I must admit: These last few weeks, I’ve found myself a little out of place amongst the sermons and devotionals of the Easter season. Because it isn’t the sobering significance of Good Friday or even (Lord help me) the glory of Resurrection Sunday that most stirs my soul to praise the One who died for me to live.
It’s today. Saturday. The time in between.
Think about it. Everyone who had committed their lives to following Jesus—forsaking families and careers and reputations—had just watched their friend and master be brutally tortured and executed. Everything they’d sacrificed for, believed for, and fought for seemed over, wasted.
They gave up all hope.
Yet hope remained.
Because hope didn’t depend on the defeated disciples as they hid or on Joseph and Nicodemus as they prepared the body or on Mary as she went to mourn. It didn’t depend on the prophecies of Isaiah or the psalms of David. It didn’t depend on any human works or feelings.
Hope remained because God remained.
Jesus knew what His friends did not as they wept in the blood-soaked dirt: that the hope we have in Him is eternal, regardless of how we feel or what our circumstances look like. That just because things seem hopeless doesn’t mean there is no hope to have.
There must be a crucifixion for there to be a resurrection, a sunset before a sunrise. But in the hours and space between despair and victory lies hope. For while our weeping may last the night, our God remains steadfast, our light in dark places, assuring us that joy comes in the morning.
That is what fills me to the brim and overflows into praise and worship at Easter. This Easter, in particular.
You see, I’m in the in-between right now, too.
It is both with great sadness and great joy that I must tell you I am stepping down as the Managing Editor of The Devoted Collective.
Sadness because I truly love and believe in this ministry. Because Aimée and Emily are dear friends who have been relentlessly gracious and sharpening. Because I love the Word. Because I am so proud of our community. Because God is moving there, and I don’t want to miss out.
Joy, though, because God is calling me to something wildly different from anything I’ve done before: to take my place as the heart of my house. Because it fulfils a word He gave me years ago. Because I feel the anointing as the mantle settles on me. Because I finally want to after a lifetime of scorning the role.
I have no idea what’s next. Practical steps are easy—Devoted is well-covered in my absence, and I’m fairly sure I know which end of a broom is up—but the rest? The authority and grace and wisdom and passion I need to become who God says I am? The discipline to commit all that I once poured into building His Kingdom out there and instead build it in here?
Well. I have hope.
And so do you.
As we make our way towards Easter and the celebration of Jesus’ ultimate triumph, let us not fear the in-between as a place of despair but instead treasure it as the place where true, eternal hope reigns.
Take heart, for Jesus has overcome the world! May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in Him—so that you may in turn overflow with hope, whatever your circumstances seem to be.
This essay originally appeared as the April 2022 edition of The Devoted Collective Newsletter. Sign up for monthly email updates on all God is doing in the Devoted community, plus reflective essays and reading recommendations.