This is Love: #3 Hopeless Love

I want to draw us to the day after Jesus’ crucifixion. A day known in some traditions as Holy Day.

John 19:31-42

Believe in a love that can illuminate the darkness with His light.

Palm Sunday. Jesus riding into Jerusalem on a donkey to the shouts and praises of the people. Palm branches and cloaks were laid out before him in this triumphal entry. How things would progress and change across the week that were never envisioned by his disciples. Hope that turned to hopelessness.

I want to draw us to the day after Jesus’ crucifixion. A day known in some traditions as Holy Day. A day for the disciples where hope seemed lost and confusion reigned. Jesus was dead. His body had been quickly wrapped with spices and strips of linen. They had then placed him in a tomb and a stone rolled into place and sealed. Jesus the powerful was now powerless.

The grieving disciples gathered that Friday night and across Saturday. The women had quickly gathered the things they would need for Sunday morning when they wished to fully clean and dress Jesus’ body after the Sabbath. In Luke’s gospel it simply tells us, “the disciples rested on the Sabbath in obedience to the commandment.” (Luke 23:56)

Downcast, confused, hopeless, they waited. In the monumental events from the last supper, the arrest, the crucifixion and Jesus’ death, there is this pause. A stop in the cascade of life for the disciples. They are not anticipating resurrection. They are lost.

Maybe today you are feeling lost, without hope. Darkness is your companion. But the darkness can be a crucible in which doubt can be ground away. Despair can help us focus on one who is the source of hope.

Believe in one who is hope. Believe in a love that can illuminate the darkness with his light. Believe in one who is love and who is risen. He is alive and can be known. Reach out and know his love today.

God bless

Pastor Stephen