The Worst Night before the Best Day

This Easter season everyone is rejoicing the resurrected Christ. Christ is resurrected and it is amazing however this Saturday night I find myself relating more to how the disciples must have felt the night before the beautiful resurrection Sunday. Their savior had just died. They watched him suffer as each breath and ounce of life was drained from his body. A man who they had followed and given up everything for was gone. The teachings had ceased. The best friend they loved was dead. That moment must have appeared so hopeless. They cried out and no one answered. God was silent.

What do you do when God is silent? Where do you turn? I can only imagine that they did the same things we do when trials come and God seems to be silent when you need Him most. Some respond in anger, others doubt God was ever there, some respond with faith, and some cling to the verses they know in tears. Over the past month I have been doing all of those. So many trials came at the same time and God was silent. My bipolar disorder became life controlling and I cried out to God and he was silent. My father's disease is slowly paralyzing him to the point he can't carry out daily functions. I cried out to God, and He was silent. I reacted in every way imaginable. I have screamed, I have prayed, I have clung on with all I have, and God was silent.

What I realized today is that the beauty of Easter has so much to do with the sorrow beforehand. If Jesus had not died then there would be nothing to celebrate. That Easter morning two women with tears in their eyes went to visit the tomb of the one they loved. The one who was now silent. Such tears and anger must have been shed on the way to the tomb that morning. The sorrow of seeing the body of their Lord lying lifeless is what they were preparing for. That road they walked that morning must have seemed like forever. Just as a refresher here is John 20:11-16.

 "Now Mary stood outside the tomb crying. As she wept, she bent over to look into the tomb 12 and saw two angels in white, seated where Jesus’ body had been, one at the head and the other at the foot.

13 They asked her, “Woman, why are you crying?”

“They have taken my Lord away,” she said, “and I don’t know where they have put him.” 14 At this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing there,but she did not realize that it was Jesus.

15 He asked her, “Woman, why are you crying?Who is it you are looking for?”

Thinking he was the gardener, she said, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have put him, and I will get him.”

16 Jesus said to her, “Mary.”

She turned toward him and cried out in Aramaic,“Rabbi!” (which means “Teacher”).

Through her tears she couldn't see that the very man she was mourning was there above her. Oh what joy she must have felt when she saw His face. In the moments we are crying God is just waiting above us to give us hope. When Jesus arose He conquered death. It was and is the best day in all of history. But there would have been no opportunity for the joy that came in the morning if the tears had not been shed before.
"Though the sorrow may last for the night, His joy comes in the morning".

While the morning hasn't quite come in my life I know that His joy truly come in the morning. While God is silent there can be so much we are being taught in that moment. The healing (the faith) doesn't come from being explained. God is always there waiting for us to see Him. Today while I am in the silence I celebrate the fact that God came back from the silence. I chose to celebrate in the darkness for the joy that will come. I choose to celebrate for the fullness of joy that God has provided. I choose to celebrate for the salvation in the silence.