Holy Saturday - When the story doesn't go the way we expect and God seems oh so silent!

So today is THE Saturday for which this blog was named, which is why it seemed just plain wrong to bypass posting for today.  I’ve had a lot on my mind lately,  Things I am learning as I move through the loss of a loved one, things I’m learning as I make vocational changes, and places of flux as my family grows up and my role shifts in their life.  All feel like a “Saturday” of sorts.  The sun is setting while Friday goes to sleep,  Sunday is not yet here and I find myself, as one would, lingering between “death” and life.  Waiting, sometimes weary, sometimes, sleepy, sometimes at rest.  It’s rather quiet in my soul, like the hushed obedience the mountains give after a fresh-fallen snow.

 We remember Christ crucified on Good Friday and Christ Risen and alive on Sunday -Friday and Sunday,  but what about the in-between Holy Saturday?  Not much is said about the day when God goes silent and a resurrection has yet to come. The day when all that is known is the aftermath of recent loss or the vague sense that something is not quite right.  Saturday has gone largely unacknowledged for me.   What does one do with this symbolic bridge-day that moves us from death to life? 

Well today on March 26, 2016 I have met with a client, sat with my mom as we thought about facing the first holiday without my dad.  I've taken my daughter to find Easter shoes, helped my son and his friend head back up to college for their final quarter, and will pick up dinner rolls,...my portion of the Easter meal.  (A case of bronchitis makes me glad for packaged rolls!) My husband has worked hard this week to prepare a sermon that will break the rhetoric hum of the Easter Bedtime story – (and I think he did, by the way!)  Earlier today he headed 40 minutes away to to evict a tenant and struggled deeply to do it in a way that is loving and good.  I’ve navigated a difficult conflict with a close friend and experienced deep pain, betrayal, and regret in the process... and I suppose they have too.  The laundry is slowly getting done, and my kitchen counter is visible for the first time since the boys came home last week (Let’s hear it for small victories!!) That’s what this in-between day has held…mini in-between moments, unfinished business, less than ideal snapshots of real life, and the reminder that something is not yet quite right.

But Sunday is coming.  Tomorrow we will sing, listen, reflect and pray on what this resurrection means - how we are grateful, wonder if we are, wish we felt more grateful or maybe elated that we do! Christ's crucifixion made available to us his risen life. 

Resurrection...Life arises from death. The first generation of wilderness-Israelites died before God would lead their children into the promise land. Even nature bears witness to this death-to-life phenomenon. A pine cone consumed in a fire releases its otherwise dormant seeds birthing a forest out of the ashes. And as I look back on the past few years it seems I've experienced a similar passage-a firestorm of sorts- in which my own dreams & desires - what I know to be my "life" are slowly being laid to rest.  

Its been said, God's dreams are better. There have been glimpses of that in this journey. And in it, this incidental Saturday-season becomes God’s silent storm where he comes near,  holds us as we writhe, weeps with us, and loves us intimately.  It happens in those stormy places that we often dare not share with another human heart; that's where God finds his home. He decends into those hellish shadows longing for deliverance, and we are forever changed! 

We journey to Sunday by way of the cross. Dallas Willard said, "We were meant to be inhabited by God and live by a power beyond ourselves.  Human problems cannot be solved by human means." He was so right! As we surrender to the pause, waiting becomes active.  Somewhere, out of the ashes, new life emerges as the Divine One works on our behalf.  Oh how I have been tempted to run - Haven't you?!  But we must stay in this Saturday, every hour of it, before Sunday dawns.  There are no short-cuts, just ordinary-remarkable happenings with a God who shows up along the way.

So in some ways, I've grown rather fond of this "wait-day" – there are times I wouldn't wish it away.  That's when the grit of my struggle finds the embrace of God's love.   But there are other days when my soul sits in begging screams – pleading to be taken off this bridge, this highway, that's commanding my surrender.   Yet... as I remain...God's hand works in ways I thought were impossible; and slowly, ever. so. slowly, there is a sliver, a glorious sliver of light as Sunday's dawn peeks over the horizon, awakening my dormant soul.  It all happens through the sacred wait of Saturday.

So...What are your Saturday moments?  
Could it be God is journeying you to Sunday's dawn through them?
How can you encounter Him and cooperate with Him along the way?