My thoughts are all over the place tonight. As this Saturday draws to a close, I am trying to gather the conflicting feelings of grief and hope that have plagued me all week and put them into a meaningful post that will both encourage others and quiet my soul. But sometimes it is difficult to find meaning in grief.  Hope can be equally as difficult to quantify.

This week has been difficult.  In fact, this lenten season has overwhelmed me in a way I haven’t experienced before.  Not entirely in a bad way; I have been seized with times of deep contemplation which have allowed me to look at this “holy” week from a different perspective.

As I think about Mary the mother of Jesus and Mary Magdelene preparing the oils and spices in order to go back and anoint his body, I am struck by the familiarity of the tasks which so often follow the death of a loved one.

I am in the process of purging and cleaning out boxes, and this week I came across a box full of journals.  Sorting through them  I found one from 1991, the year my late husband got sick and passed away. As I read the entry from the day after his death, it occurred to me that all of us who have experienced the loss of someone have had to endure a “holy Saturday”.  The day when we do the simple but necessary tasks: making the funeral arrangements; calling friends and family to share the sad news; picking out the clothes to bring to the funeral home; sorting through photos of our loved one.  In some ways it is the easiest day we will have compared to the days ahead because we are busy.  Busy with the mundane chores that keep our minds off our pain and grief.

So when does the hope come?  I read a number of devotionals or posts these last few days which said “without Saturday there is no Sunday”, or similar thoughts.  Comments meant to bring hope, promising light in the darkness.  But how many of us have sat in that darkness on that Saturday night, after all the preparations were made and the busyness had ended, and wondered if we would ever see light again, longing for that hope that we cannot see.

I know I have spent many dark Saturdays. And oftentimes I cannot see the hope of the future until I look back at where I’ve been.  Again, one of those contradictions that may never be explained.  But I know without a doubt that light comes.  Time and time again I have come through times of grief and sadness, not only resulting from death, but often as a result of, as one writer I read this week said, “standing in the Garden of Eden and choosing to be like God” (Joshua Bocanegra, Kansas City, MO).  My pride and my self sufficiency keep me in darkness more often than the tragedies of life.

But there is hope. There will be Sunday, when the stone keeping my soul in darkness is rolled away; when my pride and stubbornness are overcome by a relentless love, a love that has defeated death.

So although I may not be able to explain this hope in a dictionary definition kind of way, I can tell you that without a doubt it is real. I can look back and see what I have come through – addiction, widowhood, loss of parents, and so much more – and the darkness always lifts.

Tonight I will do as Mary and the other women did after all the preparations were done – I will rest. And I will rest assured.