Holy Saturday of Holy Week - Apr 19
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Meditation
Holy Saturday of Passion Week gives us a moment to regroup after the painful messages of sorrow over the last two days.
Some traditions have hourly vigils that give people opportunity to meditate on the Season of Lent, the extraordinary and redeeming sacrifice of Jesus and prepare the heart for the resurrection celebration on Sunday.
There are many Scriptures: the Old Testament prophet, whose poem in the third chapter was acrostic—i.e. the triplets (three lines) began with a Hebrew letter, so the 66 verses match the 22 letters of the alphabet. The Psalmist, David, sang of troubled times and hope in God that place of safety. The New Testament epistle of Peter placed the blame of troubles on the wrong doings of people, and yet forgiveness and redemption through the gospel was given to all—even those of the past. The Gospel lessons restated the burial of Jesus—by Joseph of Arimethea and Nicodemus—two Jewish leaders that were followers, believers in Christ.
I haven’t seen the Passion of Christ (the movie) but I heard complaints how all Jews were blamed for everything. I don't believe all Jews were to blame.
The Saturday lesson of the Gospel shared how two Jewish leaders, who were not responsible for Christ’s death, but were responsible for burying his body in an acceptable fashion by Jewish rites. A great deal of expense and effort was given by these Jewish leaders—enough that their names were mentioned specifically in the Scriptures.
The Scriptures have scolded us about judging, and yet, I am stunned at how many people ‘judge’ Jews—God’s chosen people. Some Jewish leaders manipulated the crowd into a frenzy and guided people to have Jesus killed. Some Christian leaders have manipulated crowds into frenzies and have burned people at the stake, hung people, and killed for false reasons.
Our responsibility as Christians, is to meditate on our own lives, not judge others' lives.
The prophet in Lamentations (we don’t know if it was Jeremiah or another) whined about how things were going wrong. He blamed God for beating them with a stick. The Jews had suffered exile and devastation. But Peter blamed the individual and corporate sin for things going wrong.
We can fall into whining ‘Why me?’ when things go awry. It is easier to blame the sovereign God, who could have intervened, and made things better, than being accountable or avoiding blame altogether.
However, the prophet, David and Peter all came to the same conclusion at the end: after the blame-game, after the whining, after the sadness, after the frustration, God made things better. Hope was in God, because of mercy, kindness, and everlasting love. Love covered a multitude of sins.
My life hit a rough spot after an accident put me on the disabled list. We lost our million dollar home to foreclosure, being evicted because of no income to pay for housing and most recently all our belongings in storage that amounted to close to half a million in oriental carpets, art, books and antiques. It was quite a humbling experience to lose it all. I could whine and blame God, who could have intervened, but didn’t. I don't blame God. There is a plan that I will some day understand better.
However, my hope is in God. Through all the years of my life, God has always provided. Perhaps, not as I preferred, but after some distance, I have looked back and seen how God was glorified in it.
This is the bottom line.
Things go well for us, so that we can praise God.
Things go poorly for us, so that we can praise God.
I told someone, whom I suspect was not a believer, about our recent loss. He said, if he had known, he could have helped us pay the bill current so we could have recovered our belongings. Two days. Two days late, like Jesus was four days late for Lazarus. The man actually said, “How do you spin that into something good? Isn’t that what you are supposed to do?”
I replied that the loss was hard, but that I trusted God for what had happened and the positive that would come from it. I didn’t say that glibly. I sobbed at the loss of my mother’s Bible and her prayer list in her handwriting. My father’s Bible and the Bible that he gave me on my sixth birthday. The photos of my children. Books that I gave them. Irreplaceable things.
But they are things. And I know that God has a plan for his perfect will, so that God will be glorified, even in our loss.
Bad or good. All things happen, so that God can be glorified. My father died when I was nine. I cried a lot. I asked my mother what we were going to do and she said the Lord would provide. The Lord has never failed me.
Years later, as a college church leader, a visitor came to the young people’s meeting and shared his disgust for God. He was 18 years old and had lost his father—a Christian in service to God—to a crazy man with a gun. A man shot his father in the head, murdering him when this young man was not a teenager yet. I prayed for words. I don’t remember the words, but we talked for hours about losing a parent as a kid, and how God turns bad things into hope.
He wrote me years later that he turned his life around, gave his heart to God and he was going into full-time service for God. May God be glorified.
As I experienced a lump in the throat and welling in the eyes, I silently praised God that my suffering the loss of my father helped me share the good news of Jesus, with another.
There is always hope. The prophet said God’s love doesn’t fail; Peter said love covers sins. David said God is our rock and our safety. That doesn’t mean all things will be hunky-dory every minute. We all go through loss and trials. The devil is at work to defeat us. But I will not allow the devil to undermine my faith in God (even though I had to pray a lot and have my dear friends and saints pray me through the rough spots). God is glorified in sacrifice.
As we meditate on the greatest loss of all—Jesus’ sacrifice of his life—for you and me and everyone who believes, we prepare our hearts for the glory that we will celebrate on Easter Sunday—at a sunrise service or a church or privately, if one is unable to connect with others.
Know that the Lord loves us. Jesus showed us in his death. God was and is and forever shall be glorified.
Thanks be to God.
All Scriptures printed below are in King James Version for copyright purposes. However, clicking on the verse locations will take you to Biblegateway.com where the text is linked to more contemporary versions.
Prayer: Almighty God, Open my eyes that I might see. Open my mind that I might understand. Open my heart that I might make your words a part of me. May the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart be acceptable in your sight. Amen
Passion Week Bible Readings
http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Psalm 31:1-4, 15-16;1 Peter 4:1-8;Matthew 27:57-66;John 19:38-42;Lamentations 3:1-9, 19-24&version=KJV;ERV;GNT;NCV;NIV (multiple versions)
Holy Saturday of Passion Week
Psalm 31:1-4 15-16
1 Peter 4:1-8
Matthew 27:57-66
John 19:38-42
Daily Bible Verses to Memorize for Meditating
Psalm 118:24
King James Version (KJV)
24 This is the day which the LORD hath made; we will rejoice and be glad in it.
Single Bible Study chapter to study
Lamentations 3:1-9, 19-24 King James Version (KJV)
3 I AM the man that hath seen affliction by the rod of his wrath.
2 He hath led me, and brought me into darkness, but not into light.
3 Surely against me is he turned; he turneth his hand against me all the day.
4 My flesh and my skin hath he made old; he hath broken my bones.
5 He hath builded against me, and compassed me with gall and travail.
6 He hath set me in dark places, as they that be dead of old.
7 He hath hedged me about, that I cannot get out: he hath made my chain heavy.
8 Also when I cry and shout, he shutteth out my prayer.
9 He hath inclosed my ways with hewn stone, he hath made my paths crooked.
19 Remembering mine affliction and my misery, the wormwood and the gall.
20 My soul hath them still in remembrance, and is humbled in me.
21 This I recall to my mind, therefore have I hope.
22 It is of the LORD's mercies that we are not consumed, because his compassions fail not.
23 They are new every morning: great is thy faithfulness.
24 The LORD is my portion, saith my soul; therefore will I hope in him.
OBSERVE:
Take a moment and write three observations of the verses. What strikes you? An observation is an observable fact from the Word.
1.
2.
3.
INTERPRETATION:
What do you interpret these verses to mean for you today?
APPLY:
Today, I learned _____________________________________and apply it to my life.
Prayer of Encouragement
Almighty God, we confess that we find it difficult at times to understand loss and trials. We cannot see things from your perspective, yet. But we trust in you for you are our hope and our rock. We give you the glory for you can work all these things together for our good. Help us to be obedient to your desires. In Jesus name, Amen
Conclusion
Holy Saturday of Passion Week gives us a chance to meditate. We may be reeling from the pain and suffering that Christ endured. He was betrayed. He was ridiculed, whipped and humiliated. He was harmed physically, mentally and spiritually. He suffered God turning away from him at his lowest moment. All because he loved us.
Love covers many sins. Jesus’ love covered many sins. We have the opportunity to go and do the same for others. We can allow our love for others to cover the sins that we believe they have done to us. We can forgive as Christ has forgiven us.
When we come to Easter Sunday—where we celebrate the resurrection of Jesus—let us not come to it unworthily with bitterness, blame and resentment of how God has not given us what we wanted, or provided as we hoped. Let us put aside all that blocks our joy, for the Lord is good. Mercy and love cover our sins! We have much to be grateful for. Let us confess our sin and prepare our hearts for the best Easter, ever.
I know the Lord is being glorified in our loss. I hope you experience the same joy in God’s glory in your life.
Go out and be ready for God to do mighty things in your life—for the glory of God.*
Thank you for visiting ChapLynne’s Daily Encouragement and Bible Study. God bless you.
*If you do not know the Lord as your personal Savior and you are seeking, please contact me. A genuine and simple prayer, asking God into your heart for the forgiveness of your sins will also do.
Holy Saturday of Passion Week gives us a moment to regroup after the painful messages of sorrow over the last two days.
Some traditions have hourly vigils that give people opportunity to meditate on the Season of Lent, the extraordinary and redeeming sacrifice of Jesus and prepare the heart for the resurrection celebration on Sunday.
There are many Scriptures: the Old Testament prophet, whose poem in the third chapter was acrostic—i.e. the triplets (three lines) began with a Hebrew letter, so the 66 verses match the 22 letters of the alphabet. The Psalmist, David, sang of troubled times and hope in God that place of safety. The New Testament epistle of Peter placed the blame of troubles on the wrong doings of people, and yet forgiveness and redemption through the gospel was given to all—even those of the past. The Gospel lessons restated the burial of Jesus—by Joseph of Arimethea and Nicodemus—two Jewish leaders that were followers, believers in Christ.
I haven’t seen the Passion of Christ (the movie) but I heard complaints how all Jews were blamed for everything. I don't believe all Jews were to blame.
The Saturday lesson of the Gospel shared how two Jewish leaders, who were not responsible for Christ’s death, but were responsible for burying his body in an acceptable fashion by Jewish rites. A great deal of expense and effort was given by these Jewish leaders—enough that their names were mentioned specifically in the Scriptures.
The Scriptures have scolded us about judging, and yet, I am stunned at how many people ‘judge’ Jews—God’s chosen people. Some Jewish leaders manipulated the crowd into a frenzy and guided people to have Jesus killed. Some Christian leaders have manipulated crowds into frenzies and have burned people at the stake, hung people, and killed for false reasons.
Our responsibility as Christians, is to meditate on our own lives, not judge others' lives.
The prophet in Lamentations (we don’t know if it was Jeremiah or another) whined about how things were going wrong. He blamed God for beating them with a stick. The Jews had suffered exile and devastation. But Peter blamed the individual and corporate sin for things going wrong.
We can fall into whining ‘Why me?’ when things go awry. It is easier to blame the sovereign God, who could have intervened, and made things better, than being accountable or avoiding blame altogether.
However, the prophet, David and Peter all came to the same conclusion at the end: after the blame-game, after the whining, after the sadness, after the frustration, God made things better. Hope was in God, because of mercy, kindness, and everlasting love. Love covered a multitude of sins.
My life hit a rough spot after an accident put me on the disabled list. We lost our million dollar home to foreclosure, being evicted because of no income to pay for housing and most recently all our belongings in storage that amounted to close to half a million in oriental carpets, art, books and antiques. It was quite a humbling experience to lose it all. I could whine and blame God, who could have intervened, but didn’t. I don't blame God. There is a plan that I will some day understand better.
However, my hope is in God. Through all the years of my life, God has always provided. Perhaps, not as I preferred, but after some distance, I have looked back and seen how God was glorified in it.
This is the bottom line.
Things go well for us, so that we can praise God.
Things go poorly for us, so that we can praise God.
I told someone, whom I suspect was not a believer, about our recent loss. He said, if he had known, he could have helped us pay the bill current so we could have recovered our belongings. Two days. Two days late, like Jesus was four days late for Lazarus. The man actually said, “How do you spin that into something good? Isn’t that what you are supposed to do?”
I replied that the loss was hard, but that I trusted God for what had happened and the positive that would come from it. I didn’t say that glibly. I sobbed at the loss of my mother’s Bible and her prayer list in her handwriting. My father’s Bible and the Bible that he gave me on my sixth birthday. The photos of my children. Books that I gave them. Irreplaceable things.
But they are things. And I know that God has a plan for his perfect will, so that God will be glorified, even in our loss.
Bad or good. All things happen, so that God can be glorified. My father died when I was nine. I cried a lot. I asked my mother what we were going to do and she said the Lord would provide. The Lord has never failed me.
Years later, as a college church leader, a visitor came to the young people’s meeting and shared his disgust for God. He was 18 years old and had lost his father—a Christian in service to God—to a crazy man with a gun. A man shot his father in the head, murdering him when this young man was not a teenager yet. I prayed for words. I don’t remember the words, but we talked for hours about losing a parent as a kid, and how God turns bad things into hope.
He wrote me years later that he turned his life around, gave his heart to God and he was going into full-time service for God. May God be glorified.
As I experienced a lump in the throat and welling in the eyes, I silently praised God that my suffering the loss of my father helped me share the good news of Jesus, with another.
There is always hope. The prophet said God’s love doesn’t fail; Peter said love covers sins. David said God is our rock and our safety. That doesn’t mean all things will be hunky-dory every minute. We all go through loss and trials. The devil is at work to defeat us. But I will not allow the devil to undermine my faith in God (even though I had to pray a lot and have my dear friends and saints pray me through the rough spots). God is glorified in sacrifice.
As we meditate on the greatest loss of all—Jesus’ sacrifice of his life—for you and me and everyone who believes, we prepare our hearts for the glory that we will celebrate on Easter Sunday—at a sunrise service or a church or privately, if one is unable to connect with others.
Know that the Lord loves us. Jesus showed us in his death. God was and is and forever shall be glorified.
Thanks be to God.
All Scriptures printed below are in King James Version for copyright purposes. However, clicking on the verse locations will take you to Biblegateway.com where the text is linked to more contemporary versions.
Prayer: Almighty God, Open my eyes that I might see. Open my mind that I might understand. Open my heart that I might make your words a part of me. May the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart be acceptable in your sight. Amen
Passion Week Bible Readings
http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Psalm 31:1-4, 15-16;1 Peter 4:1-8;Matthew 27:57-66;John 19:38-42;Lamentations 3:1-9, 19-24&version=KJV;ERV;GNT;NCV;NIV (multiple versions)
Holy Saturday of Passion Week
Psalm 31:1-4 15-16
1 Peter 4:1-8
Matthew 27:57-66
John 19:38-42
Daily Bible Verses to Memorize for Meditating
Psalm 118:24
King James Version (KJV)
24 This is the day which the LORD hath made; we will rejoice and be glad in it.
Single Bible Study chapter to study
Lamentations 3:1-9, 19-24 King James Version (KJV)
3 I AM the man that hath seen affliction by the rod of his wrath.
2 He hath led me, and brought me into darkness, but not into light.
3 Surely against me is he turned; he turneth his hand against me all the day.
4 My flesh and my skin hath he made old; he hath broken my bones.
5 He hath builded against me, and compassed me with gall and travail.
6 He hath set me in dark places, as they that be dead of old.
7 He hath hedged me about, that I cannot get out: he hath made my chain heavy.
8 Also when I cry and shout, he shutteth out my prayer.
9 He hath inclosed my ways with hewn stone, he hath made my paths crooked.
19 Remembering mine affliction and my misery, the wormwood and the gall.
20 My soul hath them still in remembrance, and is humbled in me.
21 This I recall to my mind, therefore have I hope.
22 It is of the LORD's mercies that we are not consumed, because his compassions fail not.
23 They are new every morning: great is thy faithfulness.
24 The LORD is my portion, saith my soul; therefore will I hope in him.
OBSERVE:
Take a moment and write three observations of the verses. What strikes you? An observation is an observable fact from the Word.
1.
2.
3.
INTERPRETATION:
What do you interpret these verses to mean for you today?
APPLY:
Today, I learned _____________________________________and apply it to my life.
Prayer of Encouragement
Almighty God, we confess that we find it difficult at times to understand loss and trials. We cannot see things from your perspective, yet. But we trust in you for you are our hope and our rock. We give you the glory for you can work all these things together for our good. Help us to be obedient to your desires. In Jesus name, Amen
Conclusion
Holy Saturday of Passion Week gives us a chance to meditate. We may be reeling from the pain and suffering that Christ endured. He was betrayed. He was ridiculed, whipped and humiliated. He was harmed physically, mentally and spiritually. He suffered God turning away from him at his lowest moment. All because he loved us.
Love covers many sins. Jesus’ love covered many sins. We have the opportunity to go and do the same for others. We can allow our love for others to cover the sins that we believe they have done to us. We can forgive as Christ has forgiven us.
When we come to Easter Sunday—where we celebrate the resurrection of Jesus—let us not come to it unworthily with bitterness, blame and resentment of how God has not given us what we wanted, or provided as we hoped. Let us put aside all that blocks our joy, for the Lord is good. Mercy and love cover our sins! We have much to be grateful for. Let us confess our sin and prepare our hearts for the best Easter, ever.
I know the Lord is being glorified in our loss. I hope you experience the same joy in God’s glory in your life.
Go out and be ready for God to do mighty things in your life—for the glory of God.*
Thank you for visiting ChapLynne’s Daily Encouragement and Bible Study. God bless you.
*If you do not know the Lord as your personal Savior and you are seeking, please contact me. A genuine and simple prayer, asking God into your heart for the forgiveness of your sins will also do.
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Replies
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Thank you for the discipline and hard work to make sure that during this season of lent, and all through the year you are there to make a difference in the lives i
Of those of virtuous living. The main reason I am still on mfp is to read the daily input that you provide us. I,am sorry for the loss of your home as well as the wonderful memorial items that you lost in storage. As i have studied through the mouths I
Could very much enjoy the strong Christian background you obtained from such a loving family. Had I known your address I would have sent flowers today for such a strong helpful woman. Thank God that you have the strength to know that someday all those things that have been lost will be reclaimed when you see all your family members again. Also you know that we do not build up treasures on earth that are treasures are in heaven where are hearts are. Thank God for his son, and for sending special people like you to help us all to live each day knowing that someone cares. God bless you and your family. Happy Easter. Harriet0 -
Thank you Harriet,
Thank you also for the kind thought of flowers. But you can pay if forward and give flowers to a homeless shelter or donate to a food bank.
Doing things for the least able to help themselves does it for the glory of God.
Happy Easter to you, too.
Blessings,
ChapLynne0
