Stop Proving And Start Telling

The resurrection story starts with a problem anyone can recognize: you’re carrying love, you’re carrying grief, and there’s a stone in the way. We step into Eastertide by following the women to the tomb, lingering over their honest question, “Who will roll away the stone?” and noticing the courage hidden in plain sight. They don’t wait for perfect certainty. They go anyway, and that single posture becomes a powerful spiritual practice for anyone facing loss, burnout, injustice, or a future that feels sealed shut.

We also talk about what gets missed when we read scripture through the same lens we were handed years ago. Why are so many women blurred into “Mary,” and what changes when we insist that every person in the story matters? From there, we move into “go and tell” as a commissioning that has too often been stifled. We explore how resurrection is more than a claim to debate and becomes a lived, embodied reality: pockets of hope, bigger tables, companionship, and the quiet ways our bodies know truth before our minds can prove it.

If you’ve ever wondered whether resurrection can be real when someone you love is still gone, you’re not alone. We hold that tension with tenderness, connect it to Hildegard’s greening and the cycles of nature, and offer a blessing for anyone who is going to the tomb with spices still in their hands. Subscribe, share this with a friend who needs hope, and leave a review. Where have you seen resurrection showing up lately?

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:01

Welcome to the Expansionist Podcast with Shelly Shepherd and Heather Drake. In each episode, we dive deep into conversations that challenge conventional thinking, amplify diverse voices, and foster a community grounded in wisdom, spirit.

SPEAKER_00 0:17

Here we are, my friend, once again. Welcome. Good to see you.

SPEAKER_01 0:23

Once again, Shelly Shepard, so good to see you. Grateful to have a conversation with you this morning. We just entered into the season of Eastertide. Because of course, Easter can't just be one week. And the idea, I think, of Easter in all of its goodness and maybe all of the sweetness that we have yet to taste. It's just the promise of resurrection, which I think is so essential to us because we remember that there are so many illusions of death that have been given to us in our lifetimes. And to be able to say, but what I see with my inner eye is the light and the truth that Jesus told me, that the resurrection is greater than the powers of death, the illusion of separation.

SPEAKER_00 1:11

Love is stronger than death. Always.

SPEAKER_01 1:15

Doesn't feel like it sometimes, but that is the truth. So that is the practicing. We've been paying attention to the women. Are there seven weeks? No, it's 50 days until Pentecost. From Easter to Pentecost, we have the 50 day. 49.

Who Will Roll Away The Stone

SPEAKER_00 1:35

Yeah. Yeah. So we're in this first week post-Easter, and and I'm excited to have this conversation about, of course, the women. What's been in your hands or thoughts?

SPEAKER_01 1:49

A few things. Even before preaching, um, Mary the mother of James. I love those, you know, and again, we have the Mary, Mary, Mary, Mary, Mary, Mary, Mary, this idea of all the women probably weren't named Mary, but the idea that any woman just throw her in under the name of Mary. And the idea, not that we have to parse everyone out and make them separate. What were the women doing? I think even collectively, it's so beautiful to pay attention to that part of the story. The part that really stood out to me this year, again, was that little portion before they go to in the synaptic gospels before they go to the garden tomb, and they're bringing the spices, they're bringing the anointing oils. And in collective group, they say, but who will roll away the stone? Yes. And I just began to sit with that question because that made so much sense to me. We understand what the reality is that is stopping us from doing what our devotion or what our love calls us to. Sometimes it is a grief or a death that feels like it's stopping us. But there are other things that feel very much the same weight as a stone in front of what we want to do to change the world for the better. We see an area of death or we see an area of destruction. And we collectively, as women, are going, yeah, who's going to roll away the stone? But I think what has happened is the questions have stopped us just in our tracks. Well, since we don't know for sure.

SPEAKER_00 3:19

We can't move the stone.

SPEAKER_01 3:21

Exactly. Exactly. But I see their pattern is go anyway. And I wonder if that posture could change things. I'm curious that the posture of go in love anyway, go and and show up at the tombs and say, we're here to see. And now who knows what else could have happened. You know, they get there and an angel has already done the work. But what does it look like? You know, maybe they got to get their brothers, their sons. They have a lot of, you know, connection around them. Maybe there is somebody there with a pry bar. I don't know. But some house stones can be moved. But I think very often the questions that we have, like we don't know for sure about this, they stop us instead of following the pattern going, yeah, let's have the conversation, but let's keep moving while we do it.

Reading Between The Lines

SPEAKER_00 4:13

Or if we if we dipped into uh Cynthia Bourgeois's work about uh Mary Magdalene following uh Christ through death, maybe there was some inclination of spirit that she had that the that the stone would somehow be moved miraculously. Like maybe she did have this intuition and the good being within her, she knew that there was maybe some good trouble that they could figure out, right? They could figure this out. But I wonder, um, in in hearing you, you know, talk about this is let's go anyhow. Um, fear is what keeps us maybe from going. You know, the stone's too big, or we're gonna need five people and we only have two people. And, you know, we just like you said, we s we stop in our tracks. But sometimes I I wonder we read the story, Heather, and we read it through the same lens that we were told as five-year-olds or 20-year-olds or 40-year-olds. What maybe we miss what what's between the lines, what's between what isn't said and what was left out, and obviously all the unnamed and all the Marys and you know, pushing everybody into one space, uh, Dr. Will Gaffney would say, hmm, let's back up. Let's back this story up and let's start over because every person in that story matters. Every person matters in the story. And so if this is our story and we're up against a rock, and we go get our friends, when we write that story, we're gonna include every person that helped us get through that trauma or that that hiccup in our life or that loss or the grief, or you know, we're gonna name these people. We're not just gonna call them all Marys, Heather. We're not we're not gonna do that. And so um some part of me feels maybe holy imagination that the Magdalene had had some inclination here about what was going on.

Go And Tell Resurrection Stories

SPEAKER_01 6:27

I don't think at all without an inner knowing that they couldn't have pushed through the big question. Because sometimes you have the question, who will roll the stone away? But then there's a deeper knowing that goes, that's not to concern yourself with right now. Carry on, bring the devotion. And then they get to the tomb. Obviously, we know that we celebrate resurrection, it's beautiful. But then Jesus commissions and says, Go and tell. And this go and tell, I think, has been stifled in us. Go and tell of resurrection. And not only go and tell of Jesus' resurrection, but where have we seen resurrection? Where do we see the breaking in of God's good kingdom? Where do we see little pockets of resistance? Where do we see people instead of building bigger walls, building bigger tables, and being able to say, what does it look like for us to go and tell and say, there is a better story that's to be told? And the story is that death doesn't win, that love wins. And the invitation is that women have always been storytellers. And so we take these stories and we we hand them down through the heart and through not just with our voices, but in the way that we prepare meals and the way that we comfort each other, in the way that we honor companionship among among women. But what are we doing to make sure that we have connection so that when somebody does need to go to the tomb, that they don't have to be able to do that?

SPEAKER_00 7:59

Well, and I suspect that the men would have understood the burial process. It would not have been the first death that they they knew of. And so perhaps they knew the women would have would have gotten up early and as the dawn was breaking and and made their way with their spices, and they they they they already knew that. And so that's a part of the story too, that you're like, hmm, yeah, I'm just gonna scratch my head here a minute. Like, really? Like your best friend dies and you're gonna sleep in.

SPEAKER_01 8:38

You know, yeah, we're not gonna go, we're just gonna lock ourselves. But you you know, I listen to that and I also go, sometimes that's what grief does, though. You cannot move. Shock, we'll do that to you. But I'm talking about Jesus was not the only resurrection that they saw. Jesus did miracles. Resurrection was something that they had seen a few times. Exactly. But even before then, when the son is given back to the dead mother, you know, like there's over and over again we see these glimpses of a resurrection, this foreshadowing of a greater resurrection. And they can't even understand it. I mean, Jesus tells them I this is what's going to happen. And they have the words, but they don't have that connection, that understanding. And so I'm grateful for the practice of joining the women and going, how do we offer what is in our hands, the the uh the spices or just the traveling or the being with people, in order to not only hold the grief and then at the same time hold the joy of the promise of resurrection, you know, to be able to have the tension of the gratitude and the grief in the same hands, and to be able to offer that to the world, to each other, so that when we all look at the same thing, one of us are saying, But I see resurrection, I see hope here, I see, I see renewal.

Grief And The Hope We Share

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SPEAKER_00 10:08

And where does our devotion actually take us to places that are full of have you ever experienced a bodily resurrection? No, no, I have not. Um and I'm sitting here wondering about people that do not believe in in a physical res uh physical resurrection or a bodily resurrection. Um and yet the symbolism of what you've just named is very real in all of our lives. We've all experienced uh something that is that has left us or is been lost or grieving, you know, a passing of a loved one or someone close to us. And so we can relate to to that sort of thing. My sister, my sister passed in uh October, and on Easter, uh after everything was kind of settled and um I had some uh alone time, I just felt her near, I felt her presence. I got emotional and you know, I wanted to be with her and uh, you know, experience something that that I had remembered about her. And so I took a few minutes, you know, to do that. And yet that that moment between what I had just experienced, that uh Christ is risen indeed to my sister has not risen indeed. Like she is still gone, she is still absent. And to me, this is what the way of the Magdalene or the fifth-way love or the wisdom way, the things that we have talked about at our table reminds me that we're not always going to see it the same way. You know, scripture isn't always going to speak to us all the same way. The story in John might not speak to everyone the same way. They might not believe, but what they can believe is in the hope that there is some kind of life in my own skin, in my own body, in my neighbors, in my friends, in my community, in my church that feels like resurrection.

Greening Seasons And Proof Fatigue

SPEAKER_01 12:32

We want to pause and take a moment and let you know how glad we are that you've joined us. If you're enjoying this podcast, consider sharing it with a friend. And if you found the conversation intriguing and want to know more about what we're learning or how you can join our online community, visit our website at expansionisttheology.com. And I think that the invitation is that we would begin to look for it, not only upon looking, then also as we find it, to tell people this is where I found it. I found this in community, I found resurrection in a different maybe family uh of people, but there is still resurrection possible. And even if you don't uh attach this to anything spiritual, the practice of every screw every spring regreening of every season coming into something new, and even if it has nothing in your mind to do with the spiritual, but what it does to our actual physiology of being able to say what it looks like in ourselves to be able to feel this promise of it may look like nothing's happening, but there is so much more happening under the surface.

SPEAKER_00 13:46

And Hildegard teaches us that too, right? That um this greening, this drying, this greening, this rebirth is all is all part of our of our lives and and the seasons that we experience, not just the the church calendar seasons like Easter or those holiday times, but the season of summer, spring, winter, fall, there's there's some kind of resurrection going on that we either are clearly seeing or watching, or maybe we're missing. We're missing the point of resurrection. We're missing the point of the story of did Jesus rise from the dead, or you know, you know, did he just like is this just a story that somebody wanted us to hear or wanted us to that wanted told? And my my deepest uh spiritual self, you know, says his words, I came to give life, right? And life to the fullest. Yeah. And so if it's through um uh death and and and and rising again, if it's through water baptism, if it's through communion, you know, if it's through passing um the peace or you know, whatever that looks like, whatever resurrection looks like to that soul that says, I need more, I need more, you know, proof. Like, do we do we always have to prove what our body already knows? I think as women we are exhausted from proving.

SPEAKER_01 15:36

Oh, heaven help us. Amen to that. And so the invitation in the spirit is to quit trying to prove, but to just practice being, to practice being in the presence of, in the presence of other women, in the presence of love, in the presence of each other, in the presence of even hard things, for us to be able to reimagine a better world, a more excellent way, a world without war, a world that doesn't center men but centers the children, centers the the rebirth that is being offered to us.

SPEAKER_00 16:18

Now, you and I haven't seen a bodily resurrection, but we have seen plenty of resurrection in our lifetime.

SPEAKER_01 16:25

Absolutely, we you know, and I think this of all manner of things, yes, friendships, relationships, all manner of things, plants, animals, yeah, um, yeah, creativity, all kinds of things.

The Story Has Changed Perspective

SPEAKER_00 16:39

Just the morning, you know, the rising of, you know, the dawn, then the night changing to dawn, right? That's that's a form of um a new day being resurrected. And and you know, when we were talking in the pre-show about this post-resur post-resurrection story, um, and that the women um are commissioned by Christ to go and tell this intentional posture that Jesus offered to them. Perhaps he knew very clearly what he was doing. Um, even if others doubted, if others didn't believe, or even now in our our time, you know, the women are not named, forgotten, or called something else. Here we are with this post-resurrection story of what do we do with the spices? What do we do with the go and tell? What do we do with the anointing? What do we do with the cloth that is in our hands as we pick it up from inside the tomb, and the body is no longer there? The grief is no longer there, the story has changed.

SPEAKER_01 17:54

I think that's such a hopeful thought, and that it could be the resurrection itself. The story has changed. What about the story you tell yourself with how things are going to be or how things were? What does it look like for us to recognize resurrection is a different perspective? Resurrection can be coming back to life because we did not see things the way that we see them now.

A Blessing For Going And Telling

SPEAKER_00 18:17

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah, I love that. Coming back to life.

SPEAKER_01 18:22

I wrote a blessing.

SPEAKER_00 18:23

Of course you did.

SPEAKER_01 18:25

Yes, I did, because that's how I'm doing everything now. I'm just blessing it. Beloved ones. Blessed are you who come to the tomb carrying both grief and devotion. Your hands still scented with spices, your hearts still heavy with love. Blessed are you who arrive expecting endings and instead are met by voices that call you beloved, the same voice that has always named you so in the hidden chambers of your truest being. May you remember this: the one you seek, the one you love, the one you thought was lost is also the one who calls you by name and sends you forth. May this belovedness reverberate in your bones, fill your nostrils like the first breath of creation, dance along your skin like a holy trembling when joy interrupts despair. May it settle in your hips with ancient knowing and in your breasts with fierce tenderness, in your body as a sanctuary where resurrection is already unfolding. Bless your inner eye, that it may open to visions of the world that has forgotten how to see, gardens blooming in graves, an angel where there were only shadows, life stirring where everything seems sealed and silent. Bless your voice, beloved daughter, especially when it quivers, especially when it feels too small for such good news. May it awaken like silver bells laughing in your throat, may their bright music spill like joy too holy to contain, like rivers unsealing from your depths, surging with gladness of good news, like wind both wild and tender, breath that gathers storms, and then breath that restores, exhaling through mountains, forests, moss, and greening the silence, drawing deep into your lungs and releasing a hush of peace, a holy kiss, moving all things toward life. Go beloved, go and tell. Tell it in all the unlikely places, in rooms where hope is thin to whispers, in streets where grief walks unaccompanied, in hearts that have forgotten their own radiance. Announce what your body knows before your mind can even begin to name it. Love is not dead, very life is not finished, the kingdom is not far away, but pressing in even now. And may you find holy companions along the way, other women remembering, other voices rising, choruses of resurrection echoing through time. And together may you practice sacred imagining, seeing goodness everywhere, midwifing it into being, trusting the holy unfolding already alive within you, among you. Blessed are you who remember, blessed are you who speak, and blessed are you who are going and telling. Amen.

SPEAKER_00 21:14

Amen. Wow. Beautiful words. Did you write that today?

SPEAKER_01 21:24

No. This weekend though. Yes, before that. Just been contemplating. And I thought, you know what? I don't know if enough people have been blessed in their going and telling.

SPEAKER_00 21:36

I would say not, particularly the women. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Particularly the woman. It's a beautiful resurrection. Images. The cascading between um what our bodies know and what what is yet to be told. Um I I think that's the power that's the part of the resurrection story that I want to you know that I that I want to hold is that that my body knows these things.

SPEAKER_01 22:06

Um and that's why we don't have to prove it.

Closing Words And Final Invitation

SPEAKER_00 22:08

I know it in my yeah we don't have to prove it. I know it in my let's just stop proving just stop proving. And as preachers I'm not sure we can stop we can stop proving um for that long but but our posture can be we're telling a better story. Thank you. Thank you for that blessing and for this conversation and may those who listen to it um find deeper ways of resurrection blooming in them as well.

SPEAKER_01 22:40

Yeah and may you have all the permission you need to go and tell it was our joy to have you listen to our conversation today. If you would like further information or for more content visit us at expansionist coming