He Is Risen Indeed!

Happy Easter Everyone!

I’ll be completely honest from the beginning, this post has very little to do with my Peace Corps service and a lot to do with the greatest day in history: The resurrection.

Today I woke up feeling groggy, congested, and overwhelmingly lonely. Holidays are a bit strange here. I find myself hyper aware of all the festivities happening back home...dressing in matching easter outfits, Sunday morning church, the smell of the honey glazed ham in the oven, eating so many Cadbury eggs and jelly beans that you can feel the sugar pulsing through your veins. Family. Food. Fellowship. When I close my eyes I can feel it. I can see it. Taste it. But then I open my eyes. There is no family. No Cadbury eggs. No wafts of the honey glazed ham. It’s just me sitting alone surrounded by these 4 salmon coloured concrete walls. And that’s when the pangs of loneliness hit the hardest.

I know I’m not the only one who has ever felt lonely on a day that is suppose to be filled with joy and belonging. And I know many have more serious heartache than homesickness to face on these occasions. Holidays have a strange was of making us aware of certain pains in our lives. Whether it is the death of a loved one, health complications, financial stressors, or you name it, the sense that a day is suppose to be joyous can sometimes make you even more sensitive to the pain bubbling up within. To anyone feeling this way today, I have some good news. God’s great love demonstrated on the cross is just as amazing, just as life changing, just as joy-giving no matter our current circumstances or emotions. So if you are feeling lonely, disappointed, numb, stressed, sick, sad, or even angry—that’s okay. Jesus still defeated sin and death. You are still a new creation. You are still being offered eternal life. And He is still worthy of all our praise. His love remains. We can rest in that truth even if our hearts can’t fully celebrate as we wish they could.

Thank you Lord that the goodness of the Gospel cannot be swayed by the brevity of my current emotions, no matter how strong or unending they seem. He stays the same. The cross remains a scandalous, radical demonstration of His saving love. It’s like Jesus said in John 16:33, “I have said these things to you that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart, I have overcome the world.”

Fact: Easter is awesome. Soon I’ll peel myself off of my bed and try to make new memories with the beautiful children of God I am surrounded by here. But even if I am still lonely at the end of the day, I will take heart. I will find peace is what He says and in what He did. I will thank Him for He destroyed my sin and made me a new creation. He is worthy. He is risen. No momentary trouble could ever change that beautiful truth.

He is risen indeed!!!!

-Caitlin