Robert Kolb (PhD, University of Wisconsin) is mission professor of systematic theology emeritus at Concordia Seminary in St. Louis. He is the author or coauthor of numerous books and articles.
In late 2009 the status of the Euro seemed up for grabs because of unstable economies within the Euro zone, and common people shared the anxiety of economists about the future of the currency. At that time Chancellor Angela Merkel of the Federal Republic of Germany observed, “the most important currency in the world is trust,” not just trust in the currency but trust in the leaders who direct the economies it serves. People peering into the future did not know what was going to happen. Some doubted whether any good lay on the horizon, a worry that today we know was quite unjustified.
In our own smaller dimensions of life, we all confront situations in which trust in the “regular” and “normal” ways of doing things seems unjustified because they just are not producing the results they have previously. Trust in our ability to cope with ever-changing elements in our lives grows weak when new obstacles arrive or our own powers recede and our own ideas fail us. We know the past, and we are wise enough to know that letting it haunt us will not change it. It is out of our control. Only God remains Lord of the past.
On the basis of how we are doing with our present and what seems to lurk and loom on the future horizon, we often fill our waiting with worry. Doubts swirl like little whirlwinds through our minds, especially in moments or hours of wakefulness at night. Plans for the future that we have carefully formulated or that others have given us appear suddenly to be not so manageable as we had anticipated. We thrash about, trying to imagine something onto which we can hang. We let our thoughts run wild, trying to find some rational explanations that make sense of what we are experiencing and offer hope of being able to cope with what is coming. Too often the explanations do not seem to offer a firm foundation for that hope. We sense that our mastery of our present, as shaky as it may seem, is more certain than what we project as our ability to cope with what is coming down the track, as the future barrels down upon us.
Jesus Christ has claimed our past and placed it in his tomb. He has raised us from the death-dealing burdens of our past to claim us as his children today. His resurrection has put his mark on our futures, futures that promise to culminate in resurrection and life that never ends. He meets us here and now as the crucified Messiah who left tomb and grave cloths behind.
It is not as though he was not familiar with the turmoil that thoughts about the future can bring. He had his disciples prepare a Passover meal that, he mentioned, would be his last till dining with them in his eschatological kingdom. Doubt and dread floated like a dark cloud around him as he led his disciples to the Garden of Gethsemane. He had predicted that it would come to this, this confrontation with the high priest’s police, who embodied the evil that is out to destroy God’s rule over his creation and especially his human creatures. Can’t we find another way of doing this, he asked the Father. But then he added, “It’s your call.” “Your will be done.” For he knew that he could count on the plan, on the presence of the Father even when he cried out, “My God, why have you forsaken me?”
And so he cast dread and doubt aside. The Father’s will was what he, too, wanted. He found joy in going the path to the cross. He looked beyond shame, suffering, and death to life as the Lord of all creation, the firstborn of the new creation. He created everything and everyone who exists, and he has held it all together. The fullness of God dwells in this Jesus who prayed, “let this cup pass,” in this bleeding and dying Jesus. He bled and died—and rose again—to restore the peace of Eden through his giving up his life. He blew the tombs of his people wide open and opened up life forever with him by claiming his own life back from Satan and death. He endured all that becoming human endured for us—for you! His wide open tomb ensures what my future and yours will be.
That means that my fist that has grasped some plan to hold me steady as the future descends upon me can now relax. That means that my dread and doubt can be cast to the winds that blow from heaven through the empty tomb into nowhere. That means that he will be lighting the way precisely in the darkest of moments when no light appears at the end of the tunnel before us, for his light shines into the darkness of the world around us. It does seem darkest before the dawn, but the dawn of resurrection morning returns each day to light up the hours immediately before us and the entire future about which we fret.
For he meets us in our Gethsemanes. We encounter him just when we wander about lost in what should be familiar territory but turns out to be overgrown with worries, cares, fears, and discouragement. There he is, on familiar ground, because he himself has been here and done this. And he knows the way out. It may be rough to follow him at times. It may be tough to stumble through. Our dreads and doubts will not completely disappear even though we know that they have no ground under their feet on which to stand and walk alongside us. But Jesus has met us, and he has assured us that he will be with us to the end, to the end of this time, and into his eternity. Our time to come belongs to him, our future is his future, too.