EASTER -DAILY RENDEZVOUS WITH MY LORD | KAIROS GLOBAL | APRIL 2019

Author: Sumol Pious

Intro : Sumol Pious shares her real resurrection experience of everyday life

Today we went to an old village in this Middle East country – our residence for the past 18 years, our beloved Oman. I see a lot of weeds with beautiful flowers on them, they have grown themselves. No one waters it, no one cares for it; yet it satiates our hearts with its beautiful small flowers, and feeds our eyes with its variety of colours. So who is actually the owner of these weeds? Most of the time, people stamp on them or pluck them up and don’t bother to care for them. But He takes care of these weeds just like He takes care of all of us – the sinners. How He has adorned them with different colours! I feel that in the same way He has blessed us with his never-ending mercy and unconditional love. 

I have always been a nature lover – ample opportunities to experience His love. The beautiful sereneness of the sky during most of the year; the bright sun with its spectacular rising and setting; the stunning beaches along the ocean; the calmness of the mountains, the splendid palm gardens, those marvellous starry nights – just to mention a few. All these revelations were teaching me the beauty, power and wisdom of Him.

He was teaching me the truth and I was head over heels in love with Him. Those days I was ready to do anything to please Him. I would go to any extend to get His attention. Or to say in other words, I was always with Him and enjoyed every bit of it. As the days went by, everything was going smoothly and there was a good rapport between me and Him. But eventually boredom began creeping in and the first love was lost for me. I began feeling that there is not much new adventure in our relationship. That is the time He told me to take a detour – I cherished those moments very much and savored every bit of it. It was an Easter experience for me. To die to myself and to explore Him in every sense – He knows me better than I know myself. And I started focusing more on my interior self and at the same time considering all others as precious and with dignity.

He knows to make me content and to console me in my need. The moments I have experienced rejection and dejection, he taught me something great – “You are partaking with me to experience the weight of Cross and in selfless act of love”.

He was different and always a maverick. He was everywhere for me. Encountering Him daily was a joyful experience for me. He even respected the weeds in the garden. He takes utmost care for them, as a justification he says “there are many to take care of the plants with beautiful flowers, but weeds, you need to take a different route where not many has traversed before.” With the poor and the rich alike, with the blessed and the abandoned, with friends and foes, He knows to treat everyone in His unique style of loving and forgiving. He doesn’t care for people’s opinion or what-others-would-think-about-me.

Many times I was like Peter. I denied His love even after knowing Him well. But He taught me to forgive and love others unconditionally. 

Many times I was like Paul. I believed in my strengths rather than in His mercy. He was the one who gave me courage to correct myself and others, and to move forward.

Many times I was like Mary Magdalene. I lived for pleasure rather than to experience the eternal joy He had already promised me. It was He who shed the light to overcome my own temptations and to find happiness in what I have now. 

Many times I was like Mathew. How much ever I could hoard material things I did, believing that this would help me lead a happy life. He is the one who compelled me by his love to share my belongings with others and to invest in my heavenly life.

He changed my life completely. It was a 180 degree turn for me. From what I have been to what I have become is a real mystery, even to me. It is a real resurrection experience for me. Those were the years I spent in total darkness, without any real purpose in life. I lived as if there is no end and nothing to care about. My life was a void in the tomb of ignorance. I was buried in my own pride and arrogance; I was buried in ego and sin; I was buried deep within me without having space to love and to be loved – the very purpose of our life.

When I found Him, He raised me up from all my iniquities; he brought me to real life. Every day I am now going to the tomb of my emptiness in search of my Lord only to know and experience that He is within me filling the void in me and brightening my life and radiating His joy. I can see the stumbling stone rolled away from my life, to enter into His kingdom with all my near and dear ones. In my ambiguity about life and its hurdles, there are always angels to wipe away my fears and show the right path filling me with confidence to meet Him. This is the real resurrection experience for me.

As I am nearing the twilight of my life I know I have less time in my hands. I want to use every bit of it sharing the good deeds of my beloved in the whole world. He is the only true love I need in my life – even though it is a late realization, yet it’s a true epiphany. Our lives in the tomb need only be permeated by His love, for us to find the true meaning of resurrection. “Indeed he has risen, Halleluiah.”

Sumol Pious works as a Secondary School Teacher. She lives in Muscat with her husband and four kids, and is currently the Animator of the Regional Council.