Mary stood outside the tomb crying. As she wept, she bent over to look into the tomb and saw two angels in white, seated where Jesus’ body had been, one at the head and the other at the foot.

They asked her, “Woman, why are you crying?”

“They have taken my Lord away,” she said, “and I don’t know where they have put him.”

At this, Mary turned around and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not realize that it was him.

“Woman,” he said, “why are you crying? Who is it you are looking for?”

Thinking he was the gardener, she said, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have put him, and I will get him.”

Jesus said to her, “Mary.”

She turned toward him and cried out in Aramaic, “Rabboni!” (which means Teacher).

Jesus said, “Do not hold on to me, for I have not yet returned to the Father. Go instead to my brothers and tell them, “I am returning to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.”

Mary Magdalene went to the disciples with the news: “I have seen the Lord!” And she told them that he had said these things to her (from John 20:11-18).

***

Ever since I was a small child, I knew that Jesus died for my sins, but He seemed like someone who “was”. For most of my life I was like Mary in the way that I didn’t recognize Jesus when He stood before me “knocking on the door of my heart”. Instead, I tried harder on my own to overcome my faults and trials, and I strived twice as hard to be noticed and accepted by God and others. Then one day, I gave up; and that’s when I realized that Jesus is with me.

On this particular day, I became acquainted with the Jesus who “is”. He is alive, all-loving and all-powerful, and He is seated at the right hand of God the Father-far above all rule, authority, principality and power; risen indeed!

Not only did Jesus died for my sins, but He filled me with a new kind of life. It wasn’t something I could buy or earn by trying hard or being “good”. His grace could only be humbly received. So for the first time in my life, I let go and let Jesus transform my despair to hope; my anxiety to inner peace; my harbored pain to forgiveness; my self-protective reclusion to loving others; my need to control my circumstances to trusting Him; my striving to be somebody of worth to resting in who God created me to be; my search for meaning and purpose to finding it in Him.

Now I know Jesus who is both my Savior and my Lord who died for my sins and invites me to follow Him. And as I let His Holy Spirit live through me each day, perhaps someone else might catch a glimpse of Jesus and realize for the first time that He is risen indeed!

“And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am….Don’t you believe that I am in the Father, and that the Father is in me? The words I say to you are not just my own. Rather, it is the Father, living in me, who is doing his work….If you love me, you will obey what I command….But the Counselor, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you” (John 14:3, 10, 15, 26).

***

In John 14, Jesus talks about being with the Father and the Father is in Him while He is on earth with us. When Jesus is resurrected, He is with us and in us in the same way.

Jesus constantly reminds me to keep my eyes fixed on Him; to walk by faith, and not by sight. When my eyes focus on circumstances, I become blinded by what I see, and I lose hope. I grow discouraged and heavy-yokes of oppression and despair drag me down.

When I walk by faith and keep my eyes fixed on Jesus, I live in a peace-filled reality; my life is filled with hope and endless possibilities. It spurs me on to live to the fullness God intended.

“I am the man who has seen affliction
by the rod of his wrath.

 He has driven me away and made me walk
in darkness rather than light;

 indeed, he has turned his hand against me
again and again, all day long.

 He has made my skin and my flesh grow old
and has broken my bones.

 He has besieged me and surrounded me
with bitterness and hardship.

 He has made me dwell in darkness
like those long dead.

 He has walled me in so I cannot escape;
he has weighed me down with chains.

 Even when I call out or cry for help,
he shuts out my prayer.

 He has barred my way with blocks of stone;
he has made my paths crooked.

 Like a bear lying in wait,
like a lion in hiding,

 he dragged me from the path and mangled me
and left me without help.

 He drew his bow
and made me the target for his arrows.

 He pierced my heart
with arrows from his quiver.

 I became the laughingstock of all my people;
they mock me in song all day long.

 He has filled me with bitter herbs
and sated me with gall.

 He has broken my teeth with gravel;
he has trampled me in the dust.

 I have been deprived of peace;
I have forgotten what prosperity is.

 So I say, “My splendor is gone
and all that I had hoped from the LORD.”

 I remember my affliction and my wandering,
the bitterness and the gall.

 I well remember them,
and my soul is downcast within me.

 Yet this I call to mind
and therefore I have hope:

 Because of the LORD’s great love we are not consumed,
for his compassions never fail.

 They are new every morning;
great is your faithfulness.

 I say to myself, “The LORD is my portion;
therefore I will wait for him.”

 The LORD is good to those whose hope is in him,
to the one who seeks him;

 it is good to wait quietly
for the salvation of the LORD.

 It is good for a man to bear the yoke
while he is young.

 Let him sit alone in silence,
for the LORD has laid it on him.

 Let him bury his face in the dust—
there may yet be hope.

 Let him offer his cheek to one who would strike him,
and let him be filled with disgrace.

 For men are not cast off
by the Lord forever.

 Though he brings grief, he will show compassion,
so great is his unfailing love.

 For he does not willingly bring affliction
or grief to the children of men.

 To crush underfoot
all prisoners in the land,

 to deny a man his rights
before the Most High,

 to deprive a man of justice—
would not the Lord see such things?

 Who can speak and have it happen
if the Lord has not decreed it?

 Is it not from the mouth of the Most High
that both calamities and good things come?

 Why should any living man complain
when punished for his sins?

 Let us examine our ways and test them,
and let us return to the LORD.

 Let us lift up our hearts and our hands
to God in heaven, and say:

 ”We have sinned and rebelled
and you have not forgiven.

 ”You have covered yourself with anger and pursued us;
you have slain without pity.

 You have covered yourself with a cloud
so that no prayer can get through.

 You have made us scum and refuse
among the nations.

 ”All our enemies have opened their mouths
wide against us.

 We have suffered terror and pitfalls,
ruin and destruction.”

 Streams of tears flow from my eyes
because my people are destroyed.

 My eyes will flow unceasingly,
without relief,

 until the LORD looks down
from heaven and sees.

 What I see brings grief to my soul
because of all the women of my city.

 Those who were my enemies without cause
hunted me like a bird.

 They tried to end my life in a pit
and threw stones at me;

 the waters closed over my head,
and I thought I was about to be cut off.

 I called on your name, O LORD,
from the depths of the pit.

 You heard my plea: “Do not close your ears
to my cry for relief.”

 You came near when I called you,
and you said, “Do not fear.”

 O Lord, you took up my case;
you redeemed my life.

 You have seen, O LORD, the wrong done to me.
Uphold my cause!

 You have seen the depth of their vengeance,
all their plots against me.

 O LORD, you have heard their insults,
all their plots against me-

 what my enemies whisper and mutter
against me all day long.

 Look at them! Sitting or standing,
they mock me in their songs.

 Pay them back what they deserve, O LORD,
for what their hands have done.

 Put a veil over their hearts,
and may your curse be on them!

 Pursue them in anger and destroy them
from under the heavens of the LORD

(Lamentations 3:1-66).

***

When God’s people tune God out to follow after the ways of the world: ” the cravings of sinful man, the lust of his eyes, and the boasting of what he has and does” (1 John 2:16), He sends those, like Jeremiah, who are listening to God, into dark places to help His people return to Him.

All around him, he sees how far away God’s people have wandered from God’s will and character and have persued their own agendas and have become emeshed in sin. Then he begins to react to the sins of others and begins to express how hard it is to be sent into dark places. He complains to God for putting him in a place he can’t hear His voice or feel His presence.

Jeremiah’s focus on the darkness derails him. It breathes death and despair.

Then he surrenders his expectations about what God should be doing about this and refocuses his sites onto who God is: merciful, compassionate, and loving. Then he returns to his rightful role as intercessory on behalf of God’s wayward people.

I have noticed that dark places exist both in and outside of the church. It is easy to react to the difficulty and take offense to the sins of others, but God’s hope is that we keep our eyes fixed on Him and to be an intercessor, proclaimer of truth, and a light to point people to Him.

It is easy to feel like God is punishing us when He sends us to dark places, but it’s because of His great love for those who have lost their way to return back to Him and newcomers to find Him.

In my life, God has sent me to love my neighbors and encourage them to give God a try, and encourage wayward brothers and sisters to return to a life of peace with God and to grow in their relationship with God and their understand of God.

In this quest to live out my faith and to participate with God, there have been many days where I’ve felt like Jeremiah, cut off from God: not hearing His voice, not feeling His love, and now questioning whether or not God is still in this. Nine times out of ten, it is because my gaze has left God and I have become consumed by the darkness around me.

It is hard to be a light when it feels like the light is turned off. But just like Jeremiah, I return to who God is and keep praying, hoping, and believing God is here, He is faithful and true, and He sent me here for His good purposes.

In time, I start seeing the light again, hearing His voice again, and experiencing His love again.

God is faithful. He sends His people into dark places–not to be consumed by the darkness. God places His light in us and sends us into dark places because He loves people and desires His messengers to point the way to eternal life: peace with God now and forever.

To keep me from becoming conceited because of these surpassingly great revelations, there was given me a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me. Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me.

But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.”

Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong” (II Corinthians 12:7-10).

***

A reoccurring nightmare has plagued my life ever since I was a small child. I am an outcast, last picked, and the one who doesn’t fit. I feel like I’m on the outside of a circle looking in. It’s life on the fringe–even in the church. It’s felt like a curse all my life.

Yet this has been the thorn in my flesh that has brought me to my knees and keeps me there. When I look up, Jesus reaches His hand of acceptance, grace, love and mercy towards me. He’s the strength that lifts me up and gives my life a reason for living. What would I do without knowing Him? How would I have survived my husband of seventeen years leaving three days before Christmas with another woman? Then losing my house and then my job soon after. Thank God there’s God and his grace is made perfect in my weakness.

The thorn in my flesh didn’t go away the first time I took His hand and leaned into His grace. The thorn continues to plague me. But every time it does, Jesus reaches out to help me if I’m humble enough to receive it.

Rejection, abandonment, hardships, and persecution are the thorns that have brought me to the throne of God’s grace, and they are the thorns that keep me glued to Him. I’d rather have thorns and know God than to have never seen the need for His grace which is made perfect in my weakness.