An elderly man and his adult daughter were saying goodbye at the airport. She is about to proceed through security to catch her flight. He hugs her and says, “I love you honey and I wish you enough.” She says, “I love you too, Dad. Thank you for all that you have done for me. I wish you enough, too.”
With that, she gets in line for security and the father begins to walk away waving at her. He starts to tear up. A person who was watching this whole event approaches him and asks, “Are you all right?” “Yes, it’s just that I am old and I don’t see my daughter much. So every time we have to say goodbye, I am not sure if I will see her again.” The person then says, “I noticed that when you said goodbye, you said, ‘I wish you enough.’ What did that mean?”
The father smiles. “That’s a wish that had been handed down in my family for generations. My parents use to say it to everyone. When we said, ‘I wish you enough.’ we wanted the other person to have a life with just enough good things to sustain them. “
Then the old man closes his eyes and says, “It’s part of a blessing . . .
I wish you enough sun to keep your attitude bright
no matter how gray the day may appear.
I wish you enough rain to appreciate the sun even more.
I wish you enough happiness to keep your spirit alive and everlasting
I wish you enough pain so that even the smallest joy may appear bigger.
I wish you enough gain to satisfy your wanting.
I wish you enough loss to appreciate all you possess.
I wish you enough hellos to get you through the final ‘goodbye.’
All through the Easter season, we have been hearing in the readings about the impact of Jesus’ resurrection on the early Christians. If you have been paying attention, you will remember that it was not always so easy or smooth . . . even among themselves. There was lots of bickering with people disagreeing about how to be a follower of Christ. In the gospel today, we hear a speech from the middle of John’s gospel. The speech has Jesus preparing them for the time he needs to leave them . . . but it’s placed near the end of the Easter season, because it talks about Jesus describing the closeness he has with them and that he will not leave them abandoned.
You see, the event of resurrection is not only the highlight of the all the scriptures from all ago, it is also an invitation for us, right now, to look at our relationship with God. Through the resurrection, we are invited into an attitude, that is, a way of looking at our lives and the world.
We all face hard issues and difficult “letting goes.” Yet we are invited not to stay in an attitude of “poor me” or “woe is me.” We are invited into a perspection centered to have hope and to receive compassion with the certainty that no matter how tough life gets . . . God is in our midst.
The resurrection (which we call the Easter miracle) is God’s assurance that
we will always have . . .
enough love to give,
enough forgiveness to seek and offer,
enough reason to carry on even as we face loss or catastrophe.
Sometimes it feels like we are barely hanging on . . . or that we are not sure how we are going to get through this awful situation. So we again hear about resurrection, and the Easter season lasts for 50 days so that some of this “good news” might trickle into our brains and that we remember it all year long.
God raised Jesus from the dead so that we have the assurance that God’s love and forgiveness is stronger than anything we are facing. God will give you enough.
Enough sun to keep your attitude bright
no matter how gray the day may appear.
Enough rain to appreciate the sun even more.
Enough happiness to keep your spirit alive and everlasting
Enough pain so that even the smallest joy may appear bigger.
Enough gain to satisfy your wanting.
Enough loss to appreciate all you possess.
Enough hellos to get you through the final ‘goodbye.’