Holly Price recalls a childhood memory, as she wonders how Jesus and the first alongsiders experienced Easter Saturday.

‘It’s done now, all finished.’
Usually those words make my tears stop.
Not today.

I huff.
I cross my arms.
I push out my ‘pantry shelf’ lip.
I replay it all again…

I took the scissors.
I walked quickly but carefully – pointy end down.
I tucked myself behind the armchair, so it would be a surprise.
I gathered a handful of hair between the shiny arms and squeezed the orange handles.
What a lovely sound!
I felt so grown up – everyone at preschool would think so!

Then Mummy called my name.
I froze.
But I wasn’t finished!
So, I kept cutting until she found me in my dark little corner.
Her face looked surprised, but not how I imagined.
She sent me straight to the naughty step.

And now here I sit, half grown-up with my lopsided new look.
Mummy called out a moment ago, asking if I’m ready to say sorry, but I’m not.
If only she’d let me finish...

It’s gone quiet…
Maybe I don’t want to stay here all on my own.
Maybe there was a reason I hid in the dark.
Maybe I do want to hear ‘It’s done now, all finished’ and feel the giant squeeze that comes with it.

I can’t undo what I did.
I can’t do anything to fix it.
But Mummy coming here, looking at me with smiling eyes and hugging me – well, that would help.
‘I’m ready!’ 

It’s all over

Sometimes we are made to sit and wait right when everything feels undone. Never more so than after Jesus said, ‘It is finished’, just before dying (John 19:30).

I wonder how his friends heard that sentence. Perhaps it sounded like: It’s over! My time’s up. There’s nothing you can do. Just a few hours later, Sabbath began. They were forced to sit, to stop, to replay, and all without the presence of their beloved rabbi.

I imagine their Easter Saturday felt like a

dead
end. Like a tomb
swallowing their hopes and
echoing their fears. Most had
already fled in terror and were
now hiding behind locked doors
(Matthew 26:56, John 20:19). 

Yet, Luke 23 reveals glimmers of light on that darkest day.  

Glimmers of faith 

Two ‘secret disciples’, Joseph and Nicodemus, stepped out of the shadows to care for Jesus’ body. Joseph acted not out of panic but out of hope: ‘He himself was waiting for the kingdom of God’ (v 51).

I wonder if they had to encourage each other to trust God enough to take this stand. 

Even more striking are the women. They had followed Jesus in life, stood near him in death, and watched where he was laid. What’s surprising is their next move: ‘Then they went home and prepared spices and perfumes. But they rested on the Sabbath in obedience to the commandment.’ (v 55-56).

For them, stopping must have been the hardest part.
They weren’t finished!
No time to properly wash and wrap the body or adorn the tomb.
No time to sit with the body, pray, lament.
No time to gather in community to express their grief.
They could do nothing for Jesus.

But whilst the chief priests and Pharisees broke Sabbath out of fear (Matthew 27:62-66), these women honoured Jesus with their waiting, following the same path of obedience their Lord had taken: ‘He humbled himself by becoming obedient to death – even death on a cross!’ (Philippians 2:8).

I wonder if they had to encourage each other to trust God enough to take this rest.  

Found in the dark 

The gospel writers cannot tell us what Jesus experienced between death and resurrection (I’d love to hear it, but maybe I’m not ready!) but other scriptures give hints. All of the punishment for our sin was laid on Jesus and died there on the cross, then his body was laid to rest in the tomb (Isaiah 53:5-6). But, his spirit was alive and active, defeating death from the inside out and proclaiming this victory in the realm of the dead (1 Peter 3:18-19, Hebrews 2:14-15, Revelation 1:18).  

Psalm 88, often read on Good Friday and sometimes called ‘the darkest psalm’, cries out: ‘Is your love declared in the grave… Are your wonders known in the place of darkness?’ (v 11-12). Jesus answers: Yes – even there!  

When I was four, my sin looked like scissor freedom and stubborn independence. Now, Sabbath rest exposes different cravings for ‘freedom’: the need to keep proving myself, to fix my own heart, to hide in my own dark corners. When Friday evening arrives and it’s time to put my phone away, something in me still wants to huff and cross my arms.

Corrie Ten Boom once wrote, ‘God takes our sins, the past, present and future and dumps them in to the sea and puts up a sign that says, “No fishing allowed”.’

It’s done now, all finished. Yet when pride, shame or fear rises, it takes faith to
sit in
the quiet
long enough
to bring it
to God.
Sometimes we need others to help us make that space. It might mean joining a Good Friday service, practising Sabbath with friends or family, or walking with someone and naming the ‘freedoms’ that keep us in the dark.

As we approach Easter and anticipate resurrection joy, Easter Saturday is an invitation to sit – just for a moment – and remember those three sweet words:

‘It     is     finished.’

May we be ready to take Jesus at his word.
Ready to honour his death together.
Ready to rest in the arms that are always open to us.