to be closer to what we are called to be.

For as grown up as we may be on this earth, what we are to become has not yet been revealed. We are only children, after all, playing in the sandbox of life. We remain an unfinished work, still being molded into something beautiful, something new. For now we see in a mirror, dimly. It is only later when we will fully know. Just as we have been fully known.

With so much still to learn, so much growing left to do, there will be some good days, and some bad days too. For life in this unfinished kingdom is not yet complete.

But we have us.
We have help from on high.
And that, fellow child of God, is enough.

An Easter Sunday message.

Christ is risen! Christ is risen indeed! Alleluia!

Oh that feels so good to say, doesn’t it? With it we proclaim newness of life, renewed hope, confidence in brighter tomorrows. With weather warming, vaccinations increasing, gathering together safely now more possible, in ways we’ve missed – for far too long – there is plenty to be excited about. Thanks be to God!

Today we remember an early morning two millennia ago, that started with three women, some spices, a journey to visit the dead. The women travelling to the tomb had no great expectations. They had seen Jesus crucified with their own two eyes.

The spices they brought would remove the stink of death from the tomb. And honor a dearly departed king. The ritual they went to complete was a chance to mourn, a time to say one last goodbye.

But inside the tomb they found not death, but a young man, dressed in white, very much alive. Was it an angel? Most likely. The angel tries to calm their fears, sharing that Jesus has been raised back to life. The angel then asks the women to do something – go, tell the disciples to meet Jesus in Galilee.

Galilee.

The location of where Christ’s ministry began. The promise of a grand reunion for Jesus and the crew. Where their mission to share God’s love with the world would begin anew.

This must be where the women shouted Christ is risen, right? They must have been super excited to carry out the assignment. Thrilled to get the show on the road, right?

Not exactly.

The women ran from the tomb that morning, scripture says, terrified by what they had seen. They didn’t say a word. To anyone. For they were still very much afraid.

At least the women went to the tomb that morning. Their male counterpart disciples hadn’t even been brave enough for that.

And just like that, the book of Mark is over. Done clap. Here ends the reading.

We’re left to wonder what would, or would not, happen next. Based on this narrative, if we’re honest with ourselves, the likely outcome doesn’t seem that great.

So jarring is this first resurrection account ancient scribes later added to it, hoping to tie up loose ends. Yes, of course the women told the disciples, one scribe wrote. Other scribes added even more.

Matthew, Luke and John share a lot about the happenings of a post-resurrection Jesus, walking and talking and fish frys, oh my.

But Mark’s version? It’s a cliffhanger. It’s filled with possibilities, yes. But filled with pitfalls too. It is a story with an ending as yet unwritten.

With so many questions left unanswered I can’t help but wonder. What if the women had stayed in fear and said nothing? Would Jesus had stuck around for a bit, realized he’d been stood up by those who claimed to love him, and then headed back, unannounced, to his heavenly home?

Would the disciples have continued Christ’s work without this grand reunion? Would the early church have formed? Would we be here, right now, talking of God’s mission for the world, and our role in bringing it about?

Maybe. Maybe not.

Today
The era we live in, more than any other in recent history, is one where we find ourselves increasingly surrounded by death.

Over half a million now gone due to Covid, in this country alone. Hundreds of thousands of which simply did not have to be.

Mass shootings and gun violence continue to rise. Initial estimates suggest daily gun violence surged last year, leading to an additional 4,000 more murders than in 2019. Making it the single worst year for this, in the US, in decades.

2021 hasn’t started out any better.

All while our politicians offer their best thoughts and prayers.

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Tomorrow
As the weather warms, as browns turn to so many hues of green, as first vaccine shots turn to second turn to immune, there is so.very.much to celebrate.

We made it! Or at least we’re pretty close. Out of one heckuva season, into a new one. Signs of new life all around us abound.

But, like Mark’s jarring conclusion, what happens next, for us, is a cliffhanger. Filled with possibilities. Filled with pitfalls. It is a story with an ending as yet unwritten. A story that we get to pen.

We’re left to wonder what will, or will not, happen next. Based on where we’re at right now, if we’re honest with ourselves, the likely outcome, to some of the largest societal issues we face, is something less than ideal.

As we increasingly journey out from our homes, like the three women that first Easter morning, we too may have no great expectations of what we will find. Perhaps we expect to encounter a culture that increasingly embraces violence, in thought, word, and deed, as the norm.

For we have seen the harm we can wreak, on each other, with our own two eyes.

Forgive us, Lord, for we have not always loved our neighbors, as ourselves.

In those ways it seems like things may never change.
And if we accept the status quo they never will.

Or, we can choose to write a new ending to this story. With plans sent from above, penned by heavenly design.

If that sound like something you’d like to be part of, be on the lookout, for –

Light, in places of darkness,
Hope, in times of despair,
Signs of life, amid certain death.

When we come upon those moments, we too may want to run back to that which we have become accustomed. Change can be hard, even when God knows it is for the best.

Or, we can embrace the divine offer to go, and meet Jesus where Jesus already is, out and about serving fellow children of God.

A Jesus who asks us to –

Lay down our swords, offering healing instead of harm;
Consider the well-being of our neighbors as much as our own;
Care for those society so often marginalizes, regardless of their –
race, ethnicity, immigration status, or who they choose to love.

If only we will follow.

Last night, my wife and I got chatting about the meaning of Easter, and she suggested a song pairing, Come Alive, from the movie The Greatest Showman. And I gotta say the lyrics smack of new life.

See if you can find the Easter promise within.

The promise of Easter is this: the story remains unfinished. Dear Lord, help us write this next chapter well. Amen.