What was it like for you
In that first week following your dying and rising?
You were alive – not again –
But more alive than any human being had ever been.
Does the world look different, feel different, smell different?
You are risen, but still interacting in the same old places
With the same often confused and frightened folks who
Nonetheless love you.
What was it like?
Your talks with your Abba; they couldn’t have been
More frequent, you were always in touch;
But were they stereo over mono now?
Digital over analog? Millions of colors bright?
What did you think about this week?
The wounds are still visible in your body.
Do your muscles, your bones, still ache
With the memory of last Friday? Do your
Nerves still cry out in old agony, or
Is all that transfigured into a more-than-physical
Shout of joy? (A shout that has only a beginning,
And no end).
You went through all this for ordinary people.
Shouldn’t it change us too? Even now?
Help us, Jesus, to lean into your heart and hear
The beat; to take your hand, wound and all;
To delight both in your appearing and your vanishing
For all of it is somehow revelation of how it is for you
This week, this eternal week
In which we join you, even if we know not how.
~ John McGinty
April 4, 2018
The Incredulity of Thomas,
by Caravaggio, 1602
Believe it. 