Fourteenth Station — Jesus Is Laid in the Tomb

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. We adore You, O Christ, and we praise You, because by Your holy Cross You have redeemed the world. The Fourteenth Station. Jesus is laid in the tomb. They wrapped Your body in clean linen, with spices. They carried You to a new tomb that Joseph of Arimathea had cut from the rock. They placed You inside. They rolled a great stone across the entrance. They went home. For one Saturday in human history, the Son of God was dead in the ground. The disciples scattered. The hopes of three years of ministry seemed to have ended in catastrophe. The tomb was sealed. Roman soldiers stood guard. Lord, the Holy Saturday is also a station for me. The day of waiting. The day when the cross is over but the resurrection has not yet come. The day that feels like an ending. I have had Holy Saturdays in my life. Long ones. Seasons when I was burying dreams. Burying loves. Burying versions of myself. Sealing the tomb. Going home in defeat. You know what those days are like, Lord. Or rather, the people who loved You knew. Mary. John. Mary Magdalene. Peter, hiding in shame. They went to bed that Saturday night with the sealed tomb on their hearts. But the story did not end on Saturday. The third day was already coming. While the disciples slept in despair, the Father was preparing to roll back the stone. Lord, in my Holy Saturdays, in the seasons when the tomb is sealed and there is no sign of resurrection yet, hold me. Help me wait in faith. Help me trust that the third day is coming, even when the second day feels permanent. I think tonight of all who are in their Holy Saturday right now. The ones in deep grief. The ones in dark depression. The ones in the long slow loss of a loved one to dementia. The ones in chronic illness with no end in sight. The ones in the long unanswered prayer. Lord, sit with them in the tomb. Be the silent companion. Be the secret seed. The grain of wheat that fell into the earth and died, as You said in John twelve, that is about to bear much fruit. Tonight, in my own way, I close this Stations of the Cross with hope. The Cross was not the end. The tomb was not the end. The Resurrection is real. The empty tomb is the beginning of a story that has been bringing life to the world for two thousand years and is not finished yet. I leave this tomb. I walk back into my own life. I carry with me the weight of what I have prayed. The fourteen stations live inside me now. They will surface when I need them. The next time I fall. The next time I am stripped. The next time I die a small death and need resurrection. You are with me, Lord. From the tomb to the throne and everywhere in between. Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be Thy name. Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. Amen. Have mercy on us, O Lord. Have mercy on us. In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.