A very long time ago, Brother Lawrence wrote a little book entitled, Practicing the Presence of God. It is a treatise on prayer that I have found to be a wonderful asset. He counseled that if we live in openness to God, if we spend time each day welcoming God into our lives, if we look for God in others, if we search for God in creation...if we do these things, we will discover the truth of the resurrection. But this is a lifetime proposition and not an entertaining hour once a week. This is more than an assemblage of facts, more than the gathering of doctrine, more than the recitation of creeds. It is much more than that.

I attended a seminary with one of the largest collections of religious books in the world. The opportunities for study and research abounded. I am deeply grateful for such an education but I am also struck by the lack of scholarship on the part of Jesus. Occasional references to the Hebrew scriptures to be sure but, by and large, what we discover in Jesus is not the wise and revered intellectual pontificating before the people. This is a man not of words but action. You do not find Jesus saying, "Read this. Study this. Write this." but rather he invites, "Follow me".

This is not an academic exercise. It is a way of life. We do not understand the resurrection by being Christians but by following Jesus and there are times, plenty of times, when they are two very different things indeed.