by Joanie Butman
You are probably expecting a joyful Easter blog and it will come, BUT - not yet. The passion of Christ (and our part in it) deserves serious reflection before we race past Saturday searching for the proverbial golden egg. Did you ever wonder why Jesus didn’t rise Friday night or Saturday? Some would answer it was to fulfill Scripture. True, but God authored Scripture so the timing was always part of His redemption plan. The Old Testament is full of three-day stories. It’s a Divine pattern. Could it be that we are meant to sit with the pain? Saturday is a Heavenly ‘not yet’ which always involves ‘wait’ training. Believe me, there is nothing harder than waiting for a miracle when God is silent.
It’s a time defined by uncertainty, loss, grief and utter despair. Think of what the apostles were doing during that Saturday – grieving, hiding, afraid for their lives, their hopes and dreams for a new order shattered, drowning in shame for having abandoned Christ in His darkest hour. I believe most of our spiritual growth happens during those not-yet times when we are willing to simply sit in the pain. My eloquent friend describes it as ‘sitting in the suck.’ Spiritual giants have a more refined name for it: ‘the dark night of the soul or the gift of despair.’ Whatever you call it, we’ve all experienced it. Times when we feel abandoned by God and perhaps others. Times when we are suffering, but God remains silent. Have any of you ever called out in despair like Jesus, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me” (Psalm 22:1a)?
I have. MANY, MANY times. They say that “God gives us only what we can handle.” I don’t know who ‘they’ are, but they’re sorely misguided. No one can deny that often our pain is of our own making, or simply the result of living in a broken world where disease and sin are rampant. That said, God does allow it. He often permits what we can’t handle to teach us trust and to train us to rely on Him rather than our own devices. Managing life on our own isn’t part of His plan. We’ve proven throughout history that we aren’t good at it. If we could deal with everything on our own, why would we need Him? No, God uses suffering to draw us close, to learn to rely on Him – not on our own strength. Perhaps a more accurate axiom might be, “God gives us only what He can handle.”
The role of suffering in a Christian’s life is illustrated so poignantly throughout Holy Week. Even so, humans want to skip the suffering and race to the resurrection. Good Friday is an integral part of God’s plan because without the pain of the crucifixion, we wouldn’t have the power, the miracle, or the JOY of the resurrection. Because of His great love for us, Christ chose to put aside His divinity to fulfill God’s salvation plan. However, Saturday plays an important role as well. It’s where we learn to trust in the unknowing and surrender to God’s will. We, too, have to choose to die to self before we can truly experience the resurrected life Christ has planned for us. It’s hard. It’s painful. It’s lonely. But when you do, that experience can move the most reserved to a resounding rendition of the Hallelujah chorus.
In my experience, pain reveals who Jesus is. More importantly, it provides an opportunity for Him to prove His faithfulness to us, which is exactly what He did on Calvary. It’s in our suffering that we learn to trust in His. There’s another familiar saying, “Only God can turn a mess into a message, a test into a testimony, a trial into a triumph and a victim into a victory.” It’s not about our performance. It’s about His – always – especially in our suffering.
God didn’t have a Plan B for saving mankind, and He doesn’t have a Plan B for you either. What cross are you struggling with today? Whatever it is, choose to believe that God is using it to prepare you for a future only He can see. When God is silent, choose to wait for the miracle – with the hope Christ’s resurrection provides.