“Stay in control” is such a theme in our lives.  Schedules and lists march through our days on their stouthearted quest for order.  What is unexpected or insurgent can be kept at bay with vigilance.  The threats to our fragile sense of direction are many.  We choose a goal, since almost any goal is better than drifting and wasting our lives.  Stay focused.  Try to make sense of things no matter how troubling they seem at first.  Look for reasons, since what doesn’t make sense can’t mean very much.  Ignore or screen out what we can’t control.  Even if my life sways like a raft at sea, at least I can avert my eyes from those surging waters.  My smallness can be terrifying.  Better not to see.

The tomb is empty. And he lives.

On Easter, we come face to face with the anomaly and it won’t go away.  We try.  There is plenty to do after all.  Coloring eggs, shoes that match, brunch, will it rain, the photographs, ham or turkey, your house or mine?  We can just sing Alleluia a little louder.  When the waves crash down upon us, we stay busy and keep our eyes averted.  Till the danger’s past.

Scared and alone, they went to the tomb that Easter morning.  Being with the dead body of the man they loved was the least lonely place in the world.  But the tomb was empty.  Now what do we do?  Now what do we think?  In the empty tomb, on the road to Emmaus, in the upper room, Jesus spoke, showed his face, shared their food, and opened their eyes.  In what is unaccountable, this saving love, we learn to see.  He lives.  And we do not have to be afraid.

Jesus does not leave us with an empty tomb, linen wrappings, and a rumor of his coming.  He lives.  And we are not left alone to figure it all out.  A truth that cannot be encompassed by logic or order.  A truth that does not devour our smallness.  A person.  What must be lived.