News from the Tomb

If you ask me where I’ve been, I’ll tell you, “In the tomb.”

My amateur blogging career is sporadic at best. I started blogging as part of a 2013 New Year’s Resolution. My resolution was to blog at least once a month and only blog if I actually had something worth reading. That lasted a few months, then life got hard and I went underground. Then life got really, really hard and went to the tomb.

I went to the tomb the day my marriage surprisingly and suddenly ended. I went into the tomb the day my life partner of nine-years left, the day my hope for a family died, the day my life as I knew it died. I went and crawled up next to a dead Jesus, cried, and died myself.

My faith died in that tomb. Who I thought I was as a wife died in that tomb. My hopes and dreams died in that tomb. A life I had spent my adulthood building died in that tomb. My closest friendships died in that tomb. And I spent months, depressed, sleeping, crying in that tomb. Some days, Jesus and I talked, but most of the time, things were just dead. I spent a lot of time in bed and I spent a lot of time staring at a blank wall in my therapist’s office - which, incidentally, is painted tomb-color.

For those of you following the RCL readings for Holy Week, you will know that on Tuesday, we read these words from the Gospel of John, Chapter 12.

Jesus said, “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. Very truly, I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. Those who love their life lose it, and those who hate their life in this world will keep it for eternal life. Whoever serves me must follow me, and where I am, there will my servant be also.

-John 12: 23-26, NRSV

Earlier this week, my therapist and I met to bury my marriage. We gathered on the outskirts of the cemetery, thirty-feet away from tombstones which read, “Love always” and “Together Forever” and “Love Endures.” I could have closed my eyes and thrown a rock and hit engraved, intertwined wedding bands on a tombstone in whatever direction I chose. Even the “Lovins” were buried within our line of vision. I can't make this stuff up.

I sat on cold dark earth with a shovel in my hand overlooking a valley filled with wind-blown, winter cemetery trash and dead trees not-quite-yet budding blooms of spring. My therapist said some words. I looked at her and said, “This is ridiculous.. Are we in a Lifetime movie?”

And then, I started weeding. Tearing out the way in which things terribly and tragically ended. Throwing out unwanted trash of the dark pieces of my soul. Remembering how I was uprooted. Destroying the shame of being divorced. Digging out the ways I was made to feel responsible. And I dug and dug deeper and deeper into my anger, sadness, grief, fear, and darkness.

I planted a bulb. A dormant vine of hope in the middle of a hopeless winter. A seed which contained beauty and love. A seed which remembered laughter, love, joy, and life; a seed that is laughter, love, joy, and life; a seed that will be laughter, love, joy, and life.  And I gave thanks for all the ways my marriage held laughter, love, joy, and life. For my current relationships of laughter, love, joy, and life. And for the ways I hope to find those relationships in the future.

I buried the bulb. Amidst dark earth I buried the anger, sadness, grief, fear, and darkness I had just un-dug. I prayed with all my heart, that in the depth of that large, recently dug hole, new life would sprout forth again for both myself and my former husband.

I watered. I poured clean water over the sins of the past. I washed away hatred. I asked for forgiveness. And I looked forward to spring - new life, new growth, new beauty.

It no longer felt like a Lifetime movie, it felt real. And I thought, “That Jesus, he really knew what he was talking about.” He knew what he was talking about when he said, “Very truly, I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls to the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. Those who love their life lose it, and those who hate their life this world will keep it for eternal life. Whoever serves me must follow me, and where I am, there my servant will be also.”

Easter is on it’s way. New life, resurrection, are on their way. I know because I’ve seen Jesus in the tomb. But I also know, he didn’t stay there for long and he didn’t allow me to stay there for long.  I know because I've been there and I believe. I believe in Jesus Christ who suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died and buried. Who descended into the dead. On the third day he rose again, and is seated at the right hand of the Father. I believe in the Holy Spirit, the holy catholic church, the forgiveness of sin, the resurrection of the body, and life everlasting.

If you need proof, there’s a vine on the outside of a cemetery about to sprout up. The packaging on the bulb said, “Guaranteed.”