I went back.

Most people who heard about him raising Lazarus from the dead thought we’d staged it to build up his following.

But I was there. I knew my brother was dead. He’d been in his tomb four days, you couldn’t mistake that sickening smell when they opened it up for anything else.

And he walked out, still wrapped in his grave clothes.

So I went back.

I knew he was dead. I’d seen him die. But there was this mad hope in my heart. Perhaps –

Someone had been there before me. The stone was gone.

I ran back and told the others.

Peter checked inside. The linen strips that Nicodemus and Joseph had used to wrap his body and the burial cloth they had wrapped around his head were folded neatly on the floor.

But his body wasn’t there.

They’d taken him. They weren’t going to risk any more stories about people being raised from the dead.

‘There’s nothing we can do,’ Peter said. He sounded very tired.

‘It’s over. Come away.’

But I went back.

You can read about the empty tomb here.

We went ahead so we were there to welcome him.

It’s odd how you think about someone’s needs and wants when they are dead.

He didn’t know that Joseph had risked asking Pilate for his body to be released.

He didn’t know that we were waiting there in the shade of the garden.

His mother can’t take it in. ‘He’s preaching to the dead’ she says.  ‘No-one is beyond God’s love, after all, that’s what he teaches.’

We don’t argue with her. She was there when they took him off the cross.  It’s not surprising that the grief has driven her mad.

Soon the stone will seal him into the tomb. Then perhaps she’ll be able to understand that he has gone forever.

What will we do now?

You can read about the death and burial of Jesus here.

I got it wrong – as usual.

He said he was going to suffer and die, to be rejected and killed.

‘But that doesn’t make sense!’ I said. ‘God wouldn’t send you to save us and then let you die. You must have got it wrong!’

I thought it was another test, he wanted to test our faith.

I thought he’d be pleased at my answer.

He called me ‘Satan’.

‘You’ll deny ever knowing me’ he said last night.

‘I won’t!’ I shouted.

I told them I had never met him.

‘If you want to follow me’ he’d said ‘you’ll have to take up your cross.’

A Cyrenian carried his cross; a man who’d never met him, never believed in him.

The women kept watch. They were stronger than I was.

He healed the sick, released people from demons, fed the hungry, stilled the storm.

Just for a moment, he made me believe I could walk on water.

But it is finished.

You can read about Peter and Jesus here and about the Crucifixion here.

You can stuff your sympathy.

Didn’t ask for it, don’t want it, I did what I did.

And you can stuff your accusations as well.

I really believed in him. I really believed he was going to do it.

When he went into Jerusalem – it was there for the taking. All it would take was force of numbers and we had that. He knows how to work a crowd.

He knew how to work a crowd.

That was the wake up call. He said he wanted to save us but he bottled it.

So – I told them where he was?

So what?

He handed me the bread and told me to get on with it.

If he’s who they say he is, he knows everything anyway. He knew what I was going to do before I did.

If he’s who he says he is, he could save himself even now.

Why won’t he save himself?

He chose to be caught, he chose to be tried, he chose –

He knew what he was doing.

He chose it. But I have to live with it.

You can read about Judas here.

Nobody knows I went to see him.

He had caused a scandal by his teachings, and even more scandal by the people he kept company with. Women followed him around and gave him money. His followers wanted to raise an army to bring in the Kingdom of Heaven with him at the head of it. Crowds gathered wherever he went and disturbed the peace.

He was trouble. He would have to be got rid of.

But there was just this nagging doubt you see. There were healings, and rumours of miracles. Maybe he was a prophet after all. I didn’t want to miss out. And the way things were going, I didn’t have much time.

I went to him at night. He didn’t live up to his reputation. I expect a teacher to make sense, to present his points in order and with proper explanations. But he talked in riddles.

‘Born from above,’ ‘born of water and spirit’ – what did he mean? We are born once and die once. Can we go back? I asked – of course not! It was nonsense. Sheer nonsense.

But all the time he had that little smile behind his eyes, as if he knew I wasn’t getting what I wanted.

I was infuriated and I let him know it. I’d risked a lot to see him and frankly I was disappointed. Teacher? As I suspected, he had nothing to teach me.

Born of the spirit? What does that mean? Why was he so obsessed with being born again?

He didn’t care – he laughed out loud, as if I was telling him a joke, not pulling his teaching apart.

‘Let’s try again’ he said kindly, as if I was a dull child who couldn’t learn my letters.

And told me about God’s love for the world, and the light and the darkness, and how we may be saved.

And just for a moment I was caught up in his story, I saw why people believed in him, just for a moment I believed he could change the world.

But he couldn’t. It was too good to be true. He’s reached the end of the road now – as I knew he would. He was just too dangerous.

Born from above? Born of water and spirit? What did he mean?

You can read about Nicodemus here.

He just seems to loves everyone.

He brings the good out in people. The people who do get to know him, who take the time to listen to his words until they start to make sense – they love him. Not because of anything he does, but because of what he is.

He once went missing. I found him with a circle of boys round him, shouting at him and throwing stones at his feet to make him ‘dance’.

If something happened to him, I think my heart would really, physically break inside me. So I keep him close.

I heard the Rabbi was out on the hills again and so we set off together, walking till we saw where the crowds had gathered.

I’d heard him before, but once you’ve heard him you just want to hear him again. I could listen forever. As he talked about Heaven I got caught up in his words, for a moment it felt as if we were all there with him.

And then my heart gave a terrible thump as I looked down and saw my little boy was gone. In this great crowd, where anyone could get up to God knows what, and no-one would hear or understand his call for help, my little boy who trusted everyone had disappeared.

I fought to catch my breath as I pushed through the crowds, shouting his name, asking people if they’d seen him.

He was gone. I would never see him again. I hadn’t cared for him enough. I’d lost my precious boy.

Then I saw him – holding out his bread and fish. The Rabbi took them, blessed them, and broke them. And he kept breaking them, but somehow there was always more.

When everyone was eating, he brought my son to me.

‘He gave me everything he had to help me’ he said.

Who will help him now?

You can read about the boy who helped feed 5,000 people here.

The fear was always there, like a dog curled up in the corner. Sometimes growling quietly in its sleep and sometimes drowning out everything else with its barking.

I was full of hope each time I saw a new doctor. I would hope for a day, a week, a month – and then realise that nothing had changed. I was still unclean, bleeding, tired, ill, and frightened.

Hope wears you down after a while.  Better not to hope, that way you don’t get disappointed.

I heard about a healer. He was good. But he was a holy man, a rabbi, and I was a woman, and unclean. There was no way he would touch me. Forget about it, I told myself.

But he had got into my head.

Nobody noticed me, nobody made way for me. So many people – where was he? I’d never find him. The dead weight of despair was back, so heavy I couldn’t keep on my feet. I stumbled and fell on the robe of the man in front of me.

It was a beautiful piece of cloth. I had never seen anything so beautiful. Light shone out of it. Soft, so soft that I wanted to bury my face in it and weep until all the pain had gone.

‘Who touched me?’

I saw in his face that he understood everything about me. Yet he looked at me as if I was the most precious person in the world.

‘My Lord’ I sobbed, ‘My Lord, I have been –‘

‘I know’ he said. ‘But your faith has healed you.’
He took my pain, my fear, my shame, my suffering, my hopelessness and my anger.

He made me clean.

And I can do nothing for him.

You can read about the woman with the haemorrhage here.

I just wanted a look. Without being pushed and jostled and spat at. But he looked straight at me, and the shouting started.

‘Don’t talk to him, Teacher, he’s scum!’

‘He’d steal the teat out of a baby’s mouth!’

‘Flaming tax collector!’

They left him and gathered round the foot of the tree. Getting me was more important than hearing what he had to say.

Someone started to shake it and more joined in. They threw sticks and stones up at me to get me down. The sweat started to pour off my face. Why had I risked it? What an idiot! What did I think would happen when the people saw me?

When they got hold of me they were going to rip me to pieces. The shouting grew louder as they could see I was starting to lose my grip.

Then –

‘Be quiet! he said.

And ‘Be quiet!’ again.

The crowd stilled and quietened – for a second I thought I’d gone deaf. Then it parted as he walked to the foot of the tree.

‘Zacchaeus, come down’ he said.

Oh hell! Did I have to? Talking to him suddenly seemed more frightening than falling into a crowd that wanted to kill me.

Stupidly, I looked the other way, as if my attention had been distracted by some distant speck in the sky somewhere. Silence.

‘Zacchaeus, come down.’

As I walked through the crowd there was a low mumble of threat. They would wait until he’d gone to grab me.

Then –

‘I’m eating with you tonight;’ he said. ‘Go and get ready.’

And now here I am again. Another day, another tree.

Thinking about the difference he made to everyone who chose to stop and look at him.

I wish I didn’t have to look at him today.

You can read about Zacchaeus here.