What do they know that I don't know?
A few weeks ago, I was driving along on a cloudy, cold, wintry, ugly day. One more day just like all the rest of the winter that had chilled my bones, plugged up my sinuses and made my nose drip. It seemed to me, however, that the grass was turning green. "Couldn't be," I thought to myself. "It's too early for grass to get green. Foolish grass. Why doesn't it just wait until it gets warm?"
Come to think of it, that grass wasn't any smarter than the tulips that sent up a test finger in February as if they couldn't wait for their time. There they stood in the midst of cracked ground and ten degree temperatures. I would have stayed longer to lecture them on learning to push up at the right time, but it was too cold, so I darted for the warmth.
Out back, here come the chives, the lambs ears, the yarrow and the tiger lilies. The daffodils didn't wait for me to signal the all clear either before they risked frost bite. Out front, the lilac bush buds are liable to get coated with ice before its all over with.
It seems to me that thirty two degrees today is just as cold as thirty two degrees was in December. Last week I had a talk with a robin, bouncing around in the snow. "It's your own fault," I said. "Why don't you use your head? Why don't you wait until the snow's gone before you come back?"
What do they know that I don't know? All these plants and animals just keep pushing up into the chilled air, turning green beneath the snow and saying a defiant "no" to the cold. Every year, they do it on their own. They never ask for my advice. Every year it seems to me they do it too soon. Every year, though, they do just fine.
Maybe in the midst of Easter, I should let those tulips and robins rub off on me a little bit. Maybe some day late in March I should take a tumble through the snow and get some grass stains on my pants. Maybe as Christians, people should be saying about you or me: "What does he know that I don't know?" "How can he be poking his head up so high in the midst of this dark, cold world we live in?" "Why doesn't he wait for better times before he comes out in the open and expresses optimism about the future.
Foolish Christians, they just keep pushing up in the cold, turning green and letting their buds swell in anticipation of what is to come. It takes some daring to be a Christian. The Easter "son"rise calls for us to come out of our tombs and into the cold and snow. It might be a little nippy, but there's no doubt about what lies ahead. God put within the plants and the birds and insects a mechanism that knows just when to spring to life. Easter is God's way of saying that this same mechanism has been placed within us. When you see Easter, when you see the Risen Christ, it is time to spring to life.
So push up, turn green, shoot up a test finger. God is on the move, and so are we.
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