“Stay joined to me, and I will stay joined to you. Just as a branch cannot produce fruit unless it stays joined to the vine, you cannot produce fruit unless you stay joined to me. I am the vine, and you are the branches.” John:4-5

Happy Sunday and Happy Easter!

As is always the case from Good Friday through Easter Sunday my mind is on Jesus and gaining a deeper meaning behind his death and resurrection.
On Good Friday I watched Jesus Christ Superstar as is my ritual. I want to keep the time of 3:00 pm sacred with my attention on Jesus, so watching this movie puts my mind into the reflective place I want to be in to consider various aspects of the passion story.
In the past I have gained many insights into the lessons of crucifixion. I recall a year when I was moved by the brutality of it, something I had protected myself from most of my life. Last year I saw the partnership between Jesus and Judas that I wrote about on 3-31-13. This year I felt I should watch the movie because it was ritual for Good Friday but I didn’t feel any excitement of gaining any new wisdom from it.
Friday I had a busy morning cleaning around the house. A headache hit me around noon so I went for a nap at 1:00 and set an intention to wake at 2:30 so I could begin watching the movie at 3:00. I woke up to stay on my schedule but I struggled at first with the DVD player in my bedroom and than the one in the living room to the point of almost giving in and saying to myself that perhaps I wasn’t meant to watch the film this year.
Still struggling with the after effects of my headache, Peter assisted me and we got the DVD playing. I watched the film and enjoyed all of the music that I know so well. I did find myself questioning parts of the story line that I usually was accepting of. (One thing that has bothered me for years is how the story implies that Mary Magdalene was a prostitute. I wish that they update this soon and change that part of the story for modern times). One of my favorite parts usually is Jesus’ struggle in the Garden of Gethsemane but this year I wondered if it really was the struggle for Jesus as portrayed in the film.
I find I swing back and forth on my perception of Jesus, perhaps that as it should be. Last year at this time I was thinking of him as human, with a sacred soul like the rest of us, so that he was playing his part in God’s will, just as Judas and the others were. I don’t think I am wrong when I think of Jesus this way, in his human form as it is the part of him that is easier for me to understand and easier to feel Love for as a beloved brother.
This year my awareness is more on Jesus as the embodiment of the Christ Consciousness; I wrote about the shift in my thoughts on 2-16-14 blog entitled ‘the Bridge’. As I watched Jesus struggle with accepting the burden he was being given I questioned it. If Jesus was the Christ Consciousness would there really have been this struggle? I thought about the lives of the Hindu Guru’s who seem to teach and live separate from their bodies; they seem to be able to go with out eating and without suffering pain. Would Jesus really have had this struggle or would he have been ‘in the moment’ knowing he could accept and get through what was coming? I think so.
Before going out to dinner Friday I pulled out my bible “The Way” and left it by my bedside to read before falling asleep. I wanted to read the words of Jesus to aid in answering my questions.
When I got to bed to read I opened the bible to look for the table of contents to help me to quickly find the Passion of the New Testament – I was not sure at this point which gospel I would read. At the front of this bible was a section that said “If you’re new to this book” where it gave a few guides on what to read to get started. It said that John was more conceptual of the gospels and contained more of Jesus’ dialogue. I went right there knowing that this was what I wanted. I found just what I was expecting.
The gospel of John has a different description of what happened in the garden before Judas arrived. Instead of the disciples sleeping and Jesus lamenting, Jesus is teaching. He is answering questions from the disciples about his leaving and what they should expect once he is gone. He also prays to God for them to have support and strength once he is gone. This is what I was thinking when I considered Jesus as a Guru connected to the Source; that he would be teaching, supporting, and giving Love knowing that his disciples would need such preparations. Jesus knew he would be OK and that those of us left would be in need of the aid.
When I had finished my reading I still had a question. My mind kept wondering whether Jesus allowed himself to feel the suffering of his torture and death or if he remained separated from the pain of his body. I think that he did as other gospels have Jesus saying ‘my God, why have you forsaken me?” Funny that John doesn’t say that though. This gospel has Jesus, from the cross, asking John to care for his mother.
I had one more question before I fell asleep that I asked directly to my guides. “Why did Jesus have to suffer so brutally?” The answer came immediately. The choice that he made to die in the manner he did was the example of how we all have the light of resurrection within us no matter how much suffering we endure. I also feel he chose his suffering to exemplify how we choose our suffering and like him, have the ability to choose differently.
Jesus lived! He lived with his Light and Love intact and so can we!
“The same power that raised Christ from the dead lives inside of you!” ~ Joel Osteen
(Loved Joel’s sermon this AM on “Resurrection Power.” His comments on the ripping of the veil in the temple at the time of Jesus’s death clarified for me the change that occurred for humanity with Jesus’ sacrifice. The symbol being that the curtain that separated ‘the holy of holies’ from the people was opened representing the ability for all humans to have a direct relationship with God. Was this an actual change in the spiritual realm or just a new awareness (or lesson) for future generations of humans?)