Lingering with Holy Saturday
A young person in our community died this week in a senseless motor vehicle accident. She was active in the community and loved by many. We are all shook.
Regardless of the circumstance, I have never known death to be a welcome thing. I even find the death of a mouse or a spider to be cringe-worthy. Life is hopeful and rich, ever unfolding, and precious.
As I have matured, I have come to appreciate the vigor of life. And yet death is our constant companion, as certain as taxes. So why does it always catch us off guard?
The events of this week have brought to mind others in my life who have crossed beyond the veil too soon: Brian, Becky, Sarah, Jon, Norma, Dan, Blake, Jason, Lucas, and many more, some of whom I have never met but wish I could have. I now add Delaney to this list of those whom my heart holds in grief.
Throughout my life, I have seen the church at large race through grief to Easter’s hope. It seems easier to medicate the pangs of sorrow with visions of a future delight than to feel the pain of loss. Even Paul told the Thessalonians that they “may not grieve as others do who have no hope” [1]. At first glance and without context, it seems that Paul also wants the church to speed through grief.
But I’d like to invite us to linger in heartache just a little bit longer.
The first time I was invited to ponder the significance of Holy Saturday was during a class I attended in seminary. While Good Friday and Easter Sunday were of crucial significance in my early years, the Saturday in between them was as ordinary as any other. But in recent years, the in-between nature of Easter Saturday has become for me one of the most sacred days in the church calendar.
In the gospels, we get to watch the disciples walk with Jesus throughout his ministry. They misunderstand Jesus’ reason for setting his sights toward Jerusalem. They watch him suffer and die. And then even the gospels seem to jump to the glory of Easter Sunday. We have to read between the lines to feel the grief and heartache of Saturday.
We see the men who sought safety by hiding in the upper room, women who gathered herbs and spices to properly prepare Jesus’ body for burial, and Mary, blinded by tears, who mistakes the resurrected Jesus for a gardener. All of these people were disoriented by their grief, lost in a world they couldn’t make sense of anymore.
In Spirit and Trauma: A Theology of Remaining, Shelly Rambo names the main theme of John’s gospel as divine love. “Love descends into the world, and the path of love is a mixture of suffering and victory, death and life. Holy Saturday is a pivotal part of this divine love story. It narrates divine love at its least discernible point — between death and resurrection, in the recesses of hell.” [1]
Holy Saturday has become significant for me because it allows my stunned body time to catch up with staggering grief. It gives me time to find my breath, feel the ground under my feet, and slowly remember that death is not the end of the story. It gives me space to feel the overwhelming anguish that is fitting for a week like this one.
So may we pause just a little longer and honor the affection we hold in our bodies for the ones we love by taking time to grieve together in whatever form that takes.
Easter will come again someday, but it’s okay for today to feel a little more like Saturday.
[1] 1 Thessalonians 4:13 NRSVue
[2] Rambo, Shelly. Spirit and Trauma: A Theology of Remaining. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2010.