Now in the place where he was crucified, there was a garden…
John 19:41
This line is one of very few written in the Gospels about Holy Saturday, the day Jesus was dead and buried in the tomb. To be fair, Holy Saturday doesn’t lend itself to the same kind of ritual rememberings by which we mark Good Friday or Easter Sunday. Not the crushing dark of death nor the burst of resurrection. It is filled with a slow kind of sorrow, like long shadows creeping through the night.
A few years ago, when I lived in Washington D.C., I frequented a Franciscan monastery on days I needed relief from the chaos of the city. One particular day in late fall, I came more despairing about the future than I had ever been up until that point in my life. Alone in the cavernous sanctuary, I knelt and pleaded with God to have mercy.
In the corner of the sanctuary sat a replica of the tomb of Jesus: an ornate crypt modeled after the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem. It had an opening so small pilgrims need to crawl on their hands and knees to make it through the little door. As I prayed, I felt invited by Jesus to join Him in the tomb, so I crawled inside. I laid a hand on the marble cushion that represented the place Christ’s body lay, and wept. He kept reminding me: I know this place. I have been here. I told the Lord that it felt like all the lights had gone out, begging Him not to leave me in the darkness.
When I climbed out and knelt again in the pews to pray, one of the monks serving as a custodian approached me. He bashfully explained the church was closing soon, but as he did, he handed me a prayer candle.
Knowing nothing about the Catholic tradition surrounding prayer candles (as a Protestant myself), I came out of the sanctuary into the dusk wondering: Lord, what am I supposed to do with this?! Am I doing something sacrilegious by taking it with me? Should I know what to do with this? It sure seemed like you sent that guy to give it to me, but…what for?
Then it struck me before He even had to say it: I asked for light. And the Lord handed me a candle.
Now in the place where he was crucified, there was a garden…
John 19:41
Of all the scriptures read on Good Friday this year, these words from John 19 were all I heard. They were Holy Saturday words, really. Tomb words:
Now in the place where he was crucified,
Tomb. And then:
there was a garden.
I could not hold back tears of relief.
Like a diver deep in the ocean cannot surface too quickly, God knows a soul drowning in the dark often cannot receive their hope back all at once. So as with His candle, He offered this word to me.
My Good Friday encounter with the garden reminded me of a song by Noah Gunderson. These lines have not left me since I first heard them:
But wait, oh wait:
See how the morning breaks?
It’s the simplest of love songs
But it’s all our hearts can take.
Though we lose our strength,
Heaven is where we make it.
Even in the smallest places
Can a garden grow.
In the place where He was crucified, there was a garden. And like Mary, we will never stop turning around in that garden to see Him in it, alive again.
In the light of Eastertide,
Grace
© 2026, Grace H Shaw