THE TIME BETWEEN

And he (Joseph of Arimathea) bought a linen shroud and, taking him (Jesus) down, wrapped him in the linen shroud and laid him in a tomb which had been hewn out of the rock; and he rolled a stone against the door of the tomb.  (Mark 15:46)

Jesus’ body is now safe.  It is safe from the elements.  It is safe from the carnivores.  To our human way of thinking, only time and decay can break his body down any more.  He is behind the stone.  He is dead and buried.

Today we visit tombs as if somehow that person’s spirit lingers nears and hears our questions and sees our tears.  Our rational mind knows it is not true, but rationalism does not drive us to walk in graveyards.  Some may call it emotionalism, of which there is a certain amount.  Others call it being delusional, driven by the need or desire to have that person close to us again.

What some will explain away, I will posit as real – we want to connect with the eternal, maybe even the divine.  Somehow, we believe that life does not end with the final breath.  But Death interrupts those desires, so it seems.  Death whispers that this is the end and the grave has spoken the final word.  The connection is severed and no one hears.  All is lost.  All is dead, locked in an impenetrable tomb.

And so it seems.  None of us have seen a dead person come back to life.  Neither had Joseph.  When Joseph maneuvered that stone into that deep groove, it sat immovable.  He was not looking to move it again.  For all intent and purposes, that was the final act.  After a day or two of grieving, we start putting life back together.  We move on and start to construct a new reality.

You protest, “But that is not the whole story!”

True.  It is hard not to look past this part of the story and move on to the REAL climax.  Resurrection Sunday is the big news and we cannot wait to celebrate.  But there is hardly room for celebration if the dead are still dead.

Besides that, we need this time of waiting.  We need the space between death and life, despair and hope.  It is in this time between that Jesus laid buried and all the old ways, the old traditions, and even the old law laid buried as well.  We not only grieve Jesus’ passing, but we grieve the loss of what was tradition and religion.  It was what we knew.  But it has come to an end in his death.

It is this way so that come the dawn of the third day, not only does Jesus come alive – and with him hope and joy and laughter – but something new will be born with him.  All the old will not be resurrected. A new covenant is ratified, a new people are formed, and new life comes, not through the law, but through the Holy Spirit.  We will be people of the resurrection come Sunday.

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he or she IS a new creation.  The old is gone!  The new is here now!  Paul writing his second letter to the Corinthians, chapter 5, verse 17.

But for this day, we live in the time between…and we wait.