Sixth Easter

Yesterday at the Easter service I held my big six year-old boy in my arms during the first hymn.  Henry still likes to be held during hymns--it is a precious ritual--but he’s getting heavy, so I usually tell him Daddy will hold him.  But March is a month of remembering, and I could not help but remember Easter six years ago when I held my son Henry--a tiny red-faced bundle, opening his mouth and rooting for his mommy every few hours.   He was one-week baptized and my body still reminded me of his recent delivery. 

And my heart was still newly-aching from my brother’s death.

Resurrection Sunday either meant more to me than it ever had before, or it meant absolutely nothing.  

That Easter and every Easter since (even in Germany, in German) we’ve sung the new hymn In Christ Alone by Getty and Townsend. I think it was written for me, truly.  In March of 2007, the space of three days held my brother’s final breath and my son’s first cry.  In the ugly face of suicide I cry out to be reminded that “No power of hell, no scheme of man can ever pluck me [or Tim or my own precious children] from God’s hand.” 

Tim was buried the day after Easter. It was raining.  I nursed Henry under my coat and some who were there didn’t even notice him.  

I cannot write today about the end of Tim’s life; I cannot reconcile all the bad things with all the truth, truth that he knew, but that could not sway his actions.  But I can write about the rest of the story.  There is no sin that Christ’s blood cannot pay for.  And though Tim ended his life in a terrible way, even he knew that he was in Christ’s arms.

“See you on the other side.”

We had it carved on his grave stone that it was not Tim who took the blame.  It was Christ.  “Presented faultless”--an excerpt from Tim’s favorite book, Jude.  

If Christ had not died, if Christ did not become alive again, I would have no hope for my brother, let alone myself.  But as it is, Christ did rise, and Tim is one of many who is not forgotten . . .not forgotten by his family and friends here, but even more importantly, not forgotten by his Savior.  

Today Elisabeth, Henry and I read from John 20, about John and Peter running to the tomb and finding that Jesus was not there.  The expensive grave clothes were still there, so it was no grave robbery.  Jesus was alive, and they would soon see him.  I asked Henry to draw a picture of the story.  As usual he was very worried to draw a picture, afraid it wouldn’t look right.  But eventually his inhibitions left him, and he drew the empty tomb, grass, Peter and John . . .  And then he said, “I wrote ‘Henry’ on Peter’s shirt. I wrote ‘Mommy’ on John’s shirt.”  I don’t know why he did that, but maybe he just wanted to be there with Peter and John--to see the empty tomb himself.  To be a witness to the risen Christ.

And indeed he is.

On Henry’s birthday two weeks ago I sang to him the song by Michael Card that was so important to me in his babyhood days:

Welcome now little stranger, to a world full of wonder,

Filled full of the fragrance of life’s sweet bouquet.

But dear one, take warning

That birth’s like a morning

To a lifetime that flies past like one single day.

Soak up like a sponge all that’s joyful and best

And squeeze yourself out upon those who are blessed. 

A God-given gift has been wrapped up in you

You show more of Him than I’ll ever teach you.

Welcome now, little stranger

To a world filled with wonder

To a world torn asunder

To a world that’s in pain.
My son, life’s a battle, so you be a rebel.  

Stand ready to fight and never stop loving the light.