Rich Dixon has good words for some of us today.

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“But we had hoped that He was the one…”

If I’m honest, I live a lot of my life on Saturday.

Not the fun-and-games teenage Saturday. Not the every day is Saturday – or Thursday – of the pandemic, when days of the week don’t seem to matter.

As a guy who struggles with chronic depression, I know all too well how it felt on the Saturday between Good Friday and Easter. I live a lot of my life on the day when hope was lost.

I understand those who are ready to move on. We’ve done Lent, Good Friday, and Easter. We’ve shouted “He is risen!” Easter baskets, chocolate bunnies, and jelly beans. Ham for dinner.

Now it’s supposed to be time for Jesus to prepare breakfast for us or point us toward a lifelong mission of service and sacrifice. It’s time for the road to Emmaus and conversations about what’s next.

He is risen, indeed! And this is the week we move forward with joy and certainty, because we carry the best Good News of all time.

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This may not be for you, and I get that, but this is also the week more than half a million of our friends have an empty spot at the table because of a virus. And my friend has his cancer treatment at an infusion center with other folks in varying degrees of pain.

And my depression, like an ever-present fog, will still linger around the edges trying to dampen that sense of Easter excitement.

The point isn’t to diminish the Good News. The point is that God didn’t stop caring on Saturday. When He was silent and all hope seemed lost, God was at work behind the scenes. Something remarkable was about to happen.

Saturday folks like me cling desperately to hope.

We believe Sunday’s coming.

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A collection of prayers and reflections from the last year is now available as God. We Still Need You.