Stuck on Saturday...

I have been “marinating” on putting into words what the Lord has been speaking to me as I have been crying out to Him over the past week. What follows is those efforts.

Stuck on Saturday

This past week, we celebrated Holy Week as the commemoration and celebration of Jesus’ crucifixion and resurrection from the grave. At my home church in Virginia, New Life Church, we hold a special Good Friday service known as a Tenebrae service (Latin for darkness).

A Tenebrae service is a very solemn service in which congregants are asked to focus on their sin and ultimately their own responsibility in Jesus’ crucifixion. As the service progresses, lights in the sanctuary are slowly extinguished until there is total darkness. The service is symbolic of the death and burial of Christ and it’s very heavy spiritually.

One leaves the service feeling the weight of their own sin and the heaviness of the realization that our personal sins sent Christ to the cross. However, despite that heaviness, a flame of hope still flickers knowing that Sunday is coming and with it the resurrection and celebration.

As I passed through the Tenebrae service and into Saturday, I began to ponder… what was that first Saturday of Holy Week like? What were the disciples and the other followers of Christ feeling and thinking after watching Him be savagely crucified and then buried? I imagined the doubt, the confusion, the anguish, the fear… they had just seen the Savior of the world crucified… but now what?!! What were they going to do? Where were they going to go? Why was this happening? Where was God?!!

I see such a parallel between that first Saturday of Holy Week and where we are currently as we navigate the COVID-19 pandemic. All around us is doubt.. insecurity.. fear.. We are questioning God’s goodness.. Why did this have to happen? Where is He in the midst of this? What are we going to do? We are worried about our livelihoods, our families, our friends, and uncertainty abounds. How long will this last?!!

We are stuck on Saturday. Just like that first Saturday of Holy Week. We are stuck in a place of the unknown where we aren’t really sure what’s going to happen next. All around panic, doubt, and fear are circling like sharks. What do we do?

We have an advantage over the early Christians that were experiencing that first Saturday. We KNOW that His crucifixion was NOT the end of the story. We KNOW that He WILL RISE again. We KNOW that His death was NOT the final chapter.

So, what do we do? We feed the flame. That tiny flame flickering inside that tells us we WILL come out on the other side of this pandemic. We stoke the fire. We hang on with everything we’ve got to the hope that WE KNOW that Sunday IS coming.

For me, I stoke my fire through worship. Putting on whatever song strikes me and just worshiping Him each day, pouring out my heart while taking a walk in the sunshine, or just sitting silently and gratefully in His presence. I am limiting my time on social media and the news, and reminding myself that HE IS STILL IN CONTROL. 

For you, it may look differently. But however it looks, keep feeding that flame of hope. Keep clinging to the hope that Sunday IS coming. All though we may be walking through the unknown, NOTHING is unknown to HIM.

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