“There was a day we held our breath

And felt the sting of bitter death

When all our hopes were buried in the grave.”

As someone who has mourned the loss of dreams, of hopes, of my ideas of the future- and even of the present- these opening lines to the song Buried in the Grave by the band All Sons and Daughters ring very true for me. They ring so true that just listening to these few lines brings tears to my eyes every time I hear them. The very beginning of my mourning process would have to be the July day in 2005 when my boyfriend of a year and a half (now my husband) dove off of a bridge and broke his neck. Or in the days following his accident, when we were told by doctors that, despite what they had encouragingly told us prior to the surgery, Spencer would likely never walk again. Still, in that time, despite the radical changes taking place in our lives and all of the fear and pain we were experiencing, Spencer and I both felt very strongly that God was telling us this wasn’t the end of the journey, it was just the beginning. We both felt God tell us that He was going to heal Spencer-that Spencer would walk again! Because we had this hope to cling on to and were very much believing this healing would not only take place but would take place quickly, a lot of the sadness and the mourning  that people expected of us didn’t happen then. When I think back on those days, I really don’t remember being overly sad or worried about how different our lives would look one, five, ten years in the future. I was certain that if God was promising to us that Spencer would walk again that he would!

It has now been over eight and a half years since that tragic July day that changed our life, and let me tell you, since that time mourning has definitely taken place. I have cried out to God many, many times asking him to take away the pain, to change our circumstances, to resurrect buried hopes and dreams. Never in our wildest dreams, while Spencer was in the hospital or working through hours of physical therapy, did we consider that God’s timing was so far removed from what we expected. Never. God told us something, and we believed it, and of course out of longing and our human nature we imagined all the ways and times it could take place. But God, as we’ve been reminded time and time again, does not work how we expect or when. Although we see evidence of that truth countless times throughout the Bible, it’s still hard to come to terms with when it involves our own lives. But that shouldn’t change our trust in Him or our belief that He is faithful to do as He promises. That He is good always, that He does not make mistakes, and that He is still working in us and for our behalf. I mourn, yes, because life gets hard and it is confusing and it hurts at times, but that doesn’t mean that I don’t still trust that God is not done working in us!

I’ve been dwelling on these thoughts a lot lately, as this song Buried in the Grave is on my current favorite album and I’ve had it on repeat while I drive. The song itself is actually written about Easter, so I felt it fitting to write about it this week. The authors were inspired by the thought of that Saturday, between the Friday when Jesus was crucified and the Sunday when He rose again. What was that Saturday like for all those who had been following and trusting that Jesus was their Messiah and had come to reign? Jesus had asked them to leave their homes, their jobs, their families, to change their lives, their thinking, and follow Him and now He was dead. How much more bleak can a situation get? I can only imagine the disappointment and confusion that the disciples must have felt on that day. Even though they had Jesus’ words and promises, this wasn’t what they expected and they must have thought “What now? Were we mistaken in trusting Him?” They didn’t know that it would be the next day when Jesus rose from the dead. How bleak and discouraging that Saturday must have felt.

In an interview about the inspiration for the song the authors say that the message is about waiting, saying that “there are going to be seasons in our life where we feel we have answered the call of God…or something has happened and the call has changed the course, the direction, for us and we find ourselves sitting and waiting and we go ‘God, I know this is what you’ve called me to do but I don’t see you right now.’” We all, at one point or another will go through this time of waiting. It won’t be the same for everyone, obviously, but there will still come a time in your life when you trust God in something and find yourself questioning that trust due to time or circumstances or fear. Maybe your waiting is not for a healing miracle, and maybe it’s not a wait that lasts for over eight years (I mean, Jesus came back to life on the third day!), but it’s still a lesson in waiting. So what do we do when we are standing there, with our hopes and dreams buried in a grave, waiting on the Lord to act? The song’s chorus goes:

 “All we had, all we had

Was a promise like a thread

Holding us, keeping us

Oh from fraying at the edge

All we knew, all we knew

Was you said you’d come again

You’d rise up from the dead.”

So what do you do when all you are holding onto is a word, a promise? In the interview, the song writers continue with, “I think He just calls us to be faithful to wait and to remember His words. That He was going to (and did!) come again and that He will come again. The obedience is sometimes more, and the waiting is sometimes more important, than what it is He calls us to do. What we learn in the waiting is sometimes a greater message.” I know for me, when I start questioning my trust in Him, the best thing I can do is to dive into the Word of God and remind myself Who God is. God is loving, God is all powerful, He is faithful, He is conqueror, He is mighty, He is in control...the list goes on and on. I remind myself of His promises to me about Who He is and who I am to Him. About what He has done and what He will do. The same God who spared Spencer’s life in that river and throughout his recovery is the same God who raised His son from the dead, and He is the same God who can and will heal Spencer one day. He does not make mistakes, He does not go back on His word, and He is always faithful. Always. So in this time of waiting I chose to lean into Him and remember that just like the disciples on that dark Saturday before the resurrection, just because we don’t understand what is happening doesn’t mean we have been abandoned or that we should give up hope. If all we have to go off of is a word, a promise, we can still cling to that because we know the One who spoke it and we can trust that He is faithful to the end.

I know many friends and family who are waiting on the Lord, trusting in Him in various aspects of their lives, and I pray that this is at least some encouragement to you that you have not been forgotten, that you are not alone, and that amazing, miraculous things happen after the darkest, bleakest Saturdays of waiting. He rose up from the grave! Hallelujah! 

"It is won

It is done!"

Here is a YouTube link to this awesome song:

Here is a YouTube link to the interview with the songwriters:

 (Note: All quotes were taken directly from this video interview with Leslie Anne Jordan & David Alan Leonard, or quoted from the song lyrics.)