04/04/2026
Easter Saturday, Holy Saturday, Silent Saturday... the day we allow ourselves to ask 'what if...? What if Jesus was not who he claimed to be? What if his bruised and battered remains remained in that tomb decaying away as the disciples went back to work, his teaching gradually forgotten and he became no more than another deluded rabble-rouser in people's fading memories? What if sin could never be cancelled and humanity is doomed to be destroyed by its inability to escape sin's clutches? What if there is no resurrection? No eternal life? It's a question which all Jesus' first disciples and followers went through and, scripture records, they gave into in despair.
In some churches, particularly the more sacramental ones who might celebrate the Eucharist every day, Holy Saturday is the only day of the calendar where there must be no Holy Communion, as if for this one day the whole church is playing the 'what if' game. After all what would be the point of celebrating His redeeming body and saving blood if there is no resurrection power?
So in keeping with that, today there is no music; just a painting and a poem. The painting is the controversial 16th Century painting by Hans Holbein: The Body of the dead Christ in the Tomb. At 3 metres long by 30 centimetres tall it is a grotesque lifesized depiction of the remains of an emaciated crucified Christ laid out on a European style slab. The Russian author Fyodor Dostoevsky was so deeply traumatised when he saw it he climbed up onto the wall to get closer to it and had to be dragged away from it for fear of the onset of a seizure. He later said 'One could lose one's faith from such a painting.'
But on Easter Saturday we use what faith we have to push past this day of 'What if's. Unlike the first disciples we have the evidence of scripture, the testament Christ's impact on planet earth for the past 2026 years and the testimony of our own experience that Jesus is alive. So for those of us with faith a day of pondering the disciples' loss and playing 'what if?' only enhances the ultimate joy of our Easter morning.
I leave you with this poem from the contemporary poet John Swales:
Holy Saturday: I Who Once Was Blind
They say it is morning.
They say the sun has risen.
They say the dew is fresh upon the olive leaves,
and the birds sing as they always have.
But today the light
tastes hollow.
And the birds—
do they not know
he is gone?
I, who once was blind,
sit now in a deeper kind of darkness.
The world’s true hope
lies silent in the grave.
My hope,
like his body,
is crushed.
The world’s true light
swallowed by death.
He touched me once.
Mud and spit, yes — but more.
More than hands on skin.
He reached into my unformed self
and whispered,
“Let there be light.”
And there was.
And I saw —
not just trees and sky,
but the ache of beauty.
The mystery of meaning behind the veil.
Now unveiled.
I saw him,
and in seeing him,
I saw everything.
But now he is gone.
They took him —
those who could see,
but saw nothing.
And they killed him —
the one who opened the eyes of the blind.
I walked the road to the Skull
just to see if my sight would fail.
It did not.
And I wish it had.
I saw the blood.
The final breath.
Darkness covering the land.
The silence.
The shaking of the earth.
And now…
nothing.
No voice.
No light.
No hand reaching through the veil.
I do not know what to do with this gift of sight.
What is the use of eyes,
if I cannot see him?
So I sit on the edge of the Sabbath,
between the no-longer and the not-yet.
The women weep.
The men hide.
And I—
I keep watch.
Because once he opened my eyes,
and I cannot forget.
I sit.
I see.
I wait.
And somewhere,
deep within the silence,
a whisper stirs —
as I remember
that the Healer from Nazareth
said he would die,
but
did he not also say
he would rise.
I sit,
I see,
I wait.
- Rev’d Jon Swales, 2025
