It could be hard to hope and imagine when all the things you touch is cold. I’ve been praying a couple of certain situation for over three years. Recently, it has gotten to the purpose where I feel like I want to see movement. I haven’t.
Movement brings heat. Movement keeps you warm. Jog in place for just a few minutes and also you’ll feel your temperature increase. Your blood starts pumping. Your body prompts. But how do you pray when your hands grow cold? How do you hold onto hope when all the things around you goes still?
I don’t know where it’s worthwhile to see movement. I don’t know the way anxious your heart feels. I don’t know if you happen to are waking up within the night because your body is processing what you didn’t have time to confront in the course of the day. I don’t know if it’s been three years of waiting, or ten. But I’ll share with you what I keep saying to myself: give up to the fact of Easter.
Throughout Jesus’ ministry, the disciples had seen a number of movement: the blind saw, the lame walked, the sick were healed. Jesus’ teaching drew crowds and made converts. So much had happened in and around them over the span of three years, and so they should have felt the warmth of it in every single place. And then suddenly, all the things went still. On Good Friday, all the things went cold.
Good is an Old English term which means “holy.” Good Friday is “Holy Friday,” and on the day we remember the holiness in Christ’s death that made a way for our salvation, there may be awe even in stillness. God works even when the blood isn’t pumping. God can move even when all the things appears to be deathly still. Today, Good Friday is an emblem of hope for your complete world. But it was also the day before the disciples knew there could be a resurrection. We forget that sometimes: after they saw Jesus nailed to a cross, they did so without understanding the aim of Calvary.
1 Peter 1:24–25 reads, “‘All persons are like grass, and all their glory is just like the flowers of the sphere; the grass withers and the flowers fall, however the word of the Lord endures ceaselessly.’ And that is the word that was preached to you.” Right now, if all you’ll be able to see is withered grass, ask yourself whether it’s okay to take a seat and wait, because the disciples did. What if, today, we don’t look away from the lament of the Lamb? What if, today, we undergo the silence of Saturday? What if, today, we don’t jump to the enjoyment that followers of God had no idea was coming on Sunday morning? What if, today, we give up to the holy grief of Friday?
There is not any resurrection without death; there isn’t a Sunday morning without Friday night; there isn’t a redemption without the One who redeemed. Trust the methods of heaven.
Maybe like me you might be also watching sand go through an hourglass; the sparse grains actually don’t look encouraging. Surrender your emotions to the reality of Easter. Let Good Friday be Good Friday. Let death feel like death. Let the air be uncomfortably cold.
And we’ll see one another Sunday morning.
p.p1 {margin: 5.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; text-align: center; line-height: 9.1px; font: 9.0px Helvetica} Dr. Heather Thompson Day is an interdenominational speaker, an ECPA bestseller, and host of Viral Jesus, a podcast with Christianity Today.
This article is a component of Easter within the Everyday, a devotional to assist individuals, small groups, and families journey through the 2024 Lent & Easter season. Learn more about this special issue here!
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