Experiencing Jesus Opens the Bible: Part 5 – Knowing His Resurrection

(This post is Part 5, and the last, of the series Experiencing Jesus Opens the Bible. The other posts in the series are Introduction, Part 1 – Drawn by the Holy Spirit, Part 2 – The Word of the Lord Appeared, and Part 3 – A Low Whisper, and Part 4 – Seeing Jesus.)

We come to the Bible with presuppositions about God. Typically, as we study the Bible, those presuppositions about God – no matter if they are right or wrong – are confirmed. However, when we truly experience the life of Jesus Christ, our presuppositions about God are challenged, overturned, changed. Then, when we go the Bible, we see this new perspective of God confirmed.

In Parts 1 through 4, I shared about some of the suffering I went through – loneliness, my wife’s battle with cancer, and my wife’s death. But, this post is about the fruit, the new life, that was produced from all of that suffering. This is about how I met Samatha, my wife of the last five plus years. If you haven’t read Part 1, then you will want to because the two stories have some interesting similarities.

A few weeks after Dawn passed away I went to Asia for three weeks. The first week was a mission trip to the Philippines that Dawn and Trey, our son, were supposed to go on with me (Trey still ended up going with me). Then, the last two weeks were for work in other parts of Asia.

I had two opportunities to speak on the mission trip. The first was at a conference of more than 1,000 youth and the second was at the church that hosts the youth conference we attended. I had prepared messages for these opportunities. But, on the flight over, the Holy Spirit told me to put away those messages and speak about everything that Dawn and I had been through. The last week of Dawn’s life, Part 4, of this series, was what I spent the most time talking about.

Imagine being in front of more than 1,000 people and sharing all the suffering your wife and you went through together just weeks after she died. It was tough but a real blessing.

Towards the end of part 4, I mentioned that we needed to focus on what God will do – his love for us – and not on all the many things that God could do for us. Focusing on what God will do – his love for us – instead of the things God could do but hasn’t keeps us from becoming bitter and angry. If we don’t become bitter and angry about what God hasn’t done for us, then we open ourselves to untold blessings form God. Even though it was just weeks since my wife had died, this was the thrust of my talk.

For me, the root of this belief was Romans 8.28, which says, “And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.” More than a decade earlier, this was the first scripture that ever became more than words on a page to me, the first scripture I understood by the Spirit. Not coincidentally, it was during a very dark time in my marriage to Dawn. But, it was a scripture that we (and many other Christians have as well) clung to over the years. In fact, the scripture is quoted on Dawn’s tombstone.

At the end of this three week trip to Asia, I was in Taiwan with two co-workers and our sales representative. It was late in the day before we were going to fly home. We were driving from Taichung to Taipei, which was a several hour drive. I was exhausted and ready to go home.

I was riding in the back of the van with no on paying attention to me. I began to think about Dawn. I started crying. My parents had stayed with Trey and me from the week before Dawn died to the time I was coming home from this trip. But, I knew they were leaving when I got home. It was going to be just Trey and me in the house. The realization that Dawn was dead and I was going to be without another adult in the house was finally sinking in.

Dale, the pastor of church, went to Ghana for two weeks to preach at a funeral just as I was arriving home from Taiwan. We were very close and I had just become an elder at the church at the beginning of the year. Dale told me that even though he wouldn’t have electricity where he was going in Ghana he wanted me to write him while he was gone. Then, we he got to back to the airport in Ghana he could read my emails.

I wrote Dale twice while he was gone. Both times I told him that things were more difficult than I thought they would be. I told him how much I missed Dawn, how I needed to focus on being a parent, and how I didn’t have time to be an elder at the church right now. I cried throughout the writing of both of those emails.

When Dale got to the airport in Ghana he read those emails. He wrote me back and said he had been praying for me and wanted to come see me when he got home. Seemingly, Dale came to my house immediately after he landed in Cincinnati. It was less than two months since Dawn had died.

Dale and I went to the basement of my house to talk. For 10 minutes or so, Dale just kept telling me what a great marriage Dawn and I had, how we touched so many people, how I had handled everything so well, and on and on. I was thinking this can’t be what he came to talk to me about.

So, I told Dale that we were friends. He was the only person in the room with me when Dawn died. That’s how close we were. Whatever he had to say wasn’t going to offend me.

I’m paraphrasing, but Dale said, “You know how I tell people to not go around saying, ‘God told me to tell you…’ right? You know how I warn people against that, right? Well…I was praying for you. And, I felt like the Holy Spirit told me to tell you that it was time to start dreaming about your next wife.”

On the one hand that was not what I was expecting to hear. It was less than two months since Dawn died.

But, on the other hand, unbeknownst to Dale, I had already started doing that. Dawn, had battled cancer for six years. And, since the beginning of the year she would pass away, I knew the end of her life was close. So, I had mentally prepared myself for this possibility. While Dale was in Africa, I actually started to fill out a profile on eHarmony. But, I stopped about half way through. I thought to myself, “What if someone I know sees me on here less than two months after my wife died? They will think I’m a huge jerk.” So, as soon as I heard these words from Dale, I knew I needed to do this. But, I didn’t say anything to Dale. I just kept listening to what he had to say.

Dale continued, “You need to make a list of whatever you want in your next wife. I don’t care what it is. Just make a list and write it down. Then I think you should get on eHarmony. Meeting someone from church, your son’s school, or your office is not a good idea. God works so fast for you. Everything in your life happens just like that.” When Dale said that, he snapped his fingers.

So, the next day, I got up and made a list of everything I wanted in my next wife. The list had 31 things on it. There were serious things, such as she had to be a strong Christian woman and love my son like her own son. There were five such things that I starred because I could not compromise on them. But, then there were some not so serious things. For example, I wrote down the type of diet or food that my next wife should eat. At the time, I was eating a paleo/primal diet. So, I wanted my next wife to eat that way too. At the time, the diet was no where near as popular as it is now. I actually laughed when I wrote that down because I assumed that would never happen.

After I made my list, I got on eHarmony again. Filling out the profile seemed like it took hours. I felt like I was being psychoanalyzed. But, that same night I got my first set of matches. At the time, eHarmony gave you matches in groups of six, probably so you would actually take the time to look through them and not just go by looks. But, the woman in the very first match was beautiful. I thought to myself that I have no shot at her, but I will read her profile anyway.

Her profile was fascinating. She had a list of her favorite books. One particular book caught my attention. Even though I had not read that book, I had just read some others on the same subject.

Now, eHarmony has a system of “guided communication.” When you find a match you are interested in, you can send them a pre-written message. Then, they can send you a pre-written message back. Then, you can send them some pre-written questions. And, they can send you some pre-written answers. I thought this was a complete waste of time. So, I just emailed this woman.

Her name was unusual – Samatha with no “n.” So, I made sure I spelled it right. The email was pretty short. I simply asked her about why this book was one of her favorites because I was intrigued by that. And, I recommended another book on the same subject that I thought she might find interesting.

I sent that email on Saturday night, just one day after Dale told me to start dreaming about my next wife and the same day I made my list. Sunday afternoon I was sitting in a chair in the room that Dawn had died in, thinking about my life. I hadn’t heard anything back from Samatha yet. I said to myself, “This is such a waste of time. I’m never going to meet anyone this way. Why am I bothering with this?” It hadn’t even been 24 hours since I sent the email to the first interesting match I had and I was ready to throw in the towel on the whole process.

When I went in to work on Monday, I had an email from Samatha. The very first thing in the email was a thank you for spelling her name correctly, which is often overlooked. Score! Then, Samatha gave an in-depth reply about why she liked the book so much. She discussed several quotes from the book, too. I thought, “How did she pull quotes from the book like that so fast?”

By the time I finished reading the email, I knew I was going to marry her (just like the first time I met Dawn).

We continued to email each other for the next few days. The emails got very personal very fast. By the fourth day, we decided to shut down our eHarmony accounts and focus on this relationship. Also, we traded phone numbers so we could call each other.

So, just a few days after we met on eHarmony, I called Samatha. We talked on the phone for hours. In fact, we were on the phone until almost 3 a.m., which was really late for me to be up. I told Samatha that I had to go to bed because I needed to get up for work the next day. So, the phone call just sort of ended, awkwardly.

I called Samatha again the next day. Right away I asked her if she thought last night’s phone call had ended awkwardly too. She said yes. I told her that was because I wanted to tell her “I love you,” but I was afraid that would scare her away. She said she felt the same way but was not ready to say it.

So, we kept calling each other for the next six weeks or so. During that time we made plans to finally meet each other in person. Samatha lived about a four drive from me, but she was visiting some friends who were about half way between us. So, she would come down to visit me for a couple of days after she saw her friends.

I can remember the moment I saw her when I picked her up from the hotel. Beautiful! Just like the picture. We went to get sushi. Then, we went to see a play (I had season tickets to the theater).

During those couple of days we met in person for the first time, we actually went shopping for engagement rings. I mentioned in Part 1 that I had no clues about the rules of dating when I met Dawn. Not much had changed in 15 years.

The first person I told about this new relationship was my cousin Melissa. We work together in our family business. At the time, our offices were right next to each other. It was about three months after Dawn died. When I told her about Samatha and that we were likely to get married, Melissa said that she was not surprised. In fact, she had told the rest of my family the week before Dawn died that I would either get married in six months or I would never get married again.

Eventually, Samatha and I got married. It was six months and 12 days since Dawn had died.

Remember, when Dale said God did things for me quickly, in the snap of a finger?

Yeah, pretty much. Samatha was the very first person I was matched with on eHarmony. We shut off our accounts four days later. We went shopping for wedding rings six weeks after we met online. We were married six months after Dawn died.

But, about that list of 31 things?

Over the first few months that I knew Sam, I would go back to the list and check off the things she had that matched what I wrote down. Right away I could tell she had a lot of them. During some emails back and forth, it came out that she even ate the type of food I wrote down. Eventually, I crossed off everything on my list.

Do you know the odds of that?

Zero!

God is amazing!

So, how did this experience with the life of Jesus – his working in my life – open the Bible for me?

What presuppositions needed to change so I could see God clearly in the Bible?

Suffering.

Death.

Suffering and death are everywhere. I, along with many other Christians, viewed God as the cause of them. But, it wasn’t until 2017 that I truly understood that God doesn’t cause suffering and death. Instead, Jesus suffered and died himself. Most of all, he suffered and died at the hands of his own creation.

“Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things…?” (Luke 24.26)

“Thus it is written, that the Christ should suffer…” (Luke 24.46)

But, that was not the full picture. Jesus did not suffer and die and the story ended.

Luke 24.46 says that the “Christ should suffer these things and enter his glory.”

Luke 24.46 says “that the Christ should suffer and on the third day rise from the dead, and that repentance and the forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed in his name to all nations.”

I began to understand that God does not cause suffering and death. Rather, God enters into suffering and death only to enter his glory, to rise from the dead, to be resurrected, to change minds, and to forgive sins.

I had been through a lot of suffering and death. But, Jesus entered that suffering and death. But, Jesus brought new life out of it because of his love. By focusing upon Jesus’ love and not becoming bitter and angry, I was able to receive the resurrection, the new life, that Jesus wanted to bless me with.

Truly, when Samatha and I met and got married, it felt like a completely new life to me. I really have no way to explain what that feels like. One life was over – not just Dawn’s, but mine. And, a new life had begun.

I know have a better understanding of Philippians 3.10-11, which says, “That I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, that by any means possible I mat attain the resurrection from the dead.”

Now, I see this everywhere in the Bible. God did not cause suffering and death. Rather, the stories, the accounts, are witnesses to Jesus’ own suffering and death from which he was resurrected so that he could change our minds about God and our sins could be forgiven. Acts 18.5 says that “Paul was occupied with the word.” Jesus’ suffering, death, and resurrection was the word Paul was occupied with.

And, it is this same word that I have become occupied with. Once you have seen it, you cannot unsee it. And, once you have seen it, it becomes the thing that you see in scripture.

“Then he said to them, ‘These are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you, that everything written about me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled.’ Then he opened their minds to understand the Scriptures, and said to them, ‘Thus it is written, that the Christ should suffer and on the third day rise from the dead, and that repentance and the forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed in his name to all nations, beginning in Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things.” (Luke 24.44-48)

The scriptures has been opened to me. They have been revealed in my experiences with the life of Jesus. I am a witness to these things