Yesterday we took a few moments to consider the humility of Good Friday’s cross and before long, we will turn our attention to anticipating the hope that is revealed by Resurrection Sunday’s Empty Tomb. But there is a hidden truth in the space between: Holy Saturday, the sycamore in the gap if you will.
Consider Northumberland, England, home of Hadrian’s wall where until recently, a lone sycamore tree stood tall within the slopes of two bold cliffs. This iconic feature was one of the most photographed trees in all the United Kingdom, and you can see why. Thousands of people would visit the site until recently when this beautiful tree was unceremoniously felled. This act of vandalism produced a remarkable outcry from local and national media. There was shock that this symbol of natural beauty, which had seemed to speak of life in unexpected places, had been torn down. I’ve been thinking about the sycamore in the gap ever since.
In a recent news article, it was reported that seedlings from the felled sycamore gap tree have sprouted and there is great hope that these seedlings will produce many more trees. Furthermore, the stump of the sycamore gap tree is reportedly healthy enough that it is likely to grow again to stand in the gap once more. What a remarkable example of the resilience of creation! Let me take a little ‘preacher’s license’ to show you how this image of the sycamore in the gap has been reminding me of the hidden truth in Holy Saturday, when Jesus lay dead in the tomb and his followers mourned their loss.
Good Friday showed us the incredible humility of the cross as Jesus lay down His own life for our sake. He died a sinner’s death, not a humane execution but a brutal crucifixion. The Perfect One was treated in the most inhuman way imaginable; the Holy One was trodden under the muddied feet of human evil. He was felled, as it were, not with the clean cut of a vandal’s saw, but by the ragged thorns, rough nails and rasping spears of Roman soldiers. He was brought low amid jeers and cheers from the crowds and religious leaders. Jesus Christ, like a sycamore in the gap, had come to bridge the gap in our own lives between God and man. But those He came to save were those who cut Him down and as the dust settled on Good Friday night, a lonely disciple took down the body from the tree and laid it in the tomb.
The morning of Holy Saturday brought mourning for those who loved Him. I’m sure they were numb with grief and shaken with sorrow. I’m sure they had a hundred questions. Why death? Why despair? Why delays? We know the end, but I’m sure that on that Saturday they felt these questions had no answers. For us who’ve seen the resurrection, we can tend to skip the questions, but I think there is a lesson for us as we lean into the quiet that Holy Saturday allows space for. Space to ask our own questions, perhaps: to ask those real questions that are often found in the gaps. The gap between prayer and answer. The gap between love and loss. The gap between now and not yet.
Holy Saturday allows us the space to remember that Jesus lay dead in the tomb. He was not in a rush. He was waiting in the gap. He was working in the unseen. There is a place to mourn, a time to grieve, and an opportunity to wait. That’s the invitation of Holy Saturday: to trust that there is life out of death.
It may be that a natural tree stump can return to life, or that a felled sycamore can produce seedlings that will survive. But the death of Christ is so much more than that. What kind of man could break the bonds of death, or live when all life has gone, or rise from such a descent? Only Jesus. As the words of Isaiah’s prophecy said, “a shoot will come up from the stump of Jesse; from his roots a Branch will bear fruit. The Spirit of the Lord will rest on him.”
The tree of life is indestructible. The One who was cut down has risen in glory. We will celebrate that this Jesus is risen from the dead! Because of that fact we really do have resurrection life now! We have redemption now! We taste heaven now! All because He is risen… yet, in this age there are still gaps we long to see closed, sicknesses we pray to see healed, losses we feel, and longings we sense. So, this Holy Saturday, let’s not ignore the invitation of the space between but let’s consider the ‘Sycamore in the Gap’. There are trees that sprout from the soil of suffering. There are hopes that rise out of the deepest hurts. There is life even when there seems to be only death.
“When you take Holy Saturday as a day of contemplation and quiet, you feel the silence and confusion and sheer weight of the period between crucifixion and resurrection, and notice the connections between that day and the rest of the Church age.”
Andrew Wilson
Up next… Resurrection Sunday: Hope Rekindled.
