For me, resurrection used to be a heavy word. In fact, many of the words used in a faith practice held burdensome, static meanings that were given to me but did not belong to me. They did belong to me, but I just didn't know I had the freedom to allow them to be defined uniquely in me. It took me a good fifty years to trust that the voice inside of me was my god, instead of the voices outside of me telling me who God was. Or wasn't. And isn't that what faith is? Forsaking all others for my faith in God?
This is how I know God:
god is the canyon, and the fog, and the crunching sound under my feet when I run. god is the sunshine, and the rain, and in everything I don't understand. god is the feeling I have when the coffee is brewing and the morning is quiet and I have some kind belief in the possibility of the wild ideas that come to me--ideas about things I can write and things I can do and things I can make that exist in that early morning space before all of my critics wake up. That's God.
And forgive me for stating the obvious: God lives large in dogs.
God can be comforting, but faith is not comfortable. It's dynamic and feral and can be infuriating. god can piss me off and faith can seem childish. It's a big mess. And a big mystery. god, faith, whatever--I don't know. They are interchangeable and it's not important to me to be able to clarify it for myself, and forgive me, but I certainly don't need to be able to explain it to you, you meaning anyone asking me to defend my faith. I don't have anything to defend; this is just what I've come to know. To understand. To cling to. And, by the way: I don't know anything. That's what a big, beautiful mess this whole thing is.
Today is Good Friday in the Christian tradition. I was raised in a Baptist church, and I hated the weeks leading up to Easter Sunday. It was full of violence and unbearable to me. I could never grasp why Good Friday was called good, and I waited each year on Good Friday for the skies to grow black at the moment Jesus died on the cross. But they never did. It was such a relief when Good Friday was over. And such a confusing disappointment. I showed up every year. I believed. But each year it was just another Friday--the day before we colored Easter eggs. The day before we sprinkled our dresses and stored them in the refrigerator to be ironed into their Easter glory. The day before we baked ham and cleaned the house and prepared for Easter Sunday. Good Friday came and went, and on Saturday we cleaned, we colored eggs, we watched Hee Haw and The Carol Burnett Show. We went to bed, got up and searched for eggs that were hidden the night before, ate way too much chocolate, and had our picture taken in our Easter best. We went to church and checked out what everyone was wearing that day, with silent judgement for the folks who didn't go the extra mile to dress up for Jesus' resurrection. There were special flowers in the church--white lilies--and the cross over the baptismal tub was draped in a purple sash. We sang a rousing rendition of Christ the Lord is Risen Today, and greeted one another with the Easter salutation:
Christ is Risen!
He is Risen Indeed!
I was so thankful the Easter season was over--no more Pontious Pilate; no more betrayal of Jesus; no more horrific torture and death; no more Jesus pleading with God the Father, Why hath thou forsaken me? Why did God forsake him? It seemed to me, from that statement, that Jesus didn't have any idea what was coming. It was too much. How could he ever trust God again? How could I ever trust God again? I was relieved that it was over, but I also felt empty. We cooked special food and dressed for a celebration; Jesus went through all that shit and rose up from the dead, but nothing changed.
Even so, I carried the story of Resurrection with me. I believe resurrection is meant for me.
But it's on new terms.
I was baptized when I was nine years old, and I mean Baptist baptized, like dunked backwards under water, dying to my old, sinful first nine years of life and rising out of the water to a new life in Christ. That's a heavy burden for a developing nine-year-old. And that is exactly how I experienced it. As I became an adult I could not reconcile all the oppressive messages and culture of the church with living out a joyful life on earth. Wasn't I supposed to be free? But the church didn't bring me freedom. It brought me fear and self doubt and binary thinking. It was a fearful faith, or nothing. So, I chose nothing. And nothing was kindness and acceptance and a bigger world view, a Jesus-approved way of being, ironically.
And now I don't live in a binary choice of faith, and I know that nothing is everything and faith is a living act. I can doubt and struggle or be wrapped in gratitude on any given day--and all of it helps to deepen a faith I have in the big mystery. There are as many paths to peace and goodness as the world is big, and to decide that only one is the right way is to diminish the possibility of God, in my opinion. If there is a god, that spirit is unfathomably vast, and I'm suspicious of any one system that claims it has cornered the market on the rules and regulations to get you to a relationship with their version.
Something calls me. I can feel it deep within myself, especially in that time when it's no longer night but not yet daytime, and the coffee is brewing, and the committee of the mind is quiet and all things seem possible. I feel generous and compassionate and full of love. I am gentle with myself and in my thoughts of those in my life. Love and kindness sit with me, and I know a presence is within and all around. Resurrection. Every morning.
Be still and know that I am God.
I am God. God is me.