SATURDAY: HIDDEN

If anyone is thirsty, let him come to Me and drink—John 7:37 (NASB).

Can you imagine the thoughts of Jesus’ disciples the day after He was crucified? Yesterday we were stunned with grief when our Christ was tortured and killed. Worse, we had a hand in that. Either we turned traitor with the crowd and demanded Pilate crucify him, or we kept our mouths shut, complicit in silence. 

Some were close some distant;
Some braced for the finality and others stiffen to ignore the pain
some grow cynical or uncaring. And death wins—

Most certainly, their minds were filled with questions. Their hearts must have been anxious. They were a hunted people. They felt alone, facing the hostility of the Jewish leadership. As Jesus had prophesied, His “sheep” had been scattered.

So today we stumble through familiar habits, work blindly through our Saturday to-do list, interact with folks and wonder whether they can see it in our eyes. The bottom of our world has fallen out. We’ve prayed to shape our lives around Jesus’ tenets, struggled with things done and left undone. We’ve truly depended on his powerful grasp, when our choices were stupid or worse, to haul us back onto the right path. But he’s dead now, on Holy Saturday, and for a few hours religious imagination sweeps away our holy hopes, and we are left striking echoing footfalls in an empty house.

The pain of loss is acute. What to do? Through tears and despite fear, we throw our arms around the faith that Jesus taught us. “The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases, his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning… therefore I will hope in him.” Lamentations counsels further,  

Lam 3:1-9, 19-24

I’ll never forget the trouble, the utter lostness,
the taste of ashes, the poison I’ve swallowed.
I remember it all—oh, how well I remember—
the feeling of hitting the bottom.
But there’s one other thing I remember,
and remembering, I keep a grip on hope:

God’s loyal love couldn’t have run out,
his merciful love couldn’t have dried up.
They’re created new every morning.
How great your faithfulness!
I’m sticking with God (I say it over and over)
He’s all I’ve got left.

Holy Saturday is our quiet time, and there is no doubt that tomorrow, the dawn of Easter Sunday will break anew with the glorious resurrection of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Let us wait until then.

Great it His faithfulness as we are hidden in Him.