On the Saturday of Easter week did it feel to the disciples like Jesus and God had failed?

The day between Good Friday and Easter Sunday is a reminder of how life often feels. The disciples must have been distraught as they tried to come to terms with what had happened and we can only imagine how they were feeling. Jesus had been their hero, guide, mentor and lord and now he was gone. The events surrounding his arrest and death had been so traumatic, that the disciples must have been in shock.

Jesus had said that he would die but that on the third day that he would come back to life, but that had been some time earlier, did the disciples remember this promise in the midst of their grief? There is no evidence from the gospels that they expected Jesus to come back to life and so the day after Jesus died was one of absolute despair.

The day between Good Friday and Easter Sunday is a reminder of how can sometimes feel,  day in between torment and triumph where hope feels far away.

For the disciples it was a day when it felt like Jesus had failed when in fact he had won his greatest victory.

Jesus’ death opened the way for us to know God! God had won and death was defeated but from the disciples perspective it looked like God had lost and that he had lost badly!

Sometimes, as we look around us at the chaos in the world we can feel the same and this can lead us to wonder where God is and what he is doing.

In these times we need to reach out to God in hope, rather than turning away from him in despair.

Are you living in this sort of in between experience at the moment, full of despair when hope seems far away? If so, I hope that you will remember that Easter Sunday came next and everything changed that day.

God is always at work and his love is never ending, so perhaps it’s time to take a leap of faith, looking to him and then moving forwards one step at a time to follow in the way he is leading.

One final thought,

It is not God’s priority to make sure that you never get upset or hurt.

The disciples felt pain on that Saturday, but God’s priority was the salvation of the world.

Jesus suffered greatly, but God’s priority was the salvation of the world.

Do you see the pattern, some Christians think that God’s priority is their personal comfort, when in fact God’s priority is the salvation of the world.

Can it really be true that you are the most important person to God if we accept that he loves the whole world. When we become God’s children, God wants us to grow to become the people who he created us to be and this growth in faith and character is often accelerated in the difficult times of life.

When we struggle and feel pain, God has not abandoned us, in fact the opposite is true and we know that the promise of Jesus is that he is with  us always.

A prayer for all of us who are finding life a struggle:

I pray that God, the source of hope, will fill you completely with joy and peace because you trust in him. Then you will overflow with confident hope through the power of the Holy Spirit. (Romans 15.13)

You also might find this short video reflecting on Psalm 62 helpful as a way of giving God stress and grief and receiving his presence afresh.