A Good Thing Going

Bev and I had an amazing opportunity to go and interview for a job in the Midwest. We would have left Friday morning and returned Tuesday. We decided to take a pass on it, which was a very difficult decision. It was not so much deciding we didn’t want to go, but more that we wanted to stay. I have a much better understanding that when you have difficult decisions to make, share those with people you love and trust and ask people to bathe it in prayer. Quaker circles, if you have time! We had our family over on Sunday and we ate and drank and laughed and tossed it all around, and one look into the backyard to see my children laughing-roaring-with their beloved cousins, just nudged my heart to the truth I knew I was fighting all along. I really, really wanted to go, this is true, but I now know what it means to be called to stay. And we have peace. Deep peace. Christ has Risen! He Has Risen Indeed!

One other factor that I thought was minor was the fact that we were going to be away from our children over Easter. For quite a few years we gather with people from our community on Easter Sunday at Crescent Beach in White Rock. At 7:00 a.m. And the weather usually is brutal and cold. Think rain-sideways. And the thought that I might miss that and that my girls might miss that told me something about what we have going on here. Christ has Risen! He has Risen Indeed.

And my nephew Michael, who has wisdom beyond his years and whom I trust deeply, made an offhand comment that stuck in our gut: “We have a good thing going here.” And that churned in my gut as I thought of those good things and wanting my children to participate in them. It wasn’t choosing against the possibility of a wonderful place, but choosing this place. These people. This community. The rich communion of these saints. Christ has Risen! He Has Risen Indeed!

At this time of year I can not help but think back to 5:00 a.m. on Easter morning in 1995, when my brother-in-law Mike woke us out of bed and said “Have you heard the news?” and I stumbled out of my sleep and said, “What? What News?” And he said with child-like glee “He’s come back. He is back.!” And me, in a state of confusion, had no idea what was going on, “Who? What are you talking about?” “Jesus, Jesus is back. He has returned. He has risen!” And for a few seconds in the spring of 1995 my heart leaped like it rarely has in my life, because in my heart of hearts that morning, for a few brief seconds, I really believed that Christ had returned once and for all. It really was finished--and all at once just beginning. I remember believing it long enough to have a sense of disappointment that He hadn’t come to Montana yet! And as I type this I smile because that was such an intense and almost intimate moment of my life. To this day, that morning was one of the favorite mornings of my life, because I believed it so deeply. And I pray that I may believe that deeply again. And then I remember, Christ has Risen! He has Risen Indeed!