It all matters

Lutheran, The, Apr 2001 by Miller, David L

Resurrection happens in the flesh and blood ofour woundedness

Our conversation began innocently-two middle-aged men, having just met, swapping stories about work and travel. But without warning "John" plunged into deeper waters.

He began detailing his previous five years, a spiraling descent into chaos: working 18 hours a day, neglect of family and friends, a business that went south, deteriorating health. He tumbled into depression, each day further dissolving his faith, psyche and marriage-until there was nothing left. Now he is alone.

But his lack of bitterness was arresting. So, too, was his honesty about his responsibility for his pain.

"It's different now," he said after a pause. "I enjoy my friends and do things that bring me satisfaction, things I'd neglected for years. I'm not sure where my life is going or even where I want it to go. But I know it isn't about getting to some destination but about the journey." He fell silent.

"In a strange way I'm grateful," he said. "I'm better for it all."

I don't doubt it. His face bore the wear of the wounded, but the lilt in his voice reflected a gentleness with himself and others born of pain.

Somehow his wounds transformed him. The death of a life now forever lost became a death unto resurrection. Something new had risen, still wounded-yet also more human, more complete, more beautiful, more gracious.

His wounds had become gaping windows through which so much grace had streamed that he began to believe the rumor that God does give life to the dead.

The hope I saw in John's eyes glistens like Easter. And it recalls Jesus' wounds.

Nailed to the cross, Jesus dies and is sealed in a tomb, forever gone. But he rises in the glorious power of God, strangely, still bearing the marks of his torture. Ruined hands, cut by the nails, a pierced side-these are not wiped from his flesh. He generously offers his broken body to startled disciples, even to one who refuses to believe until he touches those ruined hands (John 20:26-29).

The wounds mark Jesus' identity. They show that it is truly he who is risen and stands there-the living, breathing, physical life and blood of all God is and intends to do.

But why the wounds? Wouldn't it be better if they were miraculously wiped clean?

That's what we want for our wounds. It's what we want for the physical and psychological gashes through which human blood pours out almost everywhere you turn. For God's sake, take them away. Enough with wounds.

But that's not what Jesus' body offers. The wounds remain. But they're transformed. No longer marks of destruction, they give silent witness to God's power to give life to the dead. Jesus stands before the congregation of the world testifying to God's invincible life that invades every moment, bringing resurrection to all the deaths human bodies and spirits suffer.

His wounds say that it all matters. Nothing is left out. All that we are, every hidden corner of our being, each wound and sorrow, will be gathered up and redeemed, transformed into something immensely more gracious and beautiful than we imagine.

Resurrection happens in the flesh and blood of our woundedness, our losses, our grief, in the death of our shining dreams for all we wanted for ourselves and loved ones.

Sometimes one sees it beginning even now. When we do, like John we may be moved to say two startling words about our wounds, "Thank you. Thank you for wounds that became windows of grace. Thank you for the death that became a door to unimagined life."

For some, the wounds of life are only a curse. The cruelty of injustice, loss and disappointment can cut so deeply the wounds seem beyond any healing that even God can offer.

But Easter invites us quietly to trust that the wounds which kill body and spirit are the very places where God-in utter love and incomprehensibility-is plotting the unimaginable.