Let it Die
On begging for resurrection
“You don’t have to be scared of letting it die,” says my friend, across from me at the table. She holds my gaze firmly, even though my eyes are filling with tears, spilling over at the thought of another death of another dream. “God’s not scared of it. There’s always resurrection.”
Of course I know this. Resurrection is my favorite word. It has been my word through sickness and heartbreak and loss, the overarching theme of every poem I have ever written. It has defined my life, but not always because I’ve seen it. I have watched a lot of things die. I have watched a lot of them stay dead.
I told my pastor on Sunday that I am afraid of letting my One Last Dream die because if it dies, do I become nothing? Who is Hannah without a dream? I have dreamt this dream since I was a little child, since everyone started asking who I wanted to be when I grew up, I have had the same exact answer. Things were added along the way, but the heart was always One Thing. One Good Thing that I have cherished, watered, fed, believed for, desired, ached for, despaired for.
And that One Good Thing, does it have to die?
Before I let it, will it get resurrected?
Martha stands before the tomb of her brother—her caretaker, her protector, her provider. She stands with her brother’s best friend, kicking dust with her feet as she tries to hold back her tears that refuse to stay put, the lump in her throat so big she can hardly form words around it. The Lord makes promises, there, to her, but they are impossible to understand. “I know my brother will rise on the last day,” she says, miserably. This is not a lack of faith, but a frustration, a tender terror as she looks at the rest of her earthly life and wonders how it can be done alone.
The Lord is weeping as He describes resurrection, as He gestures to Himself.
Ask, seek, knock. I have done this for decades. I have held up my dreams for inspection, begging the Lord to remove them if they are not His, desperate to walk in alignment with my Jesus, who I love. I have asked for things, seen clearly His yes and amen, and then had it taken away in the end.
What, then, can we say? Is God not for us? Does He cast His sweeping gaze over us and shake His mighty head at what idiots we are for asking for the same dream to come alive day after day after day? Surely a kind and loving Father would not give stones to His children who ask for bread.
I turn, back at the table, to my other friend and he is crying because I am crying, we are all three of us grieving and aching at the curse of living in the temporary as citizens of an eternal kingdom, with a God whose timing is perfect but makes no sense here. We are holding unanswered questions along with the certainty of a loving God, arms full of the tension that poses. We are bearing each others’ burdens.
What a kindness. And that kindness is only perceivable in grief. (Is that why God lets so many things die?)
The Lord has asked me if my life without the Dream would be enough.
I tell Him I am not sure.
I want to say yes, but I am scared to.