Waiting with anticipation

 Saturday is a day of waiting. A day of anticipation. A day of...

Let me step back for a moment. Today is Saturday, April 3, 2021. What does that mean? It means that for me as a Christian, it is Holy Saturday, the day that comes between Good Friday and Easter Sunday. Good Friday is the day when Jesus Christ was handed over to the Romans by the rulers of the Jews, put on trial before Pilate, condemned to die and was crucified. He was hung upon that cursed cross. It was meant to cause Him to suffer. It was also meant to cause Him to die. You did not hang anyone on a cross and then take them down before they died. The cross was meant to kill. Period. So on Good Friday, Jesus died (no it wasn't called Good Friday then). He was then taken down from the cross by Joseph of Arimethea and then laid in the tomb. He was left in that stone cold tomb, wrapped in cloths and spices, a corpse, with no life, left to decompose. That was Friday.

We know that on Sunday, the 1st day of the week, Jesus rose from the dead. He came back to life. He did not decompose like they thought He would. He did not remain in the tomb like they expected Him to. He rose. He came back to life. When He did, He kept His wounds as a way to show who He was (remember that it took Thomas seeing and touching those wounds for him to believe it was Jesus). Other than that, Jesus did not look like a person who had been dead and came back to life. What did He look like? Like Jesus, except with the scars in His hands and feet and the hole in His side. 

Good Friday and Easter Sunday - between them lies Holy Saturday. What happens the is day? It is a day of waiting and a day of anticipation. We wait for Easter, though we know it is coming. We anticipate the excitement of Easter morning. And yet, we must wait. 

Waiting with anticipation - that describes the life of the Christian. We wait in anticipation for the moment when we will pass from this life to that eternal life in heaven. We wait in anticipation for the resurrection that will take place when Jesus returns. We wait in anticipation for the return of Jesus. We wait in eager anticipation all through our lives. 

And as we wait, we have an assurance. That is that Jesus is alive. He is in heaven. He is interceding for us to the Father. He is with us. He is forgivening us. He is watching over us. We are never left alone with Jesus being right there with us. We are assured that of this. And it helps us each and every day. It lifts us up. It encourages us. It carries us. It fills us. A living Jesus gives to us the confidence to face each day - with all the ups and downs, goods and bads, health and sickness, joy and sorrow. 

All of that is because Jesus rose from the dead. In Him we have everything that we need. 

But today, we wait in eager anticipation. It is Holy Saturday. Good Friday happened. Easter is coming. And we wait in anticipation.