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On January 1, I received an e-mail devotion from Father Richard Rohr that I have been saving in my e-mail inbox so that I might share it with you. If you are interested in subscribing to this daily devotion, I have included a link at the bottom of this section. I pray you find this devotion meaningful as well. Peace.
Tony Haglund
Canton Lutheran Church
 Center and Circumference
On a recent day of prayer, I did some Scripture study on the four Gospel accounts of the resurrection of Jesus. Something became very clear to me that I had never seen before!
The texts do not really emphasize a miraculous "returning" of Jesus' body, nearly as much as Jesus' new cosmic body leading us "forward!" Note that he sends his disciples forward into Galilee (Matthew 28:7), into the whole world (Mark 16:20), into their own futures (Acts 1:11)-and without any baggage from the past. Notice how many verbs and stories there are of rushing, running, rejoicing, excitement, joy, and even jumping into the water (John 21:7) and catching more than ever before! Jesus even feigns walking ahead of the disciples and beyond them as they approach Emmaus (Luke 24:28), so they have to catch up with him. These are all people going somewhere, and somewhere they can trust. Jesus' risen presence holds no rancor, no bad memory, no call for retribution, and in fact, he breathes forgiveness (John 20:22-23), after which he prepares for them a meal of bread and fish on the beach. This is no funereal liturgy of lament but a liturgy of feeding for the future, at which Jesus is the cook! He allows Peter to undo his three betrayals with three expressions of love (John 21:15-17) to take away all bad memory and shame. He says to Mary Magdalene what might first seem cold and unkind: "Do not cling to me, but go tell the brothers that I am going forward to my Father and your Father, my God and your God" (John 20:17). In other words, "Come on! Come with me to a shared and bigger future together, much larger than any small love here-and much larger than any past hurts or failures!" How much we need such hope these days! The Risen Presence makes clear that there is never an open-ended future, unless one also hands over the always limiting and condemning past. The Risen Jesus allows us now to say Dag Hammarskjold's most quoted line, and perhaps this time to really mean it: "For all that has been, THANKS! For all that will be, YES!"
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