Looking Back at Easter
Peter Rollins’ tells a story about this in his book The Orthodox Heretic called “Being the Resurrection.” Here it is.
“Late that evening a group of unknown disciples packed their few belongings and left for a distant shore, for they could not bear to stay another moment in the place where their Messiah had just been crucified. Weighed down with sorrow, they left that place, never to return. Instead they traveled a great distance in search of a land that they could call home.
After months of difficult travel, they finally happened upon an isolated area that was ideal for setting up a new community. Here they found fertile ground, clean water, and a nearby forest from which to harvest material needed to build shelter. So they settled there, founding a community far from Jerusalem, a community where they vowed to keep the memory of Christ alive and live in simplicity, love, and forgiveness, just as he had taught them. The members of this community lived in great solitude for over a hundred years, spending their days reflecting on the life of Jesus and attempting to remain faithful to his ways. And they did all this despite the overwhelming sorrow in their heart.
But their isolation was eventually broken when, early one morning, a small band of missionaries reached the settlement. These missionaries were amazed at the community they found. What was most startling to them was that these people had no knowledge of the resurrection…of Christ, for they had left Jerusalem before his return from the dead on the third day. Without hesitation, the missionaries gathered together all the community members and recounted what had occurred after the imprisonment and bloody crucifixion of their Lord.
That evening there was a great celebration in the camp as people celebrated the news of the missionaries. Yet, as the night progressed, one of the missionaries noticed that the leader of the community was absent. This bothered the young man, so he set out to look for this respected elder. Eventually he found the community’s leader crouched low in a small hut on the fringe of the village, praying and weeping. “Why are you in such sorrow?” asked the missionary in amazement. “Today is a time for great celebration.”
“It may indeed be a day for great celebration, but this is also a day of sorrow,” replied the elder, who remained crouched on the floor. “Since the founding of this community we have followed the ways taught to us by Christ. We pursued his ways faithfully even though it cost us dearly, and we remained resolute despite the belief that death had defeated him and would one day defeat us also.”
The elder slowly got to his feet and looked the missionary compassionately in the eyes. “Each day we have forsaken our very lives for him because we judged him wholly worthy of the sacrifice, wholly worthy of our being. But now, following your news, I am concerned that my children and my children’s children may follow him, not because of his radical life and supreme sacrifice, but selfishly, because his sacrifice will ensure their personal salvation and eternal life.” With this the elder turned and left the hut, making his way to the celebrations that could be heard dimly in the distance, leaving the missionary crouched on the floor.”
Living Its Meaning
For many of us, Easter has become similar to Christmas is in that what the day means isn’t what the day means. Christmas is a season of consumerism and stress instead of what it’s really about: peace, presence, and humility. Christmas has become what it’s not. It’s the same with Easter.
Rollins’ story about the island community and the missionaries illustrates this well. The community had never heard of the resurrection yet were living its meaning.
As the story says, the island community was living in “simplicity, love, and forgiveness.” They were also “spending their days reflecting on the life of Jesus and attempting to remain faithful to his ways.”
Why were they living their life this way? Because it’s how Jesus lived. It’s what he taught and it’s what he lived. They were inspired by and committed to this way of living.
I believe they also lived this way because it made them healthier people. Living in simplicity, love, and forgiveness makes us more compassionate, just, peaceful, content, kind, gracious, wise, trusting, and empathetic. It also makes you less judgmental, manipulative, controlling, violent, and resentful.
Universal Trauma
Their lives weren’t pain free. The story says they were “overwhelmed with sorrow.” This means they were grieving the loss of Jesus, but it was more than that. I believe the bigger idea of “overwhelmed with sorrow” means their lives included plenty of sorrow, pain, disappointment, and trauma—to the point that it overwhelmed them at times. The individuals that made up this community had experienced both the particular trauma of watching their friend and teacher die but also the universal experience of the trauma of life overall.
People were surely grieving the death of people besides Jesus, right? I mean, their community was 100 years old, which is plenty of time for children to grieve the loss of their parents, for parents to grieve the loss of their children, for the community as a whole to grieve the loss of friends, family members, and neighbors. Maybe some of the children born on the island were born with life-threatening birth defects? Maybe some experienced painful separation from their romantic partners? Maybe some had mental health issues that made life unbearable at times?
We all have unique and specific traumas that can overwhelm us with sorrow. We’re also all doing this thing called “life” that, at a basic level, is traumatic in a way that’s universal to everyone. Our individual stories may differ in certain ways, but the bigger picture is we’re all walking a path that includes plenty of good but also plenty sorrow, pain, disappointment, and trauma.
Good Friday says sorrow and trauma are very much a part of lives. We must not pretend it’s not true by denying its reality or repressing its pain, because if we do, we may feel better initially, but in the long run, we’ll feel worse. In other words, at some point we’ll feel the pain—just not in a way that heals us.
Denying trauma’s reality and repressing its pain doesn’t make it go away; it just makes it come out in maladaptive and unhealthy ways. In ways like addiction, chronic-distraction, violence, materialism, workaholism, bitterness, and surface-level living, etc.
Unless we embrace our pain and grieve or sorrows, we’ll tend to use and abuse others as away to distract ourselves from our inner turmoil. When we make “the other” the main reason for our troubles, it’s often time to look inside ourselves to see what pain we’re repressing.
This is one of the lessons of Good Friday. People made Jesus the scapegoat for their personal and societal traumas. In other words, instead of looking within themselves to see how they might grieve their losses and heal their pain—instead of looking within themselves to see how they might love themselves and others better—they projected their inner angst onto someone they deemed threatening. “If we kill him, we’ll be good; we’ll be at peace.” And yet after his death, they were in the same place they were before—only worse (they’d crucified someone).
Wounded Healers
That’s what the elder of the island community was afraid of. He wasn’t afraid of the reality of the resurrection itself; he was afraid that the resurrection would come to mean what it doesn’t mean.
What resurrection means for so many is the denial of trauma—that somehow the hope of new life defeats suffering rather than embraces it. That somehow the hope of new life overcomes suffering rather than gives it new meaning.
Sorrow, pain, disappointment, loss, and trauma: these aren’t meant to be “defeated” or “overcome.” They’re meant to be grieved—which is painful. They’re meant to be healed—which is a long road. They’re meant to make us more honest and soft-hearted and tolerant and uncertain and needful of others.
That’s new life. That’s resurrection.
The elder worried his people would celebrate the resurrection as a way to defeat trauma instead of embrace it. That they’d stop living as “wounded healers” in need of each other and, instead, as over-comers destined for success above all else.
by Jason Holtgrewe
