Surely he has borne our infirmities
and carried our diseases;
yet we accounted him stricken,
struck down by God, and afflicted.
But he was wounded for our transgressions,
crushed for our iniquities;
upon him was the punishment that made us whole,
and by his bruises we are healed. (Isaiah 53:4-5)

Dear brothers & sisters in Christ,

Grace and peace to you from God our Father and Jesus Christ the Lord and Savior. Amen.

The three days between death and resurrection probably seemed like an eternity to the disciples. Their grief and fear would have been palpable. Confounded by the present, terrified of the future, and perplexed by the past, their faith experienced the greatest test of all. The one whom they had trusted and loved, the one they truly believed was the promised Messiah, was dead.

Jesus was ripped from this earth and their lives in the most humiliating and painful means available. Crucifixion was reserved for the worst of the worst criminals. The purpose was to make the suffering of the accused so great that it deterred all sympathizers from committing similar crimes. The challenge of re-evaluating all of Jesus’s teachings and the life the disciples shared with Him in light of the condemnation of the religious and state authorities would have been daunting. How do you reconcile the reality of the person you loved and believed to be the Son of God is branded and executed as an enemy of both Rome and Israel? How do you make reconcile the all He taught you with the violence done to Him? Making any sense of how events transpired from Thursday evening through Friday noon would have been both arduous and horrifying for this group of followers. How do you move into tomorrow when yesterday and today are so full of conflict, worry, and suffering? How do you face the future mission of your group while struggling to come to terms with the complete upheaval?

The wait for Sunday morning would have been excruciating. Especially since they managed to forget Sunday morning was coming. Despite Jesus’s promises and teachings about His own death and resurrection, despite the teachings of prophets like Isaiah, the disciples are depicted as being too paralyzed by grief and fear to remember the promise. Christ told them He would rise, but they either forgot or they never really got it. When faced with grief and fear, their hearts were hardened to the very promise that could ease their pain.

How do you comprehend the Will of God in the midst of pain and grief? It has been commented by theologians, particularly those specializing in pastoral care, that most of our lives are spent ‘living in Holy Saturday.’

Some scholars are describing faith with this metaphor. They posit our faith existing somewhere between the crucifixion and the resurrection. We have experienced the pain. We are expecting the joy. We are waiting for the fullness of God to be accomplished in us.

Others are describing human experience. We all have times in our lives we consider ‘highs’ and others we would say are ‘lows.’ The bulk of our time is spent somewhere around the middle of those times.

Either way, ‘Holy Saturday’ time describes a time with some degree of uncertainty and waiting. It is time spent trying to comprehend the past and present while imagining the future. It is a time of testing. It is a time of reflection. It is a time to listen for God. ‘Holy Saturday’ time is sacred.

While hiding in the caves, Elijah recognized God in “a sound of sheer silence.” (2 Kings 19:12b) For the disciples, that “sound of sheer silence” was Holy Saturday. That was their time to listen for God’s voice. It was their time to remember all that Jesus had taught them. Our ‘Holy Saturday’ times provide us the opportunity to listen for God’s voice and listen in the midst of ‘sheer silence.’ We too have time to remember all that Jesus has taught us. And, so we wait. We wait until that time when we, having been united to Him in death, are raised in Christ.

‘Holy Saturday’ is not forever. Easter Sunday comes. Alleluia! Christ is risen! He is risen indeed. Alleluia!

The grace and peace of God which surpasses all understanding keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.

In Christ,

Pastor Carla

  For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we will certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his. …  We know that Christ, being raised from the dead, will never die again; death no longer has dominion over him. (Romans 6:5,9)