Holy Saturday is always a quiet day. A day of reflection. A day between sorrow and joy. A day to await the resurrection. Let’s not rush from sorrow to joy. Let’s not hurry the unfolding of new life that takes place deep in an earthy grave. Let’s sit among the tombstones and wait.
At first it is almost imperceptible. Subtle. Muted. Slow. Gradual. And then is bursts. New life.
I learned a new word this week. Yugen. Yugen is an important concept in traditional Japanese aesthetics. It means, “A profound awareness of the universe that triggers feelings too deep and mysterious for words.” Yugen is very clearly about this world and this experience but the notion struck a chord with me as a Christian on this Easter weekend. The crucifixion and the resurrection trigger feelings too deep and mysterious for words.
I always find it hard to write the sermon for Easter Sunday. How do we describe the resurrection? How do we put words around the mystery of life from death? How do we make sense of something that is beyond our realm of daily experience? How to speak of something that is too deep and mysterious for words?
So today, this Holy Saturday, I wait for the surprising in-breaking of God’s new life in mine. I wait in the tomb of Holy Saturday until the angels call me to new life.
