THE DAY IN-BETWEEN

APRIL 16, 2022

Today is called by many in the Christian Tradition HOLY SATURDAY. I call it the “DAY IN BETWEEN”. Yesterday was Good Friday, we attended services perhaps, listened or read a devotional, or thought about what occurred on a Friday a long time ago and what Jesus went through and how he lovingly suffered a cruel death that we might live a “life full of hope.”

Holy Saturday really hasn’t been significant in my Holy Week reflections to be honest. After Good Friday my thoughts head toward tomorrow, Sunday, EASTER Sunday and its Celebrative features.

This year, it is Saturday that speaks to me just now, the day in between, the day of dull numbness after the events of the previous twenty-four hours, the day when there is no hint that the pain and fear of the moment will ever subside. What did the disciples do? How did they comfort each other? Did they even try? Or might they have stumbled through that Sabbath completely unaware of what was going on around them, fearful of a suddenly and unknown future, and unable to even imagine putting the pieces of their lives back together?

My thoughts have wondered if this in-between day is important because like so many of us the deep longing that will likely never be satisfied is an experience, we know all to well, perhaps more so than the agony of Good Friday or the joy of Easter.

When you lose a loved one, when your marriage fails, when your dream job evaporates, when you receive a devastating diagnosis, when your livelihood disappears, when…. Each of us has likely gone through moments of tremendous disappointments like these and more. Maybe Holy Saturday speaks to me more profoundly this year, because I am grieving, the death of my Father-in-law, the death of a very dear Aunt last week, the death of a very dear friend, and officiating at the life celebrations of several families during these last two years.

I think we all know that hardest days are usually the ones that come afterward. Days after the funeral, when the calls and visits stop. Weeks after the divorce, or loss of employment, when sympathetic friends no longer check in, as often. The time in between the diagnosis and treatment when there is absolutely nothing you can do.

I am thinking that these are the experiences that Holy Saturday speaks to, for they are the experiences of Jesus’ disciples ahead of Easter, struggling through the absolute uncertainty of what their future might possibly hold that is worth living for.

This Holy Saturday, that seems particularly to be the case, for my family, our community, well really across Our Canada, and around the world. Talk of loss and death, to natural causes, to disease, to accidents, the horrors of war and tension, struggles of refugees, shootings in our neighborhoods, housing pressures and crisis, Covid variants and 6th wave talk. We, too, live in a time of waiting and longing. Wouldn’t you agree?

Perhaps that is why it’s important to remember this day. Because while the disciples stumbled through their routines, and while we try to carry on with our lives, I want you to hear, really hear what I am about to say. Even in our waiting and longing, on an in-between day, God is not absent nor inactive. Indeed, as we know, God was preparing to raise Jesus from the dead and provide the turning point of all history, fashioning a new and open future that none on that Saturday could imagine. Perhaps on this HOLY SATURDAY, we might reap spiritual benefits by remembering the promise of Holy Saturday that, God is not finished yet. We might recall that God’s favorite thing to do is to show up where we least expect God to be and to surprise those of us who have given up on God, and so can no longer imagine what redemption and love and blessing and grace feel like.

This day of Holy Week, Holy Saturday, is a day that I believe captures the painful rhythm of our lives of waiting and longing, yet also invites us to hear the promises that God is still at work, eager to surprise and redeem us and the whole creation.