Today is a sad day. As much as I want to believe that I am trustworthy, and unfailing in my trust of God, the events of Good Friday remind me that even the disciples fell short. Jesus asked them to keep watch for an hour, while he prayed nearby. But three times their eyes drooped shut. 

My son just told me that there is physiological evidence that when we are faced with an unsolvable problem, our body gets tired. This was in response to my request for help with a forgotten password, which eludes me like a taunting toddler who is dangling my keys over a grate in the road. Yes, I feel tired, and stupid. I can no longer move fast enough to snatch the keys, or press the right sequence of digits and letters to satisfy the Cerberus who lives inside my keyboard. He barks at me and will not let me pass. 

But I digress. Easter is about the explosion of relief that comes after we believe that what we love has died, and it flickers with life. My world has not been rocked to the core by such grief, but I respond to people everyday whose hearts are broken. I hold their names in my mouth, and if they say who has died I think of them too. It is a small thing, really. What can I write that will ease the groaning of a parent whose baby is gone, or a wife whose beloved husband of forty years is lost to her? 

But I do write. Sometimes I pray for them. Mostly I don't hear from them a year later, when the seasons have done their magic with earth and baby birds and new leaves. I want to believe that pain subsides, or is at least overshadowed by other bursts of joy. 

That is why Easter is precious to me. Even the darkest night submits to the dawn. It is our chance again to leave exhaustion behind.