Surprised by Resurrection

We weren’t living in this house last year at this time. We owned the house, but were in the midst of renovations and were still living in an apartment.

A few weeks ago - around Holy Week - with recent rains and unseasonably warm weather, lots of green things began poking their heads up out of the ground around here. By the big oak tree, thirty daffodils sprouted in unison, overnight it seemed. The first green leaves of iris emerged from the pine needles in front of the house. Will their flowers be white, purple, yellow? (They turned out to be a beautiful peach I’d never seen before.) Of course, the white blossoms of those infernal Bradford pears had also appeared, and with them the smell…


We had watched as things died back last fall. We saw grasses and brambles in the fields brown and harden and return to the ground. We watched as leaves flashed brilliant reds, yellows, and oranges, before littering the yard and filling the gutters. We put the lawn mower into hibernation in the barn. As days grew shorter and temperatures colder, we looked out over silent, barren fields.

We had watched as things died, as things went undercover, dormant for a season. But we hadn’t yet experienced the new life of spring.

In Romans 6:5, Paul writes:

“For if we have been united with [Christ] in a death like his, we will certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his.”

In the midst of death and despair, anxiety and loneliness, monotony and madness, may we be surprised by resurrection. May we experience the creative presence of God pushing new life up to the surface from places we imagined only to be dead.

Where do you see (or desperately want to see) signs of new life in yourself, your relationships, your family? In your church or community or workplace? In the wider world?