15. Dark Saturday

.John 14:20 & 21 Very truly I tell you, you will weep and mourn while the world rejoices. You will grieve, but your grief will turn to joy. A woman giving birth to a child has pain because her time has come; but when her baby is born she forgets the anguish because of her joy that a child is born into the world.

There is an emphasis on Good Friday and Easter Sunday, but Saturday seems to be well: nothing.  I know that in some traditions that the church is made bare, the altar is covered in black.  Some hold no services or masses while others hold vigils.  And to be honest I am not overly concerned about what happens in terms of church services.  The scriptures reveal little about what happened between the burial of Jesus and his resurrection.

We have the benefit of knowing how the story ends; they didn’t.  After this past Good Friday service my wife and I went for lunch, a bit of shopping and then came home.  Those who were at the crucifixion spent Friday Evening in horror and disbelief wondering what was to come next.  The next day, the Passover Sabbath, must have seemed incredibly cruel.

What must have it been like to be one of those who loved Jesus on that dark Saturday?  Your son, your friend, your brother, your teacher is dead.  Your hope for the world was lost.  The great change was not coming.  The man who loved you, he knew how dark your soul could be and loved you anyway, was dead.  It must have been a dark time indeed.

I wonder what it would have been like to be one of the apostles on that day.  Coupled with your grief must have been profound guilt.  I think of Peter, the one who swore to never abandon Jesus, how overwhelmed he must have been.  Having sworn to never abandon him, Peter denies that he even knew Christ.

I know I would have been distraught that the Sanhedrin had won: those who load up followers with heavy loads.  It would have been a bitter time for me, and I would have been so angry at Jesus that this man that I had trusted and put my faith in, that I had believed was God, had let me down.  After all if he was the son of God, if he was the messiah, what the fuck was he doing dead?

There were serious expectations of the Messiah.  He was to overthrow the occupying forces, free Israel from tyranny, and establish a new Kingdom of God.  The jubilation of Palm Sunday as Jesus entered Jerusalem is replaced with the despondency of the following Saturday. 

We get to live the story in hindsight.  We talk of how there was victory on the cross, that all our hopes were realized on Golgotha.  But that first weekend it would have been inconsolable defeat.  For on the cross that Good Friday, their hopes would have died along side Jesus. 

That dark space between the cross and the resurrection has significance. 

It speaks to my soul and reminds me of darker times in my life.  It reminds me of the time between my coming to the Lord and my recovery from my addiction.  When I had come to Christ it was for the Hallmark variety religious experience.  You know – that one.  The one where my soul feels like the windows have been opened and fresh air is blowing through me, and I am all shiny and new.  Yes, that one.

I wanted to be saved.  I wanted a reprieve from the violence that was my family.  I wanted to be spared from my alcoholism and addiction.  I wanted to not go to hell, either in this life or the next. 

Instead I struggled as much as I ever had.  Nowhere to be seen was the life that I thought I had been called into having.  I tried; I prayed for strength, I prayed to be spared temptation, all, in an attempt to be good enough for God to love me.  Did I not have enough faith?  Had I not been one of those so luckily chosen before time to share in the grace of God?

I think we all need our Dark Saturdays: that time when we realize that Jesus is not going to do, and probably never will do, what we think he should do.  I needed that, that despondency of spirit, that time when I come to rely solely upon God and what he wants for my life.  

Funny enough mine came on a Saturday in November 1983.  I am not sure all of what happened at that time.  Somewhere in the mix of the despair, depression and hopelessness of realizing that I was not getting saved, I was, um, saved.  That day, that morning, when I looked at myself and asked, “What has become of me?”  That moment allowed me to accept what Jesus had to offer.

It was not the Hallmark variety of religious conversions.  I still struggled, my life was not shiny and new.  But there was victory of my addiction.  There was a deepening of my faith.  I am grateful for that time between accepting Jesus as my Lord and my recovery.  It has added a depth to my life, my faith and my relationship with him.  That would not have been there with the conversion I had wanted.

For me the message of Dark Saturday is clear. 

I need to stop deciding what God should do in my life, and in your life.  I think, that our expectations of what God should do need to die, just like they did on the first Good Friday.  But most of all I should stop thinking that I know what is the Grand Design for your life.