Hobbled & Victorious

It happened almost overnight. One day we’re arguing about taxes, jobs and presidential elections. The next we are wondering who else will lose their job - or maybe their life … and looking for which store still has toilet paper.

Again with little notice, we are told to “stay safe at home.” Introverts are breathing a sigh of relief; extroverts are crowded on the internet to stay sane … no meetings, no school, no socializing, no eating out. “No” to just about everything. 

And Easter is coming. 

Yet how will the good news of Jesus’ death and resurrection be known – experienced – this Easter when we must be separated from each other? Many of our churches are offering worship, preaching and Bible studies via the internet, and I’m really proud of these efforts. But most of us, even the introverts, agree: it’s not the same. It feels weird. We really seem hobbled.

But we’ve been here before.

After Jesus’ crucifixion and resurrection, the first Christ-followers were locked away at home, afraid, because of circumstances beyond their control (John 20:19). It seems likely they, too, felt hobbled and wondered how this Good News could ever get out. They probably felt that God was hobbled in the very act of raising Jesus to life because those who knew about it had to stay safe at home.

But God wasn’t hobbled then. God was victorious over sin, death, and barriers to getting the message out. God will not be hobbled now either. 

This Easter season, we are called to put the message of God’s love in Jesus out there any and every way we can, as best we can, despite the feeling of being hobbled or hampered. We are also called to trust God for the outcome in the midst of feeling hobbled.

David C. Long reminds us,“We live within this paradox, called to trust God regardless of the circumstances over which God has control.” (The Quest for Holiness: from Casual Conviction to Courageous Faith, Franklin, Tennessee: Seedbed Publishing, 2020, p. 49).

We may be hobbled this Easter, but God will be victorious again over illness, fear and death in new ways among people around us.

~ Patti Duckworth, Associate Executive Minister Mission Northwest