Waiting for Easter

Waiting for Easter.

     I woke up this morning and began thinking about today in relationship to Easter.  We remember Good Friday as the day that Jesus suffered and died to pay for our sins.  He died to redeem us.  The gospels are full of details recounting the times leading up to and the crucifixion itself.  And of course we celebrate Easter Sunday as the day that Jesus rose victorious over death.  We love and serve a LIVING God!!  The gospels also give a lot of detail surrounding that beautiful morning.  But what about today? 

     I was thinking about today and how there’s little info in the scriptures about the happenings of this “in between” day.  I started thinking about what must have been going through the minds of the disciples as they woke up this morning many years ago.  Or did they even sleep?  I wonder what vast arrays of emotions they experienced as they began to grasp that Jesus was dead.  He was gone.  They spent their lives devoted to this man and His ministry.  They followed Him, served Him, learned from Him and deeply loved Him.  And now He was gone.  I wonder if they begged God for just one more minute with Him so they could hear His comforting words, see the peace in His eyes, feel the love in His embrace. 

     Oh, I know Jesus told them repeatedly that the temple would be destroyed but would be rebuilt in 3 days.  I know He told them that their grief would be turned to joy and that He would send the Comforter to them.   I know he said to them,  ”’I am going away and I am coming back to you.  If you loved me, you would be glad that I am going to the Father, for the Father is greater than I.   I have told you now before it happens, so that when it does happen you will believe.   I will not speak with you much longer, for the prince of this world is coming. He has no hold on me, but the world must learn that I love the Father and that I do exactly what my Father has commanded me.’” John 14:28-31.  I know they were well aware of what was spoken.

     But these disciples were mere mortals, with fleshly self loving tendencies just like us.  Yes, they’d heard Him say a hundred times that this would happen- but it actually happened.  He was arrested, stripped and beaten and was dead.  It wasn’t just a parable or metaphor for something else.  Their leader was gone.  Jesus was dead.  Now what? 

     Can I really believe ALL that He said?  Can I trust Him with this impossible situation?  Can I literally take Him at His word?  Sure, hindsight is 20/20.  And we can look back and say, ‘Come on disciples, of course He’ll raise from the dead, where’s your faith?’  But we know the outcome.  Sunday has come for us.  It’s Saturday for them and they just watched their world hang from a tree, lifeless. 

     Can you imagine how long and hard that day was for them?  Waiting for Easter.  Wondering if Easter would even come?  Wanting so much to believe what He said, but, what if???  Oh it would be too much to bear to think about the what if, but, nevertheless, what if?  The agony of waiting for Easter.  They’d watched Him perform miracle after miracle for the people He encountered, but this time was different.  He was dead, and it was personal.  Their loyalty, their dreams, their very lives depended on this one promise.  This impossibility.  This was personal.   

     I love that story in Mark where the disciples are out and about and had forgotten to take bread so they’re panicking and discussing what they’re going to do and Jesus is like (and I paraphrase), “Dudes? Do you not remember when I fed the 5 thousand with five loaves of bread and had plenty of bread to spare?  And what about when I fed the four thousand with 7 loaves of bread?  Are you kidding me?  Do you still not trust me?!?”  Mark 8:14-21.  I love it because it is so like us to praise God for His faithfulness today and then tomorrow, when our circumstances change and we have no choice but to trust Him, we panic.  Whatever will we do without any bread?!?!?  So feeble we are.    

     I believe today is the call to action.  A call to faith.  Everything in my natural body is telling me it’s ludicrous to believe the impossible is possible.  Everything in my emotions is saying, “Yeah, but WHAT IF?”    What if Good Friday is the end of the story?  What if my worst fears comes to fruition?  Can I REALLY trust Him?  Faith is a choice.  I choose to believe that Easter is coming.  I choose to believe that Jesus’ words and promises are truth.  I choose to believe because He has proven Himself faithful over and over again. 

     It’s Saturday for me right now.  I’m waiting for Easter.  And I am choosing to believe that a day of great celebration is coming.  To God be the glory!