Everything [in] between Grief & Hope
Everything [in] between: Part 7
Series based on the Narrative Lectionary & Sanctified Art
April 13, 2025 - Easter Sunday
John 20:11-18, Luke 24:1-12
Very early in the morning on the first day of the week, the women went to the tomb, bringing the fragrant spices they had prepared. They found the stone rolled away from the tomb, but when they went in, they didn’t find the body of the Lord Jesus. They didn’t know what to make of this. Suddenly, two men were standing beside them in gleaming bright clothing. The women were frightened and bowed their faces toward the ground, but the men said to them, “Why do you look for the living among the dead? He isn’t here, but has been raised. Remember what he told you while he was still in Galilee, that the Human One must be handed over to sinners, be crucified, and on the third day rise again.” Then they remembered his words. When they returned from the tomb, they reported all these things to the eleven and all the others. It was Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James, and the other women with them who told these things to the apostles. Their words struck the apostles as nonsense, and they didn’t believe the women. But Peter ran to the tomb. When he bent over to look inside, he saw only the linen cloth. Then he returned home, wondering what had happened.
Luke 24:1-12 (CEB)
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Reflections written by Rev. Jeff Chu
Grief is liminal, not terminal
What makes an ember of hope flare up into a revivifying fire?
Sometimes it’s a memory.
Then they remembered his words, Luke says of the women who had brought burial spices to Jesus’ tomb. It took outside help, in the form of two angels, and it wasn’t instantaneous. First there was terror, because it’s not every day that otherworldly visitors come calling. But then they received a gentle word: Remember.
Sometimes it’s a testimony.
The spark of the women’s story gave Peter just enough hope to get up, run to the tomb, and seek more for himself.
Sometimes neither memory nor testimony will feel sufficient. The cold cloak of grief may still be too thick, as it was for Jesus’ other friends. To them, the women’s story was λῆρος (leros). My Bible translates that Greek word as “an idle tale,” but I think that lacks oomph. Really, it might be better rendered “nonsense” or “the mutterings of the delirious.”
The other apostles’ incredulity feels so relatable to me, especially in the context of our contemporary lives. In a world beset by so much sorrow, so much suffering, and so much heartbreak, a glimmer of good news can have such a hard time breaking my gloom. A glimpse of beauty, a flash of loveliness, can feel like foolishness amidst so much bad news.
This isn’t to say, of course, that it’s wrong to sit with grief. Our grief deserves our attention, because mourning is a bittersweet memento of love. We need not rank our griefs either. Even when it comes to the pettiest, tiniest things, we need to grieve so that we can make room for the better.
There’s the key, though: our grief cannot become our everything. With memory, testimony, and time, we can recognize that grief is liminal, not terminal. And it need not crowd out other truths: that we have loved and been loved. That we are not alone. That there is still hope in the land of the living.
