This weekend is my Birthday. Not my calendar birthday, that's in February, and it doesn't count nearly as much to me.
It's my birthday as a Christian. This time last year, GOD convicted me through Jesus his Son, and said to me, "I am here. I love you. Come to me, to my house, and let me take care of you..."
So I did, and this is my one year mark. I remember being nervous about the Easter play this year ... It was going to be very VERY different than usual. Last year was basically a replica of "The Passion," but this year? This year, the play was about a church who was preparing to do their Easter play. I read the script and thought, "Hmmmm."
Last night was opening night, and I left with very little impressions on my heart. I just didn't feel spoken to. 
Today as I watched the play the second time? I was spoken to ... I was shouted to! Jesus was there tapping my shoulder and saying, "Are you there yet? Are you there yet?" And I was smiling through my tears and saying to him ... "My Lord, here am I."
Last night, when I went to the play, I went with Dana and her little sister Ashley. We dropped our kids in the nursery and went to sit down. We saw the show and while I was touched by some things in the show, I didn't feel it ... the spark, the touch, the feeling that it was a message TO ME. So we got home and I mulled it over in my head, planning to go tonight with Ryan, and praying with all my heart that he would be drawn to GOD tonight. That he would be touched and led as I have been...
We went to my mom's today and had to rush to get to the church on time, but we got there and we were on time. I sat next to Ryan hoping and praying that he would feel something, that some part of the play would move him. Little did I know how much I myself would be moved...
The Play ...
As the play opened, they showed the church coming out in their rehearsals of the crucifixion scene. It was ridiculous, the people were horribly overdramatic. There was one woman who was just laughable in her portrayal of her "grief" over the coming loss of Jesus' life. As the actor playing Jesus stumbled and fell up the center aisle of the church with his cross, the soldiers were muttering and barely doing anything but walking behind the cross.
As the "actor" approached the ramp onto the stage, he dropped the cross and came out from under it, shouting, "Cut, cut!" He affected a very prissy attitude and informed the "director" that the soldiers weren't helping with the weight of the cross, and that if they were going to keep hitting him with their whips, then he was out. The director was a terrible, impatient person who was cold, angry and unappreciative of his "little church actors." The guy who played Jesus was a "real actor," and so he was superior ... or well, he thought he was.
Anyway, the director lectured the people for not providing appropriate assistance to the "actor", and they tried to continue. Things continued to go downhill until the director quit. In the meantime, the cast is divided into their little cliques; they are portraying the reason that I stopped going to church, and I thought, "GOD, please be reaching out to someone with this ..." There is a girl who is snubbed by everyone because she has a colorful past with drugs and men and things like that. She is often ignored, and when she isn't, the people are horribly cruel to her. She eventually sings a song called "Anyway," by Nichole Nordeman." I found myself in tears with that one ... but there's more.
There is another man in the play who's son is dying. The cast members are not bonding at all, and they remain apart from each other. They are in their own worlds and don't have time to care, each about the others. Anyway, the new director comes into the next rehearsal with an unheard of idea ... He was going to start the rehearsal with prayer! Hmmmm. Imagine that.
Well, he asked for prayer requests, and there was only one ... The snooty older woman who attended the church (her father had founded it, so she thought she ran the place ... and she did) stepped up and asked for them to pray for another woman in the church. She said that the woman wasn't raising her son properly and that she ought to be ashamed because the son had been seem smoking behind the store. The director looked at her in surprise, his face said, "THAT'S what you want to pray for? How self-righteous is that? Hmm."
He asked also for praise reports, and the only person who stepped up at this point was the guy who's son was dying. He said things that made him look the model of faith. He talked about how with GOD's healing he knew his son would be healed. That was wonderful, and was inspiring to the other cast members. It lifted their hearts. But it was dishonest...
His son wasn't getting any better and he knew it, and while it is good to have faith, and in fact you are commanded to place your faith and trust in GOD, this man should have stepped up earlier. It would have been better (I think) to have asked for prayer for his son, as well as offering up faith and praise to the one true physician. The man got home later that day to find that his son was much worse. He argues with his wife in their bedroom because both of them are stressed and they have forgotten to turn to each other.
After the argument, the wife storms out of the room and the father is left alone with his emotional defeat. He sings "He's My Son," by Mark Schultz. This song hit me in two ways. One, the lyrics were the man's prayer for his son's life ... He sang, "Can you hear me? Am I getting through tonight? Can you see him? Can you make him feel all right? If you can hear me, let me take his place somehow ... See, he's not just anyone - He's my son." The rest of the song was just as moving, but the chorus had me in tears and fighting not to really cry. I saw my daughter in that bed - myself beside it. How must that be to pray to trade lives with your child because they are in pain and suffering? To beg GOD, "Take me, leave my child out of pain. Let them grow old and be happy and safe. Take me."
But then I thought, "I wonder how it must've been for GOD." The song says, "He's not just anyone ... He's my Son." How must GOD have felt? Knowing that it had to be that way ... Knowing that he had to follow through with the plan. He hates for any of us to suffer or hurt, but he had to watch his SON take the nails. He had to look down upon Jesus who was burdened with the weight and guilt of ALL sins past, present and future ALL AT ONCE ... and turn away. GOD had to see that pain and suffering in his own son, and turn away. To save us, he turned his back on his own son. Sacrificed the precious one to save the wicked many. Jesus? He's not just anyone ... He's GOD's Son. I couldn't stop the tears last night during this song, and they were full force tonight. At least last night I felt supported though. Dana and Ashley cried too.
Ryan looked at me once or twice and didn't know what to do. I wondered what he was thinking, but then I thought, "Well, he's likely wondering what the heck I must be thinking." But will I tell him? He's asked me once why I've been so quiet ... But I told him I needed to get it straight in my head first. It was a hard thought process that I was dealing with ... Too much involved to talk about without heavy crying, and I hate to cry!
Anyway, there was also a couple in the play... They were everyone's dream - on the outside. They were successful and in love, and they had money. They were leaders of various things, both at the church and in their community. They had it all. But the husband? Well, he was cheating and lying to his wife. She was heartbroken and willing to live silently with her pain so that her husband would stay with her (he didn't know she knew). She sang a song called, "To Say Thanks," also by Nichole Nordeman, and it touched me as well. It was about how hard things can be, and how hard it can get sometimes to tell GOD thank you for his blessings. Sometimes it gets so hard to see them through your pain. She ended the song crying and singing, "Why, why, why, why..."
The actor who was playing Jesus? Well, he ended up freaking out in one of the rehearsals and telling everyone that Jesus is a load of crap. That maybe he existed, but he was just a man like all the others. And he said that he didn't believe in GOD. He was asked why, and told that GOD loves him ... you know, the usual stuff. He said to them, "How can you know that GOD loves me? What would you say if you knew how my life really is, how I really am?" He started to cry and he said, "What has GOD done for me?" They answered, "GOD created you ... Jesus is your creator, your saviour." And the actor said, "Yeah great job Jesus. You've made yourself another failure. Real smooth ... what a loser." He ended up on the floor in tears and crying hard because they sang "Hold On," by Nichole Nordeman. It was a song that gets to the point and really spoke to the actor.
In the end? The church play went off without a hitch, and the cast found not only new friends. They bonded with each other in so many ways, and they all came to know Jesus better. And isn't that the point?
***Editing to come later if you get lucky!!!! (By the way - Thanks for the borrowed warning label Laurel ...)
