PsalterMark

At the end of Chapter 23 of Luke’s gospel, we read of these events that followed Jesus’ death on the cross:

There was a man by the name of Joseph, a member of the Jewish High Council, a man of good heart and good character. He had not gone along with the plans and actions of the council. His hometown was the Jewish village of Arimathea. He lived in alert expectation of the kingdom of God. He went to Pilate and asked for the body of Jesus. Taking him down, he wrapped him in a linen shroud and placed him in a tomb chiselled into the rock, a tomb never yet used. It was the day before Sabbath, the Sabbath just about to begin.

The women who had been companions of Jesus from Galilee followed along. They saw the tomb where Jesus’ body was placed. Then they went back to prepare burial spices and perfumes. They rested quietly on the Sabbath, as commanded.

Message Translation

At one level, Holy Saturday is simply the day between Good Friday and Easter Sunday. Theologically, to put it another way, it’s the day between Cross and Resurrection. It should be worth reflecting on, if for no other reason than that we live this life between cross and resurrection. If we know Jesus Christ, we have had our sin crucified with him—it no longer holds us back from an eternity with our Father. And yet we are still sinners. We are yet to know the bodily resurrection for which we hope. We are between cross and resurrection—we live in the ‘now’ and the ‘not yet’, of blessing from God.

On the first Holy Saturday Jesus lay, quite literally in death, between cross and resurrection. His body lay cold in the freshly quarried tomb made available by Joseph of Arimathea. On the Earth his physical human body was broken and lay in silence on Holy Saturday, awaiting God, waiting for a miraculous reanimation by God’s Spirit. Can a dead body be said to wait? Certainly, in a cosmic sense all of creation was waiting.

Living and waiting can be difficult. Where is the good in waiting? It bores, it frustrates, it’s distracting. Who ever enjoyed waiting for a taxi, for example? In my paranoia of being late, I not only wait for the taxi which I order early, but I then end up waiting longer for the train as I get to the station too early. And then sometimes this is compounded by the train being late. Waiting for taxis and trains bears no fruit.

What value is there in waiting for the PC or laptop to boot up? The ‘updating windows’ notice is not a moment of joy in which we celebrate the future improvements to our software’s security or the improved functionality of our computer’s virtual memory. Instead we are just held back from being the efficient moderns we feel we are called to be.

Waiting isn’t always trivial of course. We’ve all known anxiety in waiting for a loved one who is late, or news after hospital tests for ourselves or someone close to us. The worst 24 hours of my life were waiting to hear news of my Father who dramatically left our home when I was 15. Some of us have not only known the pain and anxiety of waiting, but we have had the announcement of the news that we dreaded most.

And yet we are made for waiting. There are some things that are good about waiting. We can learn perspective for a start. It’s no bad thing to remember that the universe does not revolve around us. We can learn other things too. As disciples we can learn what it means to be the person we are called to be. We can learn to serve others. We can be transformed, in time, as our communion with Christ shapes our character. God can be known more deeply in waiting. Waiting for some things can sharpen our dependence on him.

Psalm 130 is all about waiting and its words seem strangely appropriate for Jesus’ cold body awaiting new Spirit empowered life. These words could have been prayed by a faithful disciple on Holy Saturday:

Out of the depths I have cried to You, O Lord;
Lord, hear my voice!
Let Your ears be attentive
To the voice of my supplications.

If You, Lord, should mark iniquities,
O Lord, who could stand?
But there is forgiveness with You,
That You may be feared.

I wait for the Lord, my soul waits,
And in His word I do hope.
My soul waits for the Lord
More than those who watch for the morning—
Yes, more than those who watch for the morning.

O Israel, hope in the Lord;
For with the Lord there is mercy,
And with Him is abundant redemption.
And He shall redeem Israel
From all his iniquities.

Psalm 130, NIV

Do you remember being a small child and waiting for Christmas? Waiting through every day in December as the advent calendar doors were opened. In that time before cynicism, when we were naïve, the waiting was somewhere between pleasure and pain. The arrival of Christmas Day, all the sweeter for having waited what seemed half a lifetime.

What was it like for those first disciples after death took their beloved rabbi—the one they thought was more than this? Was there even one left who cried out to God that Jesus’ life could not surely be ended with crucifixion? Were there any watchers waiting on that Saturday Sabbath for the resurrection on Sunday?

Where are his disciples this Holy Saturday? Where are his disciples today? Where?—in their lives caught between cross and resurrection? As they wait, how much of the energising foretaste of resurrection are they turning back to God?

Are our souls waiting for the Lord? Are our souls watching for God more than those who watch for the morning? Yes, more than those who watch for the morning.

And beyond this one singular day. How do we wait? Waiting is different for each of us. Though we are all waiting for life to get back to normal some of us have more time than ever before, others are harder pressed than we can remember. As we wait in newfound busyness, or in a slower mode, we would so well to cry to God. What can we learn in this time of waiting? No doubt its different for each of us.

What if early 2020 could be a time we look back on. What if 2020 gave us fresh vision—the opportunity in desperation, or leisure, to make time for God afresh, to wait upon him as a regular discipline.

I pray that we might wait for the Lord, that our souls will wait.
I pray that we will find hope in his word, the Bible, and his Word, Jesus Christ.
May your soul wait for the Risen Lord,
More than those who watch for the morning—
Yes, more than those who watch for the morning.