A continuation of last week’s post: At the Cross. An imagining of Johanna’s experience of Easter and its aftermath based on Matthew 28:1-10; Mark 16:1-8; Luke 24:1-12, 33-53; and John 20:1-22.
In the days following that first Resurrection Day when she had gone with the Marys to the tomb and found it empty, Johanna spent a lot of time reflecting on the new shape of her life.
Up to the point when Jesus had healed her, her story read as a series of losses. While the miscarriages had wounded her, it was the hemorrhaging that had compounded that pain and infected it with shame. Her world had shrunk as she felt forced to forgo the companionship of her women friends, and most public gatherings. Even Samuel’s steadfast optimism, always sure that the next doctor would be able to offer a cure, had begun to crush her as the accumulation of medical failures urged her to believe her condition hopeless. In sum, it had been a gouging out process. Her very soul was leaking out as her body continued to bleed.
Then Jesus had healed her and all the empty spaces filled to overflowing. Once again her life brimmed with companionship, now infused with great purpose as she joined the women who also followed and served Jesus. She had thought, at first, that Jesus had meant to give her her life back, but soon she had realized that the gift was actually a larger life.
It was from this larger life that the crucifixion had gouged out all sense of her being, save the habit of women to do what must be done in times of catastrophe. Now that she had seen Jesus alive again, it was hard to reclaim the horror of that hollowness. Even that initial frustration with the men who could not believe them at first, dimmed in the light of His exhilarating realness.
At the cross, she would have welcomed death. What hope could make life valuable after such a loss?
Now that death itself lay slain, life held more value than ever. Her rejoicing was not the silly euphoria that too much wine can evoke for a moment. Jesus had not returned merely for her reassurance. He had work for her, for all of them. She suspected that it would be hard, but He had promised them help.
With a smile on her face that beamed forth from her heart, Johanna sighed. “And now we wait here together and see what happens next.”
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