This past week, I remembered Spring was my dad’s favorite season of the year. I forgot about how much Pa appreciated the newness of this season, yet loving Spring made sense for the vivacious Aries man he was. My dad was a man of resurrection after all. Someone who bursted with energy and a strong will to live. Someone who looked at death squarely in the eyes many times and would one day face it courageously for the very last time.
Thinking of him this Easter Sunday brought me to reflect on Howard Thurman’s meditation, “To Die Unshriven.” Here Thurman reminds us that death occurs in life rather than to life. Death does not exhaust or determine life. In other words, death is an event in life and life does not end once death occurs. Instead we find hope in the assurance that life persists and we continue to live and thrive after death. This hope grants us both permission and promise in this world and in eternity.
I am permitted to thrive.
I will thrive.
Seeing my dad embody this permission and promise towards the end of his life, to the extent that death no longer had a win or sting over him, impacted my faith forever (1 Cor 15:55). Seeing him transition with the utmost assurance and self-actualization not all people may experience in this lifetime, left me with a wonder that I will carry with me until I see him again. In the words of Howard Thurman, here was a man who went down his grave with a shout. I still wrestle with this because loss hurts like a bitch and alters your outlook on life completely, yet my wrestling, confusion and hurt are part of the Resurrection Sunday story too and I am reclaiming this. In Sensual Faith, womanist preacher, and author Lyvonne Briggs reminds us that if we invite grief into our home, joy comes alongside it, if we dive into our pain, comfort be will there waiting, if we go at the center of our suffering, rejoicing will meet us here.
Weeping may linger for the night, but joy comes with the mourning.
Lyvonne Briggs
Joy come with the mourning —alongside it, and as someone who has been in an ongoing state of grief these past two years, this rings true. This Spring, I find myself re-encountering the vibrancy of life through new experiences in the arts, traveling, and food. I find myself spending more time outside in community (again) that comes with longer days due to daylight savings. I find myself channeling my father’s fire and tenacity when taking a firm hold on what the world offers me. I find myself being filled with more of a will to live and am reminded this too, is Resurrection Sunday.
Thank you for sharing with vulnerability. May you continue to experience resurrection