[Joseph of Arimathea] went to Pilate and asked for the body of Jesus. Then he took it down and wrapped it in a linen shroud and laid him in a tomb cut in stone, where no one had ever yet been laid. - Luke 23:52-53
When it comes to Holy Week, many of us are familiar with Palm Sunday, Good Friday, and Easter. A few might even know about Maundy Thursday, the night Jesus gives His new commandment to love one another and institutes the Lord’s Supper. But what do we do with that awkward Saturday between Good Friday and Easter? Is there something we can learn about the silence of that day? Some church traditions believe so and commemorate Holy Saturday, ending the day with The Great Vigil.
My friend and fellow Charlottesville pastor, Claude Atcho, in his wonderful book, Rhythms of Faith, has this to say about Holy Saturday:
Holy Saturday calls us to sit in the stillness of the starkest heartache the world has ever known: the Light of the world extinguished and the Lord of life dead. Imagine what ran through the minds and hearts of the female disciples, standing just feet away as the Lord’s body was sealed in the tomb. Imagine the grief Joseph felt, lifting and wrapping Jesus’ lifeless arms and nail-scarred hands, his bruised and breathless body in linen for burial. The Lord who spoke the words of life breathed no more.
Writer John Onwuchekwa says, “Tragedy doesn’t ruin us; hopelessness does.” The silence of Holy Saturday combines both in one fatal blow - tragedy strikes, and hope is nowhere to be found. Yet the fact that the Father does not raise Jesus immediately speaks volumes.
Holy Saturday teaches us that wherever we are overwhelmed by hopelessness, silence, or grief, we are not alone. Even in the void, God is present. In our grief and tragedy, the Lord mysteriously works. We neither grieve nor suffer alone. None of these assertions are trite religious cliches - they are truths drawn from the story of Jesus’ own life. In the silence, Jesus descended into the bowels of death, snatching away its ultimate power. The hush was real and suffocating, but it was not final. Jesus would speak again, breathe again, rise again.
Holy Saturday teaches us that with God, there is always something on the other side of silence. This something does not bypass pain and grief but engulfs and redeems them. This something is resurrection.
Saints, this Holy Saturday (and really every day), remember that you are not alone in your suffering and your sorrow. God is with you. And because God raised Jesus from the dead, know that neither suffering nor sorrow is ever the final word.
