The Sermon from the Tomb: Waiting on the Lord

Today is the day the body of Christ lay dead in the tomb.
 
Today is the day the Virgin Mary waited for Her Son to rise.
 
Today is the day the soul of Christ descended into the underworld,
 
            into the limbo of the fathers, where all the souls of the righteous,               
                    from Adam, to Abraham,             
          to Moses, to David, 
                    to Isaiah, Jeremiah,
          to Blessed St. Joseph,                                                                                              
                    finally had their waiting end.
 
Here the Lord showed forth His blood, the unpayable ransom paid,
 
Proclaimed the day of deliverance, that heaven’s gates 
          long since shut
 
          would now open for the patient patriarchs.
 
Today those under the earth wait no more,
 
Today those upon the earth wait for the rising of their Lord.
 
The Lord who has already risen from the tomb
 
             but still waits to rise, to rise in full power 

  in the tombs of men’s lives.

***

Scripture is practically silent about what happened on Holy Saturday.

In Luke’s Gospel we read a single verse, “On the Sabbath they rested according to the commandment” (23:56b).

Jesus’ soul was in the underworld, in the limbo of the fathers, or the limbo of the righteous, where those who had died in grace before Christ’s death had been waiting for His coming.

On earth, all were sorrowful. Mary waited with earnest hope. The Apostles waited, some with shattered hope and despair, some with faint hope, others with sorrow but expectation.

Waiting. It is a common experience to our life. Life itself is one big wait for death and for the life that will be hereafter in eternity, hopefully, by God’s good grace, for the better.

We wait for many things. We wait to be older. We wait to have our resurrected body. We wait for God to complete His work of sanctification in us. We wait to see loved ones again. We wait for a better world, a world where Christ is proclaimed on every lip, declared by every mouth, where evil is no more. We wait for the return of those estranged from the family or estranged from the Church. We wait for Christ’s second coming.

From the Sermon on the Plain, Christ preached one lot of teachings. From the Sermon on the Mount, another. What does Christ preach in the Sermon from the Tomb? With silence He preaches the sacred art of waiting. He could have risen from the dead without delay, but He chose to wait until the third day.

He chose to wait, and on this Holy Saturday, by His waiting, united to that of Mary’s waiting, we are given the strength to wait in all the ways we are called to wait.

The Psalms abound with references to waiting on the Lord.

Wait for the Lord; be strong, and let your heart take courage; yea, wait for the Lord! (27:14).

Refrain from anger, and forsake wrath! Fret not yourself; it only tends to evil. For the wicked shall be cut off; but those who wait for the Lord shall possess the land (37:8-9).

 Here we see a contrast between those who refuse to wait on the Lord, and those who willingly do so. The former want action, and action now; seeking to exert the power of their own will over life and its situations, and when they cannot bend things to their control, anger and frustration results. Fury at God and life for the situation at hand. 

At times we can all fall into this in little ways. 

On the other hand, waiting for the Lord means to surrender to God, to acknowledge our finitude and limitations, our dependency on God, our need for Him. If we’re willingly waiting on the Lord, it means we are accepting that we do not have the power to bring about the things we long for. 

Spiritually waiting is not merely an endurance of time, a waiting for the clock to tick-faster, it is a faith-filled disposition of soul involving an unconditional openness to God. Trusting that He will act, that He will and is already working to bring about what we long for, that somehow, in Christ, it is already complete and finished, only needing to unfold itself in time.

“Those who wait for the Lord shall possess the land.” Ultimately, those who wait for the Lord shall possess the beatific vision, gain entrance to that glorious land of beatitude.

Mary was expert at the sacred art of waiting. She waited for the Messiah to come, and then fourteen to sixteen years later She conceived Him. She waited for Jesus to bring about the redemption of Israel and all people, and then thirty-three years later Jesus died on the Cross. She waited for Him to rise, and three days later He rose, and then ascended into heaven. She waited to join Her Son in heaven, and only after some years on painful waiting, She was assumed into heaven to join Him.

In joining Mary, we will share in Her waiting, our waiting becoming commingled with Hers, rendering it perfect. With Mary we can say the words from the prophet Isaiah, words appropriate to Holy Saturday: “I will wait for the Lord, who is hiding his face from the house of Jacob, and I will hope in him” (Is 8:17).

He will rise on the third day. He already has. Our waiting is somewhat commemoratory, but it is more than that. True, Christ has already risen, but within us, in our lives, in our souls, in our Church, in our world, we wait for Christ therein to rise again. That is, we wait for the full power of His single resurrection to resound through all things, to enliven and awaken all things into the life and glory of God.

He will rise, we need only wait.

After two days he will revive us; on the third day he will raise us up, that we may live before him. (Hos 6:2).

Other articles for Holy Saturday:

St. Joseph in the Limbo of the Fathers

Holy Saturday: Mary and The Widow of Nain