Ok - I find some of this kind of questionable and even offensive but it's what I got for today.  If you start to get offended, please just skip to the prayer at the bottom, or maybe even better yet, just close it down and come back again tomorrow, when apparently we'll have a nice haiku about thunderstorms and hail.

This comes off the title of a piece from the Plough email - What Do You Do With A Dead Jesus?  The disciples were hiding out, the women were gathering spices, and finally some guy named Joseph went and got the body and put it in the tomb where his body was meant to be laid. So there's a lot to think about there, but for me it also kind of begs the question, what do you do with a live Jesus?  So here goes -

 

Strictly speaking it seems to me like the pre-crucifixion Jesus couldn't do squat,

  (yes, kind of offensive, and of course there were the miracles - exceptions that prove the point?)

and the post resurrection Jesus still couldn't really do squat,

  (let's be honest - there were no crowds of angels, 

   there was no white robe or sparkling aura, 

   the disciples on the way to Emmaus didn't recognize him, 

   Mary thought he was the gardener, for Pete's sake)

EXCEPT love and suffer.

  Love and keep on suffering,

    Suffer and keep on loving -

and he did/does it like no one else ever

because he was/is the Child of God and that's what God does -

  Loves and keeps on suffering,

    Suffers and keeps on loving.

 

So when Jesus says, as he is going to one of these days, "The power of the Universe is given to me and I'm ready to hand it off to you", think twice before you say "Oh - here I am, pick me, pick me,"  because that's the power he has to give -

  to love and keep on suffering,

    to suffer and keep on loving.

 

At least that's how I see it today.

Let us pray -

 Long-suffering God, 

it breaks our hearts how much suffering we cause you

and how long we have been doing it.

And we can scarcely believe that you would love us still.

We begin this day trying our best to believe in that love

and to let it encourage and inspire us to live our best life today.

May we even bring some joy to your heart

and some blessing to your Creation.