Embracing My Irrational Faith in LOVE & the RESURRECTION

I am a rational person who embraces science and I believe in the resurrection. 

Let’s start again. I AM a rational person. I can hear my husband laughing right now as I type these words, because he’s seen me lose my cool once or twice. Ignore his laughter; I am rational! Example: when I worry about my kids contracting some horrible childhood illness, I look up the statistical likelihood of someone actually getting that illness. Then, I embrace the rational numbers and move on with my day.  

When it comes to my faith, I also tend to be level headed. I don’t get hung up on virgin births or single miracle stories. Jesus walking on water? Powerful metaphor, but I am not concerned if it happened or not. I’m  the first person to admit I think the Bible is riddled with mistakes and even some blatant mistruths. There are no biblical handbooks with statistics to reference there are for childhood illnesses, but I try to embrace the large sweep of love present in the Bible as my rational guide to faith. 

And I believe in the resurrection. In fact, I believe in the resurrection hook, line, and sinker. Literally. From a 21st century scientific perspective this is utterly irrational. Perhaps this is just faith. Perhaps this is just hopeful thinking. I’m not sure. But there it is. The belief that Jesus was dead and three days later walked out of the grave, appeared to the women, stuck out his bloody hands to Thomas to reassure him, and then ate fish beside the sea shore with the other disciples who had fled and gone back to business as usual. Yes, I believe it all. 
 
A faithful companion along the journey commented: “Sorry, Abby, I can’t worship a zombie.” I respect that and even find the comment comically accurate. So why do I believe in the resurrection? I don’t have an answer. At least not a good answer. I can only offer the following:

I believe in God and for this reason, I believe in hope, even when realistic people tell me to be hopeless. I gave up believing that God could single-handedly rescue starving orphans, Haitians from earthquakes, mothers with debilitating depression, victims of violence, struggling families, or trauma survivors tormented by nightmares. So if I believe in a powerless God and every day I encounter the utter brokenness of this world, then what’s the point? I am left with no choice than to believe in a God who does something! 
 
I believe in a God who loves.

 I believe in a God whose love is more powerful, more healing, and more creative than anything we broken humans can imagine.
 
I believe in a God who invites us into a dance of co-creating love. 

I believe in a God whose love is active in this world through this dance of co-creation.
 
I believe in a God who grants hope to the hopeless. Real hope. 
 
What does this have to do with the resurrection? The resurrection is the ultimate expression of God’s co-creating love.

God did not possess the sort of military power that could defeat the systematically violent Roman Empire. Hence Jesus died a brutal death on the cross. But God did possess the power of co-creating love that sprang Jesus from the grave. Together, Jesus and God defeated suffering and death with this co-creating love. The resurrection, the defeat of the grave, continues to offer today the final word: Love!
 
This final word gives me hope for the starving orphan, the depressed parent, the individual facing PTSD after a childhood filled with violence, the cancer patient, the Palestinian and Israeli leaders trying to rebuild their communities in peace. The resurrection calls me to dance with love on my darkest days, when I am sure there is only suffering to be found. The resurrection calls me to co-create in this world, instead of sitting and weeping. The resurrection calls me to roll up my sleeves, to pull out my checkbook, to fall to my knees, to utter a prayer, to hold on. The resurrection is God’s final proof that love is more powerful than anything else, even evil, even death.
 
I know that what I believe can be questioned. Pure rationalists can poke holes in my truth. I don’t care. It’s what I believe. It’s the faith of one broken disciple, a 21st century pastor following Jesus, placing one foot in front of the other on the journey, and feeling powerlessness yield to an even greater power—love.  

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