The Place Of Our Resurrection

In the ancient Church in Ireland, Christian monks often practiced a certain type of pilgrimage. They would set out on a journey with no particular destination in mind. They called this “searching for the place of their resurrection”. The point was to go to that place to which they felt drawn by the Holy Spirit, and establish that place as their hermitage and, in keeping with the vow of stability, remain there for the rest of their lives. More often than not other monks would join them. Sometimes a whole community of people seeking spiritual guidance would gather around them. This search could take years and often involved leaving their homelands far behind.

On the most basic level, of course, the phrase means they are looking for a place to live until they die, and from whence they will experience their resurrection at the return of the risen Jesus. On another level it also meant they were looking for a place to put down spiritual roots, to die to self, and experience spiritual resurrection in the power of God’s Spirit. They did not see this conversion as something would happen instantly. They saw conversion as the work of God, but often plodding and slow because of the resistance of our own human wills. It took much prayer, study, and service to die to self in this life, and be raised to God in this life and in the world to come. Human sin is not easily overcome, but if we are open to God’s life and work with in us, we will see progress. Thus a place of resurrection is also in this world as we seek to grow in grace and become better disciples.


We are celebrating Easter on April 8th this year. As I write this we are very much into the life of springtime with an early warm up. We are reminded that life emerges from death in the warmth and beauty of spring. Unlike the natural world though, resurrection is not a natural occurrence. It is a gift of grace. Jesus lives! He lives as an act of God the Father restoring his life. He lives giving life to us, raising us from the depths of death and sin to life, and making us new by his grace. The work of our own resurrection is here and now. This place is the place of our resurrection. This time is our time of eternal life. Jesus lives and life takes on a new meaning. A song of life began that first Easter Sunday that sweeps us along in a chorus of God’s love for all eternity. As the scriptures say, “today is the day of salvation”. Know the life of the living Christ within, and know a life that is eternal in this world and the next. Know a life that can be difficult and challenging, but the reward is discovery of the power of love and life. Jesus lives and so do we! This is the place of our resurrection. This is the time to come to life. He lives, and we are alive! Glory be to God for the gift of life into eternity!

In His Living Grace,

Jim Stahr

The Seventh and Final Word of the Cross

"Father, Into Your Hands I Commend My Spirit".

Once again Jesus is quoting the Tehellim, the Psalms, as a faithful Jew. This is Psalm 31:5 which reads,

"Into your hand I commit my spirit; for you have redeemed me O Lord, faithful God". (RSV translation).

I am not sure how this text is used in Judaism, but in the liturgy of the hours, the ancient daily prayer of the Church, this prayer comes often in the night office, obviously the last prayer of the day. Sleeping is a time when we relinquish conscious control of life to God, it is therefore an appropriate point to recite the text. Here Jesus is, of course, dying. He has declared his work on earth to be finished and leaving his entrance into death and the world to come to God. He has lived well, and in ancient Christian terminology is dying a "holy death". He is dying as he lived, with life in the hands of God, the Father.

Jesus said that he was "the Way, the Truth, and the Life". In him we have a relationship to the triune God. He is our way to God. In him with find the truth by which we live our lives. In him we find life in this world and the world to come. In fact, we live the whole context of our lives as Christians dependent on God. The Lord's prayer reminds us of our dependency on "our Father who art in heaven...". Jesus taught us to live lives of faith and trust in the Creator. As we grow in grace, we learn more and more to commit our spirits daily to God. We learn more and more that the One who has given us life and all good, has given us salvation. We learn more and more what a gift of grace each day of our lives is. We commit our spirits each day to God, and when we come to our hour of death we can may that ultimate commitment of all that we are, and have been to God. We do this in assurance of forgiveness when we have failed, comfort in our spiritual legacy to family friends and church and God, and expectation of the hope of eternal life.

Because of Jesus we can be awake to the truth that we are in God's loving hands each day of our lives, and will be for eternity. This is all because of his love for us, given and demonstrated on the cross for our salvation. Let us live our lives committed to his care and love.

In The Assurance of God's Presence And Love,
Jim

The Sixth Word of the Cross

"It is finished!"

We are coming to the end of the journey near to the death of Jesus for our salvation. On a theological level this word of the cross is a announcement that Jesus has completed the work that the Father had given him in the world. On another level, it is the surrendering of his life and mission to the Father and he is dying the way he lived, trusting in God. On and even more basic level, he is recognizing this is the end of his life. Whatever the meaning of this word to any of us, it does recognize that we, as followers of Jesus, have a mission to complete in our lives. It is not the mission of salvation which he accomplished on the cross for us by his grace, but a mission to reflect that redeeming love to the world. We are called to lives of trust in God like Jesus. We are called to let God set the agenda of our lives in that sovereign love. Often in my years of ministry people have struggled to know what God wants of their lives. They wish that God would tell them as clearly as he seems to in the scriptures, what the Divine One wants of them. My answer is invariable. "Love God with all your heart, mind soul and strength" and "Love your neighbor as yourself". That is the mission to live the love of God and neighbor in the world and to proclaim God's love. Many times we get the feeling that somehow winning souls for Christ is our mission. Did Jesus not tell us this in Matthew 28? Yes, and that is not done just by telling somebody "the plan of salvation". It is also accomplished by showing the world by what we say and do that God is love. In the end we will be able to say "It is finished". Yes, we will fail at times, yes we will do wrong. But God is with us and will teach us how to love God and neighbor. Then, when we come to the completion of our passing, we will hear the crucified and risen Christ say, "Well done good and faithful servant". What does God want of us? To be loving and fulfill that mission on earth. If we complete that, however long it takes us to learn it, and however much we fail at times, we can say with confidence at the end of the day and at the end of life, "It is finished!",

In Christ's Service,

Jim

The Fifth Word Of The Cross:

"I Thirst!"

This is, on one level, the simple cry of a man crucified and dying slowly in the Palestinian sun. Suffering for Jesus was real because he was fully and completely human as well as fully and completely divine. I have seen those "Lord's Gym" tee shirts that were popular some years ago. They depicted a mighty superman savior who could left the sins of the world. The church, in contradiction to that idea, sees Jesus as fully human as was well as fully divine. Jesus does suffer for us. Jesus does die for us. But he dies in a state of human weakness. Many Christians don't like that idea, they want a Savior who is not like us, who was never weak. That Savior then was merely pretending to be human, and was not completely so. The church, however, teaches, that it is in the fact that Jesus suffers and dies with the suffering of his oppressed people that makes the cross a saving sign. We believe in atonement, which is a word that was created to translate the Greek idea. It comes from At-one-ment. God is completely at one with us in Jesus. He suffers like his people, like us. He thirsts and suffers and dies. It is in this oneness of the cross that somehow, in the mystery of the incarnation, God joins us that we may be lifted to God in Jesus' the resurrection.

Some people see the second coming as the same thing. Superman Jesus is going to come flying in and save us from all the bad people around us. Well, Jesus comes in judgement, but those he judges may be quite surprised when they find that those who are judged are those who are the least compassionate, even if they are Christians. They are those who, having received the mercy of God in free grace, refuse to extend it to their fellow human beings. People are suffering all around us from poverty, disease, sin and oppression. Jesus showed mercy to such. Often we Christians show only judgment. A thirsting Savior suffers as our neighbors do. He who thirsted on the cross gives us the Water of Life and calls us to be compassionate toward the suffering. A thirsting Jesus calls us to the best of what is in us, to help the poor, oppressed and suffering, knowing that in serving them we are serving Jesus.

Our Savior suffers in weakness so that we may have God's strength in our weaknesses, and that we may be instruments of healing to others. May we look on those who suffer from all forms of disease and the effects of the harshness of our world with mercy. May we render aid to Jesus in our suffering neighbors.

Peace,
Jim

The Fourth Word Of The Cross:

"My God, My God, Why have you forsaken me?"

When I was a teenager a friend of mine asserted that Jesus sinned twice. he asserted that the first time was in the Garden of Gethsemane when Jesus asked that "this cup pass from me", which meant the cross. the second time, be believed, was with this word of the cross. On the first point it is not a sin to ask got to remove the challenge. Jesus ultimately said the prayer we all are called to pray, "thy will be done". On this word of the cross one must ask: How in the world can you sin quoting scripture? Jewish life is suffused with the Tehillim, the Psalms. They form the Jewish people as they have formed many Christians. Jesus is quoting Psalm 22:1 . It begins as a psalm of despair, and ends in trust in God. Here is the full quote in the New Revised Standard Version of the Psalms:

22:1 My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from helping me, from the words of my groaning?2 O my God, I cry by day, but you do not answer; and by night, but find no rest.

The psalm goes on to affirm the holiness of God and to express trust in God's will. We have the idea sometimes that to express human emotions that seem to be negative is a sin. These emotions are part of what we are, and part of being human is feeling abandoned by everyone, including God. We don't want to believe we are weak, but we are. It is no sin to express our frustration and anger, even with God. What burdens do you carry that make God seem far from your cry? Jesus is expressing human emotion, but also finding hope in the scriptures. Read the psalms, they range from beautiful to hateful, yet they all do the same thing. They all keep the relationship with God going by staying in communion with God. If we are still talking to God, we must believe God is there? The scriptures don't teach that it is a sin to feel forlorn, or abandoned. The Psalms are full of these kinds of expressions. If we don't feel them we are not allowing the full range of what it means to be human to be a part of us. What psalms give voice to your sense of abandonment, of your sense of thanksgiving joy and hope. In our despair we keep the relationship with God going, even when we are feeling lost and abandoned.

In Christian Hope,
Jim

The Third Word of the Cross

Woman behold your son, son behold your mother

I see the words of the cross as words of grace. Often what we are ultimately concerned about reflects the most important values in our lives. The apostle John and Mary, the mother of Jesus, are at the foot of the cross. As first born in the family, Jesus has cultural and religious responsibility for his mother. Christian tradition, and this action of Jesus, seem to indicate that Mary was a widow at the time of Jesus' death. As first born male, Jesus has family responsibility. Why not James, the brother of Jesus, he was the first head of the church in Jerusalem? It appears James was not yet a believer in Jesus as the Messiah. Paul records an appearance of the risen Jesus to James. Tradition says that is when James became a believer. Therefore, Jesus entrusts Mary to his spiritual family. John is faithful enough to have been at the cross when the others fled. He is called upon to care for Mary and tradition says that he did this until she passed at Ephesus.

Our relationships are important, both those of blood and those of spiritual kinship. As Jesus is dying he knows the importance of loving and caring for each other. I wonder, in our sad divisions, if we really see our families and friends as entrusted to our care by Jesus? Do we know how important family ties are, do we take are faith ties to others seriously? Often the connections of both human family and faith community are dysfunctional. Maybe if we realized they are trusts given to us by Christ and here on our journey to support and love us in return, we would approach this differently. It might make a difference in how our families function and our faith communities. What if the way we treat each other is the way we treat Christ? We are entrusted by the crucified and risen Christ to the care of each other. How can we best appreciate and go about this?

In Christian Love,

Jim Stahr

The Second Word Of The Cross

Today You Will Be With Me In Paradise

The "Good Thief" is promised, upon his request of Jesus to be remembered when Jesus "comes into his Kingdom" that "Today you will be with me in paradise". The request was for the coming of the Kingdom. The thief was promised that presence today. The promise of eternal life is one of the great comforts of Christian life. We do affirm and afterlife. That is the ultimate purpose of this Season of Lent as we journey toward the empty tomb of the Paschal Feast. But please note something in what Jesus said. He told that person that he would be in paradise with Jesus today. We are promised we will be with Jesus in the world to come, but we who are living are with Jesus today. We live so much in our past, perhaps feeling anger and pain about it, or perhaps glorifying the past as better than the present. Neither past nor future exist. There is only now. There is only today. Today, whether our lives are going as we wish, or we are going through extreme difficulty, is the only day we will find our salvation. Today is the only day we will "be with Jesus". As the New Testament says, "today is the day of salvation". Jesus is near us, and concerned about us in life and in death. In life and death we belong to God. The risen Jesus says to us, "...I am with you always, until the close of the age". Paradise is today as well as in the future, for Paradise is where Jesus is. Heaven is promised in our future, but heaven is also today and now. May God grant us to find life in the present, and know him all of our days and into eternity.

In The Peace of The Cross
Jim Stahr


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