Today I will go to church and among other things, I will read a psalm aloud with people and receive the eucharist with them. Last Sunday I attended church, sat in the same spot that Steve and our family always sits, reflected on our marriage ceremony and memorial service that took place within those walls in the last nine months and did not shed a tear. Until the moment that the bread was broken in preparation for the eucharist.. And then it all washed over me.
So the taking into my mouth of the wafer, and holding it there waiting for the sipful of wine to swirl over it in my mouth and dissolve it felt like Jesus saying to me, the week in between this feast will hold a sip of suffering. I affirmed in my drinking and swallowing and in walking reflectively back to my seat, that this sip would be enough to carry me another week. Seven full days.
And so today I get to go back. And sit and say a psalm with a large room of people, many who I don’t even know. But there are a few there that I do, and they will hold my gaze as Steve did. And we will know together and we will know that we know.
Steve’s dearest friend wrote me recently, “I remember Steve talking to me about how faith or Christianity should be held like a bowl with holes in it, or like water held in your hands. Most of the water will run through the holes and the cracks and you should let it go. But the water that stays, the water that holds, that’s worth holding on to. The freedom to test your own faith was real strength.”
Somehow, to me, that Eucharistic sip and the nestled drop of water are related.