In the Christian Church we have Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, Ressurection Sunday....there isn't much mentioned about Saturday. I'm well aware there are church traditions outside of my little Protestant bubble that recognize the Saturday of holy week in various ways - Catholics and Coptics in particular with blackened altars or periods of grievous silence. But nothing, for me personally, has ever captured the day before Easter quite right.
When something horrible happens, it's - well - horrible. And when I think of those moments throughout my own life, where the wind was knocked out of me or an event took place so suddenly and harshly that my entire perspective was turned upside down, it isn't actually the moment of action that hurts the most. It's always the day after.
Perhaps you are like me, and have had those moments where you've awakened the morning after crying all night, your eyes raw and your mind so full it almost feels hollow. The day after something devastating happens, you start the morning off learning to cope with a whole new reality. The day it happens, it's still almost dream-like - it isn't fully real, you're living it and don't have the time to even decide what you truly think about it all. But the day after......that's seriously the worst.
Lost friendships, moments of unspeakable violence and everything on the spectrum in between always inflicts the highest intensity of pain the day after.
Those poor disciples. And Mary. Can you seriously imagine waking up the day after seeing Jesus die on the cross? How do you live? How do you just wake up, dress and carry on? You can't. There's just no way.
I'm sure there were many faithfuls in Jesus' day who were holding fast to the concept of the Ressurection. But how many were still hanging on to hope on Saturday? It must have been so difficult. Everything they witnessed, every moment they experienced must have seemed so final. He was in the tomb. His body was still. The hope and promise must have been swallowed up so strongly by that granite shell containing all of the Jesus they ever knew.
But Sunday came! For over two thousand years we've been given a Sunday of victory, renewed hope and remarkable celebration. All who knew Christ were given an introduction to a whole new Jesus. The end of the story and the beginning of eternity. Untouchable triumph, endless grace, more-than-you-comprehend LOVE.
Tomorrow is Easter and it's so beautiful. It goes so much beyond kids in brand new clothes collecting plastic eggs. It goes so much deeper than baby chicks and bunnies. It's worth so much more than any bouquet of flowers we could ever place upon a table or altar.
Are you going through an endless Saturday? Is your life filled with despair - that raw morning-after feel that as humans we detest because we just cannot see beyond our own grave of pain and hopelessness?
Hang on. Your resurrection day is coming.
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