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Someone told him, "Your mother and brothers are standing outside,
wanting to speak to you." He replied to him, "Who is my mother, and
who are my brothers?"
And stretching out his hand toward his disciples, he said, "Here are
my mother and my brothers!"
(Matthew 12:47)
We speak often of Jesus as Savior, Teacher, Messiah, Lord, and King. But
we who are his disciples and followers can also call him Brother:
the relationship we have with Jesus has the potential to become
infinitely more personal.
This is a particular gift as we head into the season of Lent. It is
no coincidence that Lent takes place in spring, when the seeds that
have lain dormant over the winter are first struggling to break
through the hard shell of being and the rough embrace of earth.
The sturdy seedling with arched body comes
Shouldering its way and shedding the earth crumbs.
(Robert Frost: Putting in the Seed)
If we understand Lent as an opportunity to deepen our relationship
with Christ, then the struggles we endure with whatever discipline
we might be led to take on during this period of germination are struggles he shares with us. Our desert is his desert; our
challenges his challenges. Our opportunities for growth and
surrender are not faced alone. Jesus our brother is the warm sun
that entices us to leave the shell, as well as the warm rain of love
that softens the earth so we can emerge into the light, opening
leaves and blossoms that we might someday bear the fruit we were
born to give to the world.
As we walk through Lent, seeking to break out of our habitual
shells, it can prove challenging to face our failures and
weaknesses. But in so doing we learn that Jesus is with us and loves
us through the struggle; that the sun and rain will continue to
feed, support, nurture and entice us as we continue to grow into
what we are called by God and Christ to become. If what Marcus Borg
(in Meeting Jesus Again for the First Time, Harper One, 1995) calls
the pre-resurrection Jesus is our companion and brother in that dark
subterranean desert, then we know from the promise of Easter that
the post-resurrection Jesus will leave his own earthly grave to join
us on our walk through time.
For this exhibit, we invite you to bring into imaginal form what
Jesus, our brother has meant, and continues to mean, to you. |
