Struggles Pt. II

God is backwards.  Don't you agree?  Jesus once said that the first are the last.  Okay, Jesus, maybe You are trying too hard to live against the grain.  I don't think we need that dramatic of an example to shake people out of apathy (Batman quote).  Yeah, yeah we get it - the poor are blessed.  What other paradox do You have up Your sleeve?  You can't actually mean these things, because You are the Messiah.  You are the conquering king.  You surely will not die.  No, not You; the Messiah will rule.  To say such a thing means to give up.  Come on, Jesus, don't give up.  You really are an enigma.  As Aaron Weiss says, "What new mystery is this?  The Unquestionable is questioned but makes no reply."  Why accept this beating?  How can You conquer if You get beat to death?  

I am a disciple.  Well then.  Let me think about that for a second.  I guess I should be following the same paradoxical life that You showed me.  It is strange because apparently I should be living a life where death has lost its sting.  Death has lost its sting!  I should be living as if "the resurrection really happened," as Bill once challenged us. Yikes.  I really am not sure what that looks like.  Maybe that will sometimes look like the garden of Gethsemane and other times not. Who knows?

By the way, where in Hell has all the sting gone?  You seem to have brought it down to the deepest parts with You, when You did Your rounds down there, preaching to everyone and then somehow left it down there.  I guess I really am living in Your paradox.  I am broken, bleeding, but somehow called holy.  I am unworthy but welcomed.  I am somehow able to bear Your image.  I guess death really has lost its sting.  Hmmm.  It seems that there is some encouragement in living a paradoxical life.