Sad News
It's with a heavy heart that I write these words. Dearest Mama Georgette has now passed from this life and into Jesus' loving arms. At 1:20 am on Holy Saturday in a hospital bed in Bujumbura, Burundi, surrounded by her daughter Mary and a few other precious friends, she breathed her last.
To those closest to her, it seemed fitting that she would depart during Holy Week. Georgette was a devoted follower of Jesus Christ and counted her own sufferings to be nothing in comparison to thesuffering and death of her Savior. She believed wholeheartedly that His resurrection, ascension and seating at the Father's right hand changed everything: her life was one lived in grateful response and eternal hope.
But for those of us (and there are so many of us!) who are left behind on earth, there is shock. And deep grief, deep loss, deep sorrow. I, personally, feel disoriented. Words have failed me. But then a friend shared with me a meditation on what it might have felt like to be one of Christ’s followers on the day after his death. Maybe this meditative poem, written by Ian Simkins, will be of help to you, too?
Holy Saturday: The Day In Between
The day almost no one talks about.
No parade like Palm Sunday.
No upper room like Thursday.
No cross like Friday.
No empty tomb like Sunday.
Just silence.
Stillness.
Waiting.
The Messiah is dead.
His body lies cold in a borrowed tomb.
And those who loved Him most are shattered.
This is the day of disorientation.
Not because they were waiting for resurrection
But because they weren’t.
No one expected a comeback.
Their hope wasn’t hanging by a thread—it had already snapped.
The Gospel accounts offer only fragments.
Mark Tells us the women watched where He was buried.
Luke says they went home to prepare spices.
Matthew simply says they sat there.
Not speaking.
Not moving.
Just—-sitting.
I imagine they sat because standing was impossible.
Because breathing felt like betrayal.
Because going home without Him was too much to bear.
Have you ever been there?
Collapsed under the weight of grief?
Too stunned to think, too broken to move?
Maybe you’re there now.
Maybe you’ve been handed a diagnosis.
Faced a betrayal.
Lost a job.
Buried a dream.
Maybe you’re asking God, “Where are you?”
Holy Saturday is a day for that space.
The space between death and life.
Between promise and fulfillment.
Between Good Friday’s agony and Easter Sunday’s joy.
It’s the space where nothing makes sense—
And yet God is not absent.
He is silent…but He is not gone.
He is still working in the dark.
Still faithful in the in-between.
Still present in the ache.
If that’s where you find yourself today, please hear this:
Your sorrow is not wasted.
Your questions do not scare God.
Your silence is not empty.
Your pain is holy ground.
Because this day matters too.
Not just for them—but for us.
So today, don’t rush to Sunday.
Sit in the ache.
Hold the tension.
Name the questions.
Pray your uncertainty.
God is here, too.
In the confusion.
In the silence.
In the not-yet.
And the tomb isn’t the end fo the story.
But it it is part of it.
He is with you in the valley—
And He’ll meet you at the dawn.