Friendship: the scatterbrained girly kind/the best kind.

Easter has always been my favorite holiday. I love that it's not quite as commercialized as most other holidays and that there's still a pretty good helping of Jesus in there. Plus, I always loved getting a new white dress every year when I was little. I'm such a girl. Which, coincidentally, is exactly what this post is about.

Since I couldn't sleep tonight, my mind naturally wandered to crafting. In preparation for Easter, Audrey and I will be doing some pretty fun crafts that center around the Easter story. We've just starting doing a little bible project together a couple of times a week (thank you to Abby Ellis for your motivation there!) and I've been loving our time together. It's amazing to see her get all giddy about reading the "bib-el" too! If you need any tips on how to incorporate teaching your child about God into your daily routine, talk to Abby! The point of all that was to say that my mind soon came around to Easter and I began reading the last bit of Mark. I'm a little scatterbrained. Which, coincidentally, is exactly what this post is about.

Mark 16:1-4 ¹ When the Sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices so that they might go to anoint Jesus’ body. ² Very early on the first day of the week, just after sunrise, they were on their way to the tomb ³ and they asked each other, “Who will roll the stone away from the entrance of the tomb?”
⁴ But when they looked up, they saw that the stone, which was very large, had been rolled away.

This passage jumped out at me as I thought of the way my sweet girlfriends would totally be on board as soon as someone mentioned an idea of how to honor Christ. I laughed as I thought about all the times I've been so excited about something that I don't think at all about practical things (like rolling a big stone away). I think it's incredibly sweet that the women in the bible were so excited that they rushed out at dawn without thinking! I can just imagine one of them saying "Ah, crapola! What about that big ole stone!? Why didn't we think of that?! ARGGG!" Because they were so in love with Him, nothing else was on the forefront of their minds! I bet at that moment, God just fell in love all over again with those sweet, silly women when He saw how eager they were to serve Him. They took time to go shopping for spices and obviously arranged a meeting time and place (verse 1), and if it were me, they would have thought that they had everything all together and were all ready to go. And they might have been a little proud about what a good idea they had. And of course, when the obvious stone was mentioned, all the other woman would have been just as surprised at their own absent-mindedness. "Aw, dang!! Why didn't we think of that?! What'll we do now?!" I know that feeling all too well! I'm sure they were really frustrated with themselves, but I bet they forgot all about it in verse four! I wonder if they were a little embarrassed to retell this story. I bet they laughed about it for a long time. Kinda like how I still laugh at Kendall for greeting her own reflection at the drive thru window back in our college days. ;)

I can relate to this passage because 1. I'm super scatterbrained. For example, I lose my cell phone about 293502183465 times a day and 2. I have women around me that get excited in the same way I do and who are always up for honoring God in any way they can. I know that the women in my life would be up at dawn with me on the first day of the week (verse 2) if I were Mary Magdelene and I'm so thankful for that.

Also, this reminded me of Kassie's sunrise story. I don't want to embarrass her, but let's just say that she was so excited to see it, she hurried to the most familiar sunset spot. And waited... as the sun rose behind her.

Kendall, Stephanie, Shiloh and Shannon, thank you for the way you support, encourage, and are always there for and me and each other. I love you guys. I love your excitement. I love your scattered brains. I love being next to you when God reveals Himself to us, like He revealed Himself through the empty tomb.
I'm so glad to call you all friends. Which is really what this post is about.