Darkness: Finding God in the Silence of Holy Saturday
By Angel Atkinson, Open Arms Care Coordinator
Have you ever found yourself in complete darkness?
Not the kind when you close your eyes or turn off the lights… but real darkness. The kind that feels like utter despair. A solid black hole where you don’t know how you’re going to climb out—or if you even can. A weight so heavy it paralyzes you… something so overwhelming you feel like you can’t even breathe.
This, my church family, is grief.
When Grief Takes Over
When I lost my father, I felt this.
God had restored our relationship, and over the last few years, we had become extremely close. Then he was diagnosed with large cell lymphoma. His fight became my fight.
I quit my job so I could be with him. Day in and day out, for months, we went to the hospital for chemotherapy—three days a week. We spent hours together while he was hooked up to an IV, lying in that hospital bed. I was there to keep him company.
We ate lunch together. We watched episode after episode of Law & Order. We read the Bible. We talked.
And if I’m being honest… we avoided the reality. We were both terrified.
Then came five weeks of daily radiation. More long hours in Olean while he went through treatment. I wasn’t allowed in the room with him, but I did what I could. I pulled a chair up right outside the door so I would be the last thing he saw before they closed it—and the first thing he saw when it opened.
For five hours at a time, I sat there.
No bathroom breaks. No getting food. No distractions.
I did what he had to do… I stayed.
When Everything Changes in an Instant
A few years later, everything changed.
He was at home, changing a light bulb. He didn’t want to bother me while I was at work. The chair slipped out from under him, and he fell—headfirst onto the concrete floor.
He waited a few days, but the headache only got worse. Eventually, I took him to the ER. They admitted him with a concussion.
I knew something wasn’t right.
Three days later, he was unresponsive—like he was in a coma. Four days later, he was gone.
A hematoma on his brain had caused a stroke.
They had graciously placed us in a hospice room… but he never recovered.
He held me when I took my first breath.
And I held him as he took his last.
The Sound of Grief
I couldn’t think.
All I could do was scream.
I thought it was silent… but later I found out it wasn’t. My cries echoed through the hospital floor. No one tried to quiet me. Some of the nurses just stood there and cried with me. It was all they could do.
It felt like my life had been ripped out of me.
I fell into that black hole.
Life as I knew it would never be the same… and neither would I.
The Darkness of Holy Saturday
Holy Saturday feels like that.
It’s the quietest day of Holy Week.
Jesus is in the tomb. The disciples are scattered. Hope feels buried. Heaven seems silent.
“As evening approached, there came a rich man from Arimathea, named Joseph…
Joseph took the body, wrapped it in a clean linen cloth, and placed it in his own new tomb.”
— Matthew 27:57-60
Everything feels final.
Everything feels lost.
And yet… this is not the end.
God in the Middle of the Darkness
This kind of grief gives us a glimpse—just a glimpse—of what it feels like to be separated from God. When shame, guilt, and pain pull us away from Him, we can feel like we’re trapped in that same darkness.
We let our emotions lead us into a place so deep and so dark that we start to believe we can’t come back. That we’ve gone too far. That maybe even God can’t love us anymore.
But that is not true.
When we reach that place of despair—and we all do—we have to reach out and take hold of His hand.
He is faithful.
He will pull us out of that pit. He will clean us up. He never left us—not for a second. He is right there in the middle of it, feeling what we feel, holding us as we cry.
“For no one is cast off by the Lord forever.
Though He brings grief, He will show compassion,
so great is His unfailing love.”
— Lamentations 3:31–32
Even in the silence… God is still working.
“Weeping may stay for the night, but rejoicing comes in the morning.”
— Psalm 30:5
Come Home
So my friends… this Lenten season is about our living God.
A God so loving and so forgiving that even in what feels like your darkest sin, He is still reaching for you. He is still calling you. He is still ready to wrap His arms around you and say, “Come on in.”
Are you broken?
Are you overwhelmed with grief?
Are you facing something that makes you feel like you can’t go on?
Come.
Come to the Father.
He is waiting for you.
The God who died, was buried, and rose again… did that for you.
He loves you.
And He is calling you home—today, right now.
If you need prayer, don’t carry it alone. Reach out. We are here for you, and we love you.
