THE GRAVE WAS ROBBED TODAY!
YOU CAN NO LONGER FIND THE LIVING AMONG THE DEAD!
THE GRAVE CRIES OUT “EMPTY!”
WE CRY OUT “FREE!”
WATCH YOUR CHAINS FALL!
GRAB YOUR PARTT HAT!
IT’S TIME TO DANCE AGAIN!
Today we turn our eyes from a bloody cross to an empty grave.
To celebrate, my squad ate mini pancakes and then we held our own church service on base. We ended up worshipping for almost two hours before our party planning committee (yes, it’s a really thing on the race) passed out sweet notes for everyone attached to movie theater-sized candy boxes. Then our leaders held a mini Easter egg hunt with a little competition in the mix.
While we were worshipping today I was reminded of a moment I had with Abba. The other day I was sitting in a little brown chair that lies on the front porch of the base facing the most bewildering view of the mountains. I sit here daily and I am still perplexed at the beauty that has been interwoven through these peaks.
Here on the race I hear people frequently say phrases like, “While God was making this He was thinking of you,” or “He knew that you would see this creation one day.” And while this sounds remarkably within the character of God seen throughout the entire Bible, I refused to believe that God would create this mountainous view thinking that I would see it one day. That sounds impossible. There are thousands upon thousands of people that have stood in awe of this view, why would He have considered me? It just doesn’t make sense.
So I told Abba that I didn’t believe it. And He told me, “I died for you, why wouldn’t I make mountain ranges for you too? What’s harder for me to do, sacrifice my own life or make mountains stand in complicated beauty before your eyes? Only one of them cost me something.”
And today as I sit on the same porch, in the same chair, with the same view, I am not as baffled with the view as much as I am baffled with my Saviour.
My life didn’t just cost Him something, it cost him everything he has. God left heaven, where angels sang to him “Holy! Holy! Holy!” and put on skin where the crowds shouted to him “Crucify! Crucify! Crucify!” Nails never kept Jesus on the cross, only His love did. Victory wasn’t the reason why He rose, His love was.
Where are the words to describe this scandal of mercy?
They just don’t exist.
And if these words seem all too familiar to you, if you’ve heard them one hundred times growing up, if you sat in so many church pews that these sentences have seemingly become worn from all meaning, I only have one request on my heart to give. Today, in the midst of all the Easter business you might be swimming in, find a pocket of silence, a moment of solitude, and ask God to show you what the Gospel means to Him. Ask him to breath new life and perspective into words that hold so much power. Because our daily victories are found in His empty grave.
Let us never lose sight of the celebration and sacrifice that lie behind the rolled away stone. Let us wake up daily singing to the anthem of unrelenting, undeserved, sacrificial love. Real love.
My feet are dancing freely for you Jesus.
