April 15, 2017 - Holy Saturday

Holy Saturday

Scripture: Matthew 27:57-66

This week’s devotions follow a different pattern. They will focus on Gospel accounts of the last week of Jesus’ life. I encourage you to read each of the readings slowly, perhaps out loud, and to meditate on Jesus’ love in his actions. The prayers offered are from the early twentieth century and variations on them are still used in worship.

Teaching

This short reading finds Jesus being buried by men who were not his disciples. It also displays the cunning of the chief priests and Pharisees, as they seek to thwart the disciples, who were too fearful to claim Jesus’ body, in case they worked up the courage to steal the body and claim Jesus had risen. In all, it all seems rather anticlimactic. A gasp and a sigh at the end of days of turmoil and fear. But today Jesus rests in the tomb. The clock is ticking, though. He won’t be there long.

Life

Holy Saturday is sometimes a strange day in the observation of Holy Week. Good Friday is done, but Easter is not quite here yet. How do we approach this day? Perhaps we should live it like every day, for every day we wait with hope knowing that Jesus will return, even as the disciples (unknowingly and without hope) waited for Easter morning. Rest and prepare to celebrate in worship and with food and festivities. Tomorrow is a great and holy day!

Prayer

Almighty God, our heavenly Father, we give Thee most humble and hearty thanks that Thou has given Thine onlybegotten Son to bear our sins and to make atonement for us on the cross; and we pray Thee, give us grace to put our whole trust in the Thy redeeming love, and grant that our faith in Thee may be strengthened, our souls comforted, and we be enabled to resist all the assaults of sin. Protect us against the devices of the Evil One; and in all temptations keep us by Thy Holy Spirit, and help us to walk according to Thy Word, that, being guarded and defended by Thy mighty power, we may never depart from Thy ways, and in the end be saved by Thy grace. Amen.[1]






[1] Liturgy and Agenda, Concordia Publishing House, 1917, p.174

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