Monday in the Octave of Easter, April 21, 2025
(click here to listen to or read today’s scriptures)
Intersections
Jesus met them on their way and greeted them.
This is the road I want to be taking, the road where Jesus might meet me there and greet me. He would look me in the eyes and shake my hand with both of his. His love for me, for all of us together, would pour out of his eyes, his smile, his hands, his words.
That is how I imagine it.
They approached him, embraced his feet and did him homage.
I think I’d rather be with a friend when I encounter Jesus on the road. We could whisper to each other, “That’s Jesus! Isn’t it? Is that really Jesus?” And as he comes closer, and we know for sure that this is Jesus, maybe it’s less complicated if we both fall, kneel down, look up at his face and kiss his feet.
On the other hand, if my friend doesn’t respond to Jesus like I do, then how will we know what to do together? Maybe it’s better if I meet him alone, walking alone himself, and all my questions go on inside my head. Is that Jesus? How can it be? If he smiles a bit and reaches out to greet me, I might fall down in a faint. But no. Even then, I think, Jesus, that you would catch me and pull me back up and we would embrace and tears would fall from my eyes.
Jesus said to them, “Do not be afraid. Go tell my brothers to go to Galilee, and there they will see me.”
The magic and mysteries of the Paschal season are far from over. There are yet forty-nine days left in the Easter season. Pentecost, the 50th day, might be the best day of them all. There is every reason to expect surprise around any corner on any given day. Jesus is alive. He is risen! The Holy Spirit is “passing over” us day by day and moment by moment, and when I look up, there She is. We are surrounded by God.
At our Easter dinner yesterday with Ken and Machiko, Aki’s parents, along with all the Tomita clan, I eked out the melody of “Christ the Lord has Risen Today” on their seldom-used piano. It sounded pretty good. The music inspired Miles and Jasper to pound away on the piano and a child’s accordion they found in the corner of a bedroom. My melody got drowned out, but mostly I didn’t mind. I could hear What a Friend We Have in Jesus through the din, reminding me of that truth for all of us.
My heart is glad and my soul rejoices, my body too, abides in confidence. You show me the path to life and fill us with joy in your presence.
I showed Jasper a video of him crawling into my guitar case when he was just over four years old, giggling and curling up to fit. I didn’t close him in. Energy pours out of Jasper and Miles when they’re together and have just a bit of permission. The time we spend together probably should be measured in quantity rather than quality. Sometimes they are far beyond what measure I might apply, just blowing up with joy in the moment, joy in the morning, joy in the noontide, till they fall at last into night and sleep.
I don’t sleep when my head hits the pillow. They do. There might be developmental, body, mind, emotional reasons why they have so much energy and can pour it out on us. But I think of Jesus.
God raised him up, releasing him from the throes of death, because it was impossible for him to be held by it.
That does sound just like 8 and 5 year old brothers, released from the adult discipline that I sometimes want to bind them up in, released “because it is impossible for them to be held by it.” They just do NOT worry about tomorrow. Oh, Lord, like the birds in the air, let us fly and fly and fly, whether we are 8, 5 or 75. You offer us that gift, if we accept, hang on, live and breathe with you.
“Meet the Lord in the air?” How about walking down the highway, looking up and seeing someone that just about looks like Jesus?
 (Acts 2, Psalm 16, Psalm 118, Matthew 28)
(posted at www.davesandel.net)
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