SPICES AND HOPE, AN OFFERING
“At daybreak on the first day of the week the women who had come from Galilee with Jesus took the spices they had prepared and went to the tomb. They found the stone rolled away from the tomb; but when they entered, they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus.” - Luke 24:1-3
With eyes squinting at the clock, an awareness of our bodies aches and pains, and the hangover of grief thick in our minds - bodies and minds slowly awaken on that first morning after a traumatic experience. For a brief moment, we wonder “was it all a dream?” Perhaps our loved one is still alive, not really dead. Maybe the tragedy that ripped our world in two, was all a horrible nightmare. And gradually we remember the horror, the shock, the tears, the anger. And yes, this was real. It was all very real.
Maybe it is the laundry, the piles of paperwork needing to be handled, or the necessities of food and daily living that draw us into action. One foot in front of the next. In our grief and trauma, we begin to move through the present world again. Hopeless, lost, and alone - what else must have swirled through the minds of the apostles on that next morning?
Prepare the spices. The disciples struggled to make sense of the events of Good Friday and the brutal murder of Jesus. Even in this state of fear and confusion, the women in today’s Gospel could not allow the body of Jesus to lay there without proper burial rites. They prepared the spices and brought them to the tomb. They could not change the reality of death, but they could in their own way, ensure the dignity of the body and the rituals of faith were carried out as best as possible.
Jesus first appeared to those who took one step forward. I hold in my hands the spices of anointing. With these spices, I hold my deep longing, my wishes for things to be different, my frustrations with the things that do not go my way. These are ordinary spices, the stuff of my everyday living and loving, waiting to be placed in the tomb with Jesus, and offered up. I stand before the tomb, hands open, offering prepared.
And like always, Jesus is already there.
Jen Coito