I have told you thrice.

  I have a few minutes before General Conference part 2 begins (highly recommend) and I have a couple of thoughts I've been pondering the last week.  I teach seminary, and obviously this being Holy Week we discussed the events leading up to the Resurrection in detail.

Now, I'm a nerd and enjoy getting into the weeds a little.  Particularly in the Old Testament it's important to have context.  Numbers, animals, acts all have significance that we, 2,000 to 4,000 years later, don't always understand.  It's something I try to impress on my students, even to the point of providing a symbolism cheat sheet for the OT and Revelation.

Three is an important number that echoes through the scriptures.  It is usually is associated with completeness and the Holy Trinity, spiritual perfection.  There is another side to it--the act of being perfected, transformed from a earthly being to a spiritual one, which is often a little heavier than it originally appears.  Transformation often requires deeply personal sacrifice.

Important doctrines are often repeated three times. Jonah spent three days in the whale, a foreshadowing of Christ's three days in the tomb.  It took three days for Abraham to reach Mount Moriah with his son Isaac, grieving the expected sacrifice but committed to serving his God. Before beginning his ministry, Christ was tempted three times with everything an earthly man would desire. Christ prayed three times in Gethsemane only to find that his three friends--his nearest and closest disciples--could not stay awake with him even a single hour; even before the crucifixion, he was left alone three times.  Three nails while crucified, one of three "criminals" on Calvary, three hours of darkness at his death. Three times he's denied by Peter, the man who has been his staunchest supporter and who is meant to lead the church; and three times Peter, the rock, has to face his own weakness. Three women mourning at the foot of the cross and his tomb.  Three days of doubt, fear, bewilderment and loss for those who followed him.

Three days is a long time. Hours of sorrow drag numbly on.  Hours of doubt seem interminable.  In the darkness, you have a choice--to resent and reject the circumstances that you there, or to lean into them, turning to God and trusting Him. You have to change, and change isn't easy.

And yet, after the darkness, the sun rises.  The sacrifice is spared. The weak are strengthened. The Son rises.

That is the true glory of Easter. It isn't a coincidence that this happens in the spring, a time associated with the victory of new life after the long death of winter.  Even our darkest hours will pass.  The trials that blind us, the sorrows that crush us, are not forever; neither are they punishments or suffering sent to amuse God.  They are opportunities for us to transform into something higher and holier, to choose whom we serve.* 

Blessed is the Resurrection of Christ, and all that comes with it.

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*Joshua 24:14-15