Probably, for me, Holy Saturday is the most important day of the Easter Triduum... Why, you cry, surely Good Friday or Easter Sunday... but no, it has to be the Saturday which, in most Protestant traditions, is empty... nothing happens, and we are left at something of a loss as to what we should do.  And that, surely is the point... Friday is the death of hope and there is no way of knowing what will happen next... ah but, you say, we know the ending, we do it every year... but we don't... we cannot know what tomorrow will bring and it may bring nothing at all... That's the point... as my Low Sunday service will remind us, so I have to refrain from posting my 'punch line' too soon... which is fine, because I am good at waiting, good at delayed gratification.

Yesterday, scaffolding was erected next door at around 3p.m., the time we traditionally have Jesus die - which felt so inappropriate it was utterly appropriate. Life goes on, people are busy with other things, the execution of a 'criminal', especially two thousand years ago, isn't newsworthy.

Today the sky is grey, rain is possible, and it's really cold. I have excused myself from the Churches Together event on the basis that this is my official rest day, and also because there seems to be no desire within it to embrace the ache, the emptiness, the questions, the unknowing... I would gladly have hosted a space to explore such feelings, which are the real lived experience of so many people, but it's not to be.  I do hope and pray that it's a good experience for all who take part, but it's not for me.

There is a well-known tale that a child, when asked what Jesus was doing on Holy Saturday, said that he was searching for his friend Judas.  Like so many, I have always had a soft spot for Judas, feeling he got a rough deal, and hoping that he, too, found redemption.  But that's what the 'harrowing of hell' is, isn't it?  Not that Jesus experienced something of what 'eternal conscious torment' is (Medieval twaddle) but that he overturned whatever hell might be, liberating all lost souls - including his dear friend Judas.

Part of today is spent on writing tomorrow's reflections - that's a necessity! - but I learned early in ministry that to write Sunday before Friday, and in ignorance of Saturday, for me at least, doesn't work.  There can be no resurrection without death, and no wonder without the waiting.

Many of my friends who work in colleges or translocal ministry comment on how they miss preparing for major festivals - and I get that.  It makes bi-vocational ministry extra work, as the peaks and troughs never align, but I am privileged and blessed to get to do these services.

So, I savour the greyness, the unknowing, and the life as usual, so that I, too, am open to the possibility of surprise...