Earlier this week, I saw the movie Everything Everywhere All at Once. It’s an action comedy that finds a Chinese woman whose laundromat is about to be repossessed by the IRS thrust into the role of saving not only her entire world, but the infinite “multi-verse” of worlds around her. As the title suggests, she finds herself experiencing Everything, Everywhere, All at Once.
We may not live in a multiverse (maybe we do!?), but we still experience more than one thing at a time. I’ve been thinking a lot about that this Easter season. If we separate out the four “big days” of Holy Week, we find quite a range of experiences: Maundy Thursday is a day of both intimacy and betrayal. Good Friday is a day of profound injustice and grief. Holy Saturday is a day of waiting and fear. Easter Sunday is a day of breakthrough and hope.
In the rhythm of Holy Week, the narrative carries us through these difficult, often dark places. Each day comes to an end, and we know that the end of the story is a new beginning, an opening to something far bigger than the original characters expected.
If only our own lives moved so smoothly.
Instead, we may find ourselves sitting with the darkness of Holy Week, desperately wondering when Easter will dawn. We may find glimpses of hope and newness only to be thrust back into the waiting of Holy Saturday. We might find ourselves in a long Maundy Thursday, wondering what the outcome will be of a particular betrayal, abandoned by those closest to us.
One of the things I find most compelling about Jesus’ story is that it contains everything. All of the emotions, all of the hardships – there is room for my sadness and suffering to be seen and held.
It’s okay if I’m feeling a little bit of everything, everywhere, all at once. That’s Easter. When we look closely at the story of Easter Sunday, we see that it wasn’t an immediate resolution. There was disbelief and fear, and questioning and doubt – there was much that the disciples needed to work out. In the days and weeks following Easter, they had the chance to re-encounter Jesus, to make sense of what had happened as best as they could, to touch his side and confirm that this was real.
For me, Easter is a season of hope. It is the foundation of my belief that love will triumph. It also offers space. It shows us that life contains multitudes of experiences, that doubt is normal, that hope breaks through when we don’t know what we’re waiting for. It reminds us that it’s okay to feel everything, everywhere, all at once. Beth-Anne Fisher