Losing Hope

(This is the second part in an Easter series. Part One, Losing Jesus here.)

That Saturday, for any who slept, was the first time they woke without Jesus. The first day waking without a loved one is terrible for anyone... The first sunrise on a life without them. Waking to a world without Jesus must have been horrifying. Jesus wasn't just a friend, a brother, a son. He was a side of God they had not known, and now could not be sure was real. Losing Jesus was losing grace, losing love, losing hope. 

Mary was lost. It is disconcerting to lose a person so close. I have friends who have lost children and for the first few days (and even now) could barely open their eyes in their house without a wave of loss. An extra seat at the dining table. An empty bed. A pair of rainboots that will never be worn again, but no one wants to move them from their place by the door. A prenatal vitamin, taken before you remember you aren't pregnant anymore.

And when we are lost we sometimes lean on the ordinary, the day to day, the routine.  We look for chores, things to occupy our minds. But for the disciples of Jesus, for his mother, for Mary Magdalene his death was at a terrible time for distraction. The Sabbath was a day devoid of duties. It was a painfully slow day where you could not even distract yourself with chores. So Mary Magdalene and the other women quietly made plans for Sunday, plans to go and honor the broken body. "It's something we can do." They did not know what awaited them, could not have hoped or imagined what they would find. For now, to them, hope was lost. The hope they had found when Jesus was with them, the hope of love, grace, and life -- that hope was killed on that long Sabbath. This Saturday was a day of reality sinking in, of memories hitting them like physical blows. 

This must have been a rough day for all of them, but I imagine Jesus's mother must have felt the blows the worst. She was likely the closest person to him. The love of a parent is immeasurable, she had borne him in her own body. I can't even begin to imagine what she felt at the cross, and facing her first day without him, a day supposed to be devoted to the God that she knew had just poured out punishment on her son.... So much for Passover; this year God demanded her son as the Lamb. This must have been one of the hardest thing she had ever experienced.

Mary Magdalene must have seen Jesus's mother, frozen with grief and anger and loss. And she could offer no words of comfort, she tried to offer action - maybe Mary would come with them to the tomb to anoint the body? But Jesus's mother said no. She could not bear to look on him broken and bruised again, could not bear to seal him away forever, could not bear the finality, nor was she sure she could utter a prayer to God today, or ever again.

Mary Magdalene did not particularly relish the idea of looking on the body, but hoped that touching him would heal this awful ache, get rid of these new demons that threatened to break her if she listened to their voices. Perhaps touching his body would make it real that he was gone. But if nothing else she would be closer to him than she was now.

(Continuing tomorrow.)