It's a day easy to forget.
But I can't imagine how those who followed Jesus must have felt on this day over 2,000 years ago. Fear, sadness, despair, anger, longing, a feeling of being let down, shattered dreams... hopelessness.
The one they had left everything to follow had just been killed. Perhaps as everything was falling apart and they realized he was going to the cross they held out hope that he would save himself and the kingdom they expected to come would begin to take shape... but Jesus died.
No glorious victory to be seen. No new kingdom. Just their leader, dead on a cross... like the other two guys next to him.
Hopelessness must have been the overall feeling.
I have experienced hopelessness myself, and if I am honest, I really think it opened me up to loving God more fully for who he is.
I had lost my family due to my parents divorce. My dad, once my hero and closest friend was totally absent in my life. I had been wounded deeply by a church I was working for. Experienced several bad injuries, and then was laid off. At 30 I was working as a valet, didn't want to work in the church anymore, and felt like all I had known to be true was a lie.
I was hopeless... and God showed up.
Just like on Easter with the disciples, God came into the room, unexpected and unannounced.
I could almost actually see him his presence was so strong, and he began to lead me into a new life, where he was more and more the true center.
The disciples were different people after their time of hopelessness. Not just because of that, but because all they thought Jesus to be was blown out of the water, and they were now open to the truth of who he was and what he was doing. They realized it was about so much more than some earthly kingdom, and they were empowered by the Spirit to tell others about it so much that almost all of them died doing just that.
They journeyed through hopelessness and came out the other side so full of hope it seemed they might burst.
I can say, for sure, that I have more hope now than I ever thought possible, and I think experiencing hopelessness, really actually feeling hopeless, opened me up to a hope that only God could bring... a hope that didn't make sense, that doesn't always make sense now, but that isn't about anything of this earth because it's a gift from a loving Abba.
I can say with confidence that my time of hopelessness seems to have been as much a gift from God as my times now of tremendous hope... because without the first, I wouldn't have the second.
So on this Holy Saturday, I thank my Abba for bringing me through utter despair into a life of hope in God, and what he has in store. He is good, and his love endures forever. Amen.
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