Being a Resurrection People

(A Newsletter Article I think applies most days, not just in Easter season)

There was a show on the Learning Channel I loved to watch called Trading Spaces. On this show friends or neighbors trade houses for the weekend. With the help of an interior designer and carpenter they would make over a room in the house. The final reveal was the best as they showed before and after pictures of the room. What I think drew me to the show was how much a room could be transformed with a couple of days work, a limited budget and some creativity. What was even more fun was the reaction of the people whose house it was when they finally got to see the room. Except for the time a designer used hay to wallpaper the walls, the residents typically responded with joy and awe. These rooms had a new mood, a new vitality breathed into them allowing the residents to see them in a new way.

We have just entered Easter season, a time when we celebrate the resurrection. If you think about it, we are a bit like the houses on Trading Spaces. We all have areas in our lives that could benefit from some sprucing up, a little time, attention, and creativity. Just as the designers are able to see something they can work with in the rooms and furnishings they are faced with, the Resurrection announces that God hasn’t given up on the world. Like the residents, we respond in joy that God sees something worth redeeming, restoring, and renewing in the world, in you, and in me. With love and a plan God clears the way for all things to be made new.

A line from the Rule of St. Benedict is “Always we begin again”. One of the vows in Benedictine life is a commitment to ongoing transformation and recognition that we never fully arrive at the destination, we are always on a journey. When it comes to the resurrection and the renewing power of God we are living in a world with endless possibilities. Certainly there are times of large transformation, healing, and renewal in our lives. However, I think if we look only for the big changes we may miss the more subtle, daily instances of resurrection in our lives, the daily opportunities we have to begin again, and to let God in again.

As a resurrection People, I think our task is to keep looking for ways to roll away the stone so we rediscover Christ’s resurrection and it’s meaning for us. We keep rolling away the stone and we also discover where we are being called to begin again and discover our own daily opportunities for resurrection.

Bishop Todd, in his Easter Message, put it this way: every time we love again, trust again, and hope again we share in the power of the resurrection. I would say that we also share in the power of the resurrection each time we help someone else to love again, trust again, and hope again. What if during this Easter Season we were called to engage in a cosmic version of Trading Spaces? Which of our “rooms” might God want to give a make-over? Is there a friend who can help us? Is there a friend who’s room needs a helping hand?

This Easter season may we be resurrection people who continue to see opportunities for renewal in our midst, responding to them with joy.

Easter Blessings, Lori+