Weaving for the Resurrection

I’ve been walking in the wilderness the last couple of weeks.  Like the ancient Israelites, my mood has been alternatively despairing, angry, resolute, back to despairing.  My nights have been sleepless and more than a few tears have been shed.  In the midst of it, I’ve been trying to set a patient, calm, “God will find a way” example for the members of my local United Methodist church.

Amidst it all, I still must weave.  I weave ahead of the season.  So even though my mood has been in lenten purple, my weaving is in Easter white and gold.  I weave, but my heart hasn’t been in it.

Tonight I read a post from a Christian blogger - one with thousands of followers.  She was explaining her recent silence, saying that she lost her son to mental illness in January.  I can only imagine that kind of heartbreak.

And then I thought about the parents who live in fear of that heartbreak.  Parents of gay, lesbian and transgender children - children who live in confusion and despair, because they’ve been told that somehow God does not love them the way they’re made, and if they seek out loving relationships in their lives, then God will condemn them for it. I thought of the parents who have experienced that heartbreak because their children have chosen to live out their lives in fullness and truth - and who have lost their lives to violence because of that.  And I realize I have no time to despair.  I must be about the Father’s business.

Because however the pharisees choose to live according to their interpretation of God’s law and force it on others, Jesus calls us to just two.  Both grounded in love, he lived and died by that example.  And whatever happens to the United Methodist Church, or even in my local church, resurrection is not just possible, it’s inevitable.  Because of all of the infinite things that God is, infinitely persistent is one of them.

So I weave - in hope and certainty of the resurrection.

“For I know the plans I have for you” declares the Lord, 
“plans to prosper you and not to harm you, 
plans to give you hope and a future.”