Always -- and Forever

The longer we live the more aware we are of the shortness of this life we live, and the more aware we are of a sense of loss and of loneliness as those whom we have loved and lived among leave us one by one. And ever in the background we are aware of the questions that confront all men: Where are they? What lies beyond? Shall we know them as we knew them here?

The event to which each Easter day is dedicated is the assurance that we shall⎯the reality of the resurrection of Jesus the Christ, and, through him, of all others also. We read of it in scripture. We sing of it in song. We speak of it in sermon. We hold to it with full faith, but not perhaps without a gnawing wish that we could see it more certainly; nor, in a sense, without wishing that we had seen with our eyes and touched with our hands as did Thomas.

But when all the evidence is before us it doesn’t test our faith too far. True, we don’t know how it will all be brought about. There are unanswered questions. There are difficulties that may seem insurmountable. But how many unanswered questions are there concerning other things that are all around us? How can we account for the fact that we are, that we feel, that we love, that we live? How can we account for unnumbered billions of stars that are kept in their course? for the constancy of the sun and of the seasons? for the awesome miracle of a baby’s birth? for the inborn instinct of animals?

If we had never seen spring return would it not require a far-reaching of our faith to imagine that it might be so? If we had never seen trees that seemed dead one day, break forth into full flower⎯if we had never seen these before our eyes, these things which we have come to call commonplace⎯to accept them could require a far reach of our faith.

With ten times ten thousand questions that we cannot answer even about the things we can feel and touch and see, it is but a little further reach of faith to accept the reality of the resurrection and the assurance of everlasting life, and to trust Him who gave us life, to provide the way for us to see and know and live again with those we love⎯always and forever.