You can listen to this reflection here. The gospel reading for Easter Friday is here.
This Easter week we are exploring the Gospel appointed for each day. Today, we’re in a fishing boat with Peter and six other of Jesus’ disciples, two unnamed. (John takes care to mention the exact number of fish caught in the nets – someone counted them? – but can’t be bothered to find out the names of two of the crew?). These disciples must have fled Jerusalem for safer home turf in Galilee, and Peter figures he may as well do what he knows, now that everything he thought he learned since leaving his fishing boat has been turned upside-down.
As happened when Jesus first called him away from his nets (Luke 5:1-11), Peter and the crew fish all night and catch nothing. In the morning they’re ready to call it a day, but someone on the shore suggests they throw their nets over to the right. Though that’s pretty much what Jesus had done three years earlier, they don’t recognize the guy as Jesus – not until their nets become so full they’re ready to burst. Then they know who he is, though perhaps he looks different. (“Now none of the disciples dared to ask him, ‘Who are you?’ because they knew it was the Lord.”) Peter, who I guess has been fishing in the buff? throws on some clothes to jump into the water and get to Jesus as fast as he can. That’s love – when you can’t wait to reach the other.
Then Jesus utters my favorite words in the whole Bible: “Come and have breakfast.” He’s got a fire going and some bread, and he invites them to add fish from their catch – his catch, which he has allowed to become their catch; that’s how God’s abundance works in our lives. He blesses the bread and the fish – and thankfully does not say, “Do this in remembrance of me,” or our Sunday mornings would be a lot smellier. He shows them that feasting is a sign of God’s kingdom, and that no goodbye is really final in that realm.
Where has Jesus provided you with a feast lately? Where are you seeing abundance in a time of turmoil and scarcity? Here is the verse of “Was That You?” that goes with this story.” (Iphone recording of the song here, with thanks to Denise Bassett for piano and harmony.) Guess you’ll have to come back for a special Saturday Water Daily for the verse about Jesus’ latest appearance…
A bunch of us were fishing, just out doing what we knew.
The blues are all we’re catching, but what else we gonna do?
At dawn some guy calls from the shore, “Over there, you’ll find some fish.”
As nets start bursting from the haul, we meet our deeper wish:
Was that you, with abundance when I never see enough?
Was that you, showing what strength is, when all I know is being tough?
Was that you forgiving more than I could ever understand?
Don’t know why it always takes a while for me to open up my eyes and see:
That was you, watching out for me.
© Kate Heichler, 2026. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for Friday in Easter Week. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
4-9-26 - At the Table
You can listen to this reflection here. The gospel reading appointed for Easter Thursday is here.
This Easter week we are exploring the Gospel appointed for each day. Today's reading continues on from the Road to Emmaus story we heard yesterday. We are back in that upper room with Jesus’s disciples, grieving unimaginable loss (“How could he have died?), processing unimaginable news (“He is risen?” “Some of the women saw him?” “Was it just a vision?”), enduring unimaginable terror (“They’re coming for us next…”). Into that swirl of emotions, Jesus appears. He doesn’t come in through a door or a window – he is just there, speaking peace, showing his wounds, explaining God’s Word and naming them witnesses of what God has done and is doing.
And, to quell their fears that they are seeing his ghost, in Luke’s version of the scene (we had John’s on Monday), Jesus invites them to touch the healed wounds in his hands and feet. “Touch me and see; for a ghost does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have." He asks for something to eat; they give him broiled fish. Not much of a meal for someone who’s returned from the grave, but they get the point.
Luke makes a wonderful statement: “While in their joy they were disbelieving and still wondering…” The joy the risen Christ brings is our gift in the midst of disbelieving and wondering and grieving, not only after. We are invited to be people of joy in all circumstances, and especially this Eastertide. The dislocations caused by the world’s turmoil and tumults may not rise to the level of what Jesus’ followers were going through, but they do help us have insight into their situation. We too are having to process intense and competing emotions, too much information – and too little – and to cope with communal trauma if not personal. No wonder so many of us are more tired than we think we should be. (I found this piece on living with trauma very helpful on that subject.)
Jesus’ first followers didn’t know it was “Easter” either. It was just a Sunday, and they knew he had died, and learned he was risen, and was being seen. And there he was. If we can let go of our expectations of what “Easter” is or should be, and remain present to where Jesus is around us, we might find ourselves filled with joy while disbelieving and wondering.
Here’s another verse from my song “Was That You.” (Modest iphone recording of it here.) This verse didn’t make the cut in what is already too long a song, but it’s the one that goes with this resurrection appearance:
All of us were gathered, shut inside that room;
Doors were locked, windows blocked, it felt just like a tomb;
Then there he was among us, and he showed his feet and hands.
He said, “Be not afraid, my friends, I’ll help you understand.”
Was that you speaking peace to me when all I knew was fear?
Was that you, breathing your Spirit so we’d always have you near?
Was that you blessing me more than I could ever understand?
Don’t know why it always takes a while for me to open up my eyes and see:
That was you, right there next to me.
© Kate Heichler, 2026. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for Thursday in Easter Week. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
This Easter week we are exploring the Gospel appointed for each day. Today's reading continues on from the Road to Emmaus story we heard yesterday. We are back in that upper room with Jesus’s disciples, grieving unimaginable loss (“How could he have died?), processing unimaginable news (“He is risen?” “Some of the women saw him?” “Was it just a vision?”), enduring unimaginable terror (“They’re coming for us next…”). Into that swirl of emotions, Jesus appears. He doesn’t come in through a door or a window – he is just there, speaking peace, showing his wounds, explaining God’s Word and naming them witnesses of what God has done and is doing.
And, to quell their fears that they are seeing his ghost, in Luke’s version of the scene (we had John’s on Monday), Jesus invites them to touch the healed wounds in his hands and feet. “Touch me and see; for a ghost does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have." He asks for something to eat; they give him broiled fish. Not much of a meal for someone who’s returned from the grave, but they get the point.
Luke makes a wonderful statement: “While in their joy they were disbelieving and still wondering…” The joy the risen Christ brings is our gift in the midst of disbelieving and wondering and grieving, not only after. We are invited to be people of joy in all circumstances, and especially this Eastertide. The dislocations caused by the world’s turmoil and tumults may not rise to the level of what Jesus’ followers were going through, but they do help us have insight into their situation. We too are having to process intense and competing emotions, too much information – and too little – and to cope with communal trauma if not personal. No wonder so many of us are more tired than we think we should be. (I found this piece on living with trauma very helpful on that subject.)
Jesus’ first followers didn’t know it was “Easter” either. It was just a Sunday, and they knew he had died, and learned he was risen, and was being seen. And there he was. If we can let go of our expectations of what “Easter” is or should be, and remain present to where Jesus is around us, we might find ourselves filled with joy while disbelieving and wondering.
Here’s another verse from my song “Was That You.” (Modest iphone recording of it here.) This verse didn’t make the cut in what is already too long a song, but it’s the one that goes with this resurrection appearance:
All of us were gathered, shut inside that room;
Doors were locked, windows blocked, it felt just like a tomb;
Then there he was among us, and he showed his feet and hands.
He said, “Be not afraid, my friends, I’ll help you understand.”
Was that you speaking peace to me when all I knew was fear?
Was that you, breathing your Spirit so we’d always have you near?
Was that you blessing me more than I could ever understand?
Don’t know why it always takes a while for me to open up my eyes and see:
That was you, right there next to me.
© Kate Heichler, 2026. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for Thursday in Easter Week. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
4-8-26 - On the Road
You can listen to this reflection here. The gospel reading for Easter Wednesday is here.
This Easter week we are exploring the Gospel appointed for each day. Today, we hit the road to Emmaus with two of Jesus’ followers. We don’t know why they are going to this village seven miles from Jerusalem, but we are told their conversation is all about the events of the weekend, Jesus’ awful crucifixion and burial, and then the astonishing reports from the women who found his tomb empty and angels announcing that he had risen. How could this be?
Then something more confounding occurs: they are joined by a stranger who asks what they are talking about. Has this guy been under a rock? Is there anything else they could be discussing at this time? They fill him in, and he surprises them further by interpreting all these events in light of their scriptures and what the prophets had foretold about the Messiah. “Was it not necessary that the Messiah should suffer these things and then enter into his glory?” he asks.
It had not occurred to them to see the events of the past few days in terms of God’s deliverance… it just looked like God’s failure. But still they do not recognize their companion as Jesus. It is not until they sit down to supper with him, and he takes bread, blesses and breaks it, and gives it to them that their eyes are opened – and as soon as they realize who they are with, he vanishes. It is that familiar gesture, which he had done just three days earlier at the Passover feast, that reveals Jesus to them, just as his saying Mary’s name had revealed him to her.
We don’t have the advantage of lived experience with Jesus to draw upon – how do we know when he is with us? Sometimes we have an experience of our “hearts burning within us,” as these men had on the road when Jesus explained the scriptures to them. That happens to me more often in prayer or song than in bible study, but all of these are forms of worship. Sometimes we realize we’re in Jesus’ company in an intimate encounter with a friend who sees and knows and loves us. We might become aware of his presence as we serve another. And churchgoers have experience of seeing the bread taken, blessed, broken and given – we too can recognize Jesus in that action.
Could it be that Jesus is always on the road with us, always willing to illuminate scripture for us, always ready to sit at table with us? Maybe we just need to open the eyes of our hearts and name him – invoking his name is always an invitation to him to be right here.
The second verse of my song, “Was That You?" goes like this (you can listen to it here):
Met a stranger last night, just outside of town
He didn’t seem to understand why we were so cast down.
But he sure did know where God had been, and he stayed with us to eat;
When he broke the bread and blessed it, the picture came complete:
Was that you coming close when I didn’t have a friend?
Was that you giving me hope when I was facing a dead end?
Was that you blessing me more than I could ever understand?
Don’t know why it always takes a while for me to open up my eyes and see:
That was you, walking next to me.
© Kate Heichler, 2026. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for Wednesday in Easter Week. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
This Easter week we are exploring the Gospel appointed for each day. Today, we hit the road to Emmaus with two of Jesus’ followers. We don’t know why they are going to this village seven miles from Jerusalem, but we are told their conversation is all about the events of the weekend, Jesus’ awful crucifixion and burial, and then the astonishing reports from the women who found his tomb empty and angels announcing that he had risen. How could this be?
Then something more confounding occurs: they are joined by a stranger who asks what they are talking about. Has this guy been under a rock? Is there anything else they could be discussing at this time? They fill him in, and he surprises them further by interpreting all these events in light of their scriptures and what the prophets had foretold about the Messiah. “Was it not necessary that the Messiah should suffer these things and then enter into his glory?” he asks.
It had not occurred to them to see the events of the past few days in terms of God’s deliverance… it just looked like God’s failure. But still they do not recognize their companion as Jesus. It is not until they sit down to supper with him, and he takes bread, blesses and breaks it, and gives it to them that their eyes are opened – and as soon as they realize who they are with, he vanishes. It is that familiar gesture, which he had done just three days earlier at the Passover feast, that reveals Jesus to them, just as his saying Mary’s name had revealed him to her.
We don’t have the advantage of lived experience with Jesus to draw upon – how do we know when he is with us? Sometimes we have an experience of our “hearts burning within us,” as these men had on the road when Jesus explained the scriptures to them. That happens to me more often in prayer or song than in bible study, but all of these are forms of worship. Sometimes we realize we’re in Jesus’ company in an intimate encounter with a friend who sees and knows and loves us. We might become aware of his presence as we serve another. And churchgoers have experience of seeing the bread taken, blessed, broken and given – we too can recognize Jesus in that action.
Could it be that Jesus is always on the road with us, always willing to illuminate scripture for us, always ready to sit at table with us? Maybe we just need to open the eyes of our hearts and name him – invoking his name is always an invitation to him to be right here.
The second verse of my song, “Was That You?" goes like this (you can listen to it here):
Met a stranger last night, just outside of town
He didn’t seem to understand why we were so cast down.
But he sure did know where God had been, and he stayed with us to eat;
When he broke the bread and blessed it, the picture came complete:
Was that you coming close when I didn’t have a friend?
Was that you giving me hope when I was facing a dead end?
Was that you blessing me more than I could ever understand?
Don’t know why it always takes a while for me to open up my eyes and see:
That was you, walking next to me.
© Kate Heichler, 2026. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for Wednesday in Easter Week. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
4-7-26 - In the Garden
You can listen to this reflection here. The gospel reading for Easter Tuesday is here.
This Easter week we will explore the Gospel appointed for each day. Today, we go to back to Sunday morning in that garden with Mary, distraught and bereft at reports that Jesus’ body has been taken from the tomb in which she saw him laid on Friday. …She turned round and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not know that it was Jesus. Jesus said to her, ‘Woman, why are you weeping? For whom are you looking?’ Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him, ‘Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away.’
We tend to see what we expect to see. Blind is blind. Over is over. Dead is dead. And a man in a garden is likely to be a gardener, right? The man in this garden was solicitous, asking Mary why she wept. In reply, she speaks her urgent need to locate Jesus’ body, which she assumes to have been stolen. Answering the angels a few moments earlier, she articulated her deeper pain in these poignant words, “They have taken away my Lord, and I don’t know where they have laid him.” Someone she loved deeply, and depended on, and centered her life around has been taken from her, and she does not know how she will endure a loss of that magnitude.
That is a feeling most of us have experienced, or will, in our lifetime. Facing loss is inevitable when we love; I remember where I was sitting the moment that little insight hit me. But something happened for Mary, in this moment where she made herself vulnerable to a stranger, crying out her pain. Jesus revealed himself, though she had not at first recognized him. Once he spoke her name, she knew without any doubt that it was him, that he was alive. She wanted to touch him, and he said no. Is it possible that this resurrection body which could pass through walls could not be embraced? That is mystery, as is all of this. But he had instructions for her: “Go and tell my brothers.”
Could it be that Jesus is with us in our moments of deepest loss and despair, and we don’t know it? We can, in prayer, bring to mind some of those times and ask Jesus to show us where he was, even if we couldn’t see him or recognize him. It is a way of praying healing into those wounds.
Some years ago, I wrote a song exploring several of the encounters people had with the resurrected Jesus, in many of which they did not recognize him until he did or said something familiar. (You can listen to it here – not a great recording, but it’s all I have - with thanks to Denise Bassett for piano and harmonies. The first verse is about Mary; I will share other verses through this week. The last is about us).
Ran into a gardener, my eyes were blind with tears
Pretty hard to see straight when you’re living your worst fears.
The one I loved the most, gone without a trace -
Then he said my name, I knew that voice… my heart began to race:
Was that you standing next to me when all my hopes were done?
Was that you, alive and breathing, when it looked like death had won?
Was that you loving me more than I could ever understand?
Don’t know why it always takes a while for me to open up my eyes and see:
That was you, standing next to me.
© Kate Heichler, 2026. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for Tuesday in Easter week. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
This Easter week we will explore the Gospel appointed for each day. Today, we go to back to Sunday morning in that garden with Mary, distraught and bereft at reports that Jesus’ body has been taken from the tomb in which she saw him laid on Friday. …She turned round and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not know that it was Jesus. Jesus said to her, ‘Woman, why are you weeping? For whom are you looking?’ Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him, ‘Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away.’
We tend to see what we expect to see. Blind is blind. Over is over. Dead is dead. And a man in a garden is likely to be a gardener, right? The man in this garden was solicitous, asking Mary why she wept. In reply, she speaks her urgent need to locate Jesus’ body, which she assumes to have been stolen. Answering the angels a few moments earlier, she articulated her deeper pain in these poignant words, “They have taken away my Lord, and I don’t know where they have laid him.” Someone she loved deeply, and depended on, and centered her life around has been taken from her, and she does not know how she will endure a loss of that magnitude.
That is a feeling most of us have experienced, or will, in our lifetime. Facing loss is inevitable when we love; I remember where I was sitting the moment that little insight hit me. But something happened for Mary, in this moment where she made herself vulnerable to a stranger, crying out her pain. Jesus revealed himself, though she had not at first recognized him. Once he spoke her name, she knew without any doubt that it was him, that he was alive. She wanted to touch him, and he said no. Is it possible that this resurrection body which could pass through walls could not be embraced? That is mystery, as is all of this. But he had instructions for her: “Go and tell my brothers.”
Could it be that Jesus is with us in our moments of deepest loss and despair, and we don’t know it? We can, in prayer, bring to mind some of those times and ask Jesus to show us where he was, even if we couldn’t see him or recognize him. It is a way of praying healing into those wounds.
Some years ago, I wrote a song exploring several of the encounters people had with the resurrected Jesus, in many of which they did not recognize him until he did or said something familiar. (You can listen to it here – not a great recording, but it’s all I have - with thanks to Denise Bassett for piano and harmonies. The first verse is about Mary; I will share other verses through this week. The last is about us).
Ran into a gardener, my eyes were blind with tears
Pretty hard to see straight when you’re living your worst fears.
The one I loved the most, gone without a trace -
Then he said my name, I knew that voice… my heart began to race:
Was that you standing next to me when all my hopes were done?
Was that you, alive and breathing, when it looked like death had won?
Was that you loving me more than I could ever understand?
Don’t know why it always takes a while for me to open up my eyes and see:
That was you, standing next to me.
© Kate Heichler, 2026. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for Tuesday in Easter week. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
4-6-26 - Peace Be With You
You can listen to this reflection here. Sunday's gospel reading is here.
Our Sunday lectionary doesn't let us linger on Easter morning; by next Sunday we’ve jumped to the evening. So today we will look at next week's Gospel, and the rest of the week explore the Gospel appointed for each day in Easter Week, various encounters Jesus’ followers had with his resurrected self.
By the time we meet Jesus’ disciples huddled in that upper room Easter night, they’ve had a very long, strange, dislocating day. It began before daybreak, when some women hurried to the tomb to do for Jesus’ body what Sabbath laws forbade them to do on Friday; a day that went from sad to joyful and bizarre as they were met at that now-empty tomb by an angel (or two) announcing that Jesus was risen. And then, there he was, right there on the road in front of the women, saying, “Tell my brothers to meet me in Galilee,” a travel bulletin which has always struck me as a bit prosaic from someone who’s just been to Death and back…
Yet Jesus’ disciples have not gone to Galilee but are holed up in that room – perhaps the one where they’d celebrated the Passover a few nights earlier, a lifetime ago: When it was evening on that day, the first day of the week, and the doors of the house where the disciples had met were locked for fear of the Jewish leaders, Jesus came and stood among them and said, ‘Peace be with you.’ After he said this, he showed them his hands and his side. Then the disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord.
“Peace be with you.” I can imagine many emotions those men and women probably experienced that day, and none of them involve peace. Here they are, trying to process the cosmic developments they’ve witnessed, while hiding in a locked room because the threat to their lives has just intensified. And here is Jesus, just suddenly there, despite the doors shut and locked? “Peace be with you?”
But Jesus doesn’t only say, “Peace.” He can impart peace. This is the man whom they saw still a violent storm, and calm a violent man. This is the friend they watched endure ridicule and torture and betrayal and a horrible death. When Jesus says, “Peace,” he has the power to generate it. It worked on them – soon they are rejoicing.
And then he breathes upon them, imparting the Holy Spirit and authorizing them to release or to retain sins, to bind or to set free. Jesus’ mission was to set humanity free. Now he sends us to participate in that mission, and he breathes upon us his Holy Spirit. Take a deep breath in…. hold it, let it expand in you…. Feel the life of God fill you. And then exhale, breathing God’s forgiving love out upon someone (maybe yourself..). Then do it again.
Jesus invites us to rejoice too, even in the pain and disruption of global crises. Jesus is still risen! He still speaks peace to us, and as we let his presence live in us, we can feel that peace spreading through our minds and bodies and spirits. This is one way we know we have received God’s Spirit. This is one way Easter becomes real for us.
© Kate Heichler, 2026. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
Our Sunday lectionary doesn't let us linger on Easter morning; by next Sunday we’ve jumped to the evening. So today we will look at next week's Gospel, and the rest of the week explore the Gospel appointed for each day in Easter Week, various encounters Jesus’ followers had with his resurrected self.
By the time we meet Jesus’ disciples huddled in that upper room Easter night, they’ve had a very long, strange, dislocating day. It began before daybreak, when some women hurried to the tomb to do for Jesus’ body what Sabbath laws forbade them to do on Friday; a day that went from sad to joyful and bizarre as they were met at that now-empty tomb by an angel (or two) announcing that Jesus was risen. And then, there he was, right there on the road in front of the women, saying, “Tell my brothers to meet me in Galilee,” a travel bulletin which has always struck me as a bit prosaic from someone who’s just been to Death and back…
Yet Jesus’ disciples have not gone to Galilee but are holed up in that room – perhaps the one where they’d celebrated the Passover a few nights earlier, a lifetime ago: When it was evening on that day, the first day of the week, and the doors of the house where the disciples had met were locked for fear of the Jewish leaders, Jesus came and stood among them and said, ‘Peace be with you.’ After he said this, he showed them his hands and his side. Then the disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord.
“Peace be with you.” I can imagine many emotions those men and women probably experienced that day, and none of them involve peace. Here they are, trying to process the cosmic developments they’ve witnessed, while hiding in a locked room because the threat to their lives has just intensified. And here is Jesus, just suddenly there, despite the doors shut and locked? “Peace be with you?”
But Jesus doesn’t only say, “Peace.” He can impart peace. This is the man whom they saw still a violent storm, and calm a violent man. This is the friend they watched endure ridicule and torture and betrayal and a horrible death. When Jesus says, “Peace,” he has the power to generate it. It worked on them – soon they are rejoicing.
And then he breathes upon them, imparting the Holy Spirit and authorizing them to release or to retain sins, to bind or to set free. Jesus’ mission was to set humanity free. Now he sends us to participate in that mission, and he breathes upon us his Holy Spirit. Take a deep breath in…. hold it, let it expand in you…. Feel the life of God fill you. And then exhale, breathing God’s forgiving love out upon someone (maybe yourself..). Then do it again.
Jesus invites us to rejoice too, even in the pain and disruption of global crises. Jesus is still risen! He still speaks peace to us, and as we let his presence live in us, we can feel that peace spreading through our minds and bodies and spirits. This is one way we know we have received God’s Spirit. This is one way Easter becomes real for us.
© Kate Heichler, 2026. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for next Sunday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
4-4-26 - Holy Saturday: The Other Mary
You can listen to this reflection here. Today's gospel reading is here.
Each day this week we have heard from one of the main characters in the gospel reading appointed for the day, as I imagine they might speak. I hope this will help engage your own imagination as you walk this story with Jesus.
The Other Mary: That’s what I’m called in these accounts of Jesus’ death – “The Other Mary.” Like these gospel writers couldn’t bother to get my full name or where I’m from. I’m not Mary, Jesus’ mother; nor Mary of Bethany nor Mary of Magdala. I am Mary, mother of James. And I was there.
I watched them murder him. I watched his mother’s agony, watching him suffocating in agony. I heard the scoffers and the mockers. I saw them take his body down. I helped wrap him in a clean cloth and went along to the tomb that Joseph so generously offered for our use. There was no time to prepare his body – the sabbath was about to begin, and this is the Passover sabbath. We had to put his body somewhere safe until this sabbath is over. We will be there at dawn on Sunday with our spices and ointments to anoint him for a proper burial.
But now we must wait. Doing nothing. This is the worst sabbath I have ever endured. I love my sabbaths – the God-commanded day of rest when I can put down my cooking and cleaning and mending and tending. My only chores are feeding my family and our animals; the rest of the time I can nap, or read, or walk slowly enough to notice the new growth on the fields and trees, appreciate the birds and creatures around me. God’s greatest gift, this sabbath day each week.
But not this day, not this week. To bear this weight of pain and loss, with no tasks to distract us? To have nothing to do BUT think and talk and remember how our Lord we loved so much, who gave us so much, was tortured to death for no reason but to protect the pride and arrogance of insecure men? To have nothing to hold back the waves of feelings that threaten to drown us – terror, rage, confusion, and sorrow, sorrow so deep I don’t think we’ll ever get to the end of it. What have they done? How will we live?
So I will sit, and feel what I don’t want to feel. I will rest, like God rested on the seventh day. Was he gathering up his energy to create even more new life?
What would new life even look like, now?
Will you spend this day in Sabbath time – resting, walking, praying, not doing anything productive? That is one of the best ways to honor Jesus and prepare to celebrate the joy of Easter Day…
You are welcome to join our Great Vigil of Easter service online tonight at 8 pm; find the link here.
© Kate Heichler, 2026. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for Holy Saturday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
The Other Mary: That’s what I’m called in these accounts of Jesus’ death – “The Other Mary.” Like these gospel writers couldn’t bother to get my full name or where I’m from. I’m not Mary, Jesus’ mother; nor Mary of Bethany nor Mary of Magdala. I am Mary, mother of James. And I was there.
I watched them murder him. I watched his mother’s agony, watching him suffocating in agony. I heard the scoffers and the mockers. I saw them take his body down. I helped wrap him in a clean cloth and went along to the tomb that Joseph so generously offered for our use. There was no time to prepare his body – the sabbath was about to begin, and this is the Passover sabbath. We had to put his body somewhere safe until this sabbath is over. We will be there at dawn on Sunday with our spices and ointments to anoint him for a proper burial.
But now we must wait. Doing nothing. This is the worst sabbath I have ever endured. I love my sabbaths – the God-commanded day of rest when I can put down my cooking and cleaning and mending and tending. My only chores are feeding my family and our animals; the rest of the time I can nap, or read, or walk slowly enough to notice the new growth on the fields and trees, appreciate the birds and creatures around me. God’s greatest gift, this sabbath day each week.
But not this day, not this week. To bear this weight of pain and loss, with no tasks to distract us? To have nothing to do BUT think and talk and remember how our Lord we loved so much, who gave us so much, was tortured to death for no reason but to protect the pride and arrogance of insecure men? To have nothing to hold back the waves of feelings that threaten to drown us – terror, rage, confusion, and sorrow, sorrow so deep I don’t think we’ll ever get to the end of it. What have they done? How will we live?
So I will sit, and feel what I don’t want to feel. I will rest, like God rested on the seventh day. Was he gathering up his energy to create even more new life?
What would new life even look like, now?
Will you spend this day in Sabbath time – resting, walking, praying, not doing anything productive? That is one of the best ways to honor Jesus and prepare to celebrate the joy of Easter Day…
You are welcome to join our Great Vigil of Easter service online tonight at 8 pm; find the link here.
© Kate Heichler, 2026. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for Holy Saturday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
4-3-26 - Good Friday: Mary of Nazareth
You can listen to this reflection here. Today's gospel reading is here.
Each day this week we hear from one of the main characters in the gospel reading appointed for the day, as I imagine they might speak. I hope this will help engage your own imagination as you walk this story with Jesus.
Mary of Nazareth: They keep offering to take me away, my sister, the two Marys. They keep trying to take me home, to get me away from here, from watching him… But I can’t go. I must feel some need to finish this. He said a moment ago… “It is finished.” Or, that’s what they said he said. I couldn’t hear him. His voice was so faint…
But still I can’t leave. Not yet. It wasn’t like I could ever forget that there would be an end like this. I just didn’t ever know how or when it would be. I always knew that he was a gift with strings attached. From the beginning, what that angel, or whatever he was, said to me, “He will be great, and will be called the son of the Most High… his kingdom will never end.” And the whole way he just suddenly... was there, in me… And his birth, those crazed shepherds running, finding us, yelling about choirs of angels on the hills…
I always knew he was no ordinary child; I always knew he was never mine to keep. But this – this was not a day I ever imagined, to see my own first son, flesh of my flesh, there…naked, pinned… suffocating… In agony. And yet I can’t leave.
A little while ago he spoke again. Oh God, he barely had the strength to lift his voice. He was looking at me, he wanted me. And there was nothing I could do for him! They took me by the arm, Joanna and Mary, they led me closer. I felt I could have touched him – could have reached out and touched his feet, those feet that were once so small they fit into my hand, those toes I used to tickle, and he would laugh and laugh like an angel… And there they were, and a spike… Oh God, what have you done?
He looked at John, his faithful friend. He looked at me. “Woman, behold your son,” he said. “No, you are my son!” I wanted to cry out. “Take him down!”
Then he said to John, “Here is your mother.” I thought my heart would stop. To be given away, even for my own care? Like the time he wouldn’t see us, his brothers and me. He said those who followed him, his disciples, those were his mothers and his brothers now. And I tried to understand… he was never mine to keep.
But what was it all for? The crowds, the miracles, the healings? All those amazing stories that he told, about forgiveness and the Kingdom of God? Where is all that now? That’s what I want to know. Maybe that’s why I can’t look away – I’ve been waiting to see what he does now! God, where are you now? Your moment to intervene just passed, it seems. Are you going to finish what you started?
A soldier spoke a moment ago, a Roman. He said, “I am sure this man was the Son of God.” That’s what that angel said, so long ago, the words are seared into my memory: “The Holy One to be born will be called the Son of God.” So how did this Roman know? Did God tell him too? Maybe it is all true! I believed once and said yes; can I believe again? Maybe God hasn’t finished? Maybe the story isn’t over…
Ah, now John wants to usher me away, already taking up his duties. I am staying till they take him down. They have promised to take care of the body, these women, these Marys, his friends, my friends. And some important men – Joseph, who gave us the tomb; Nicodemus, another one of the Sanhedrin. They brought the ointments and cloths – 75 pounds of myrrh and aloes, Mary said.
I will help. We can't anoint his body with oil until after the Sabbath, but I will touch his bruised skin one more time, look at his face, now just an empty space, before they put him away in that tomb in the garden. Then I will go home.
What has been your greatest loss?
Have you let God into that heartache? Let God fill that space with something that brings life? We can't rush it - but in time, our greatest pain will be overshadowed by the Life of God that cannot be quenched, even in death...
Wait for it. Wait with Mary.
© Kate Heichler, 2026. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for Good Friday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
Mary of Nazareth: They keep offering to take me away, my sister, the two Marys. They keep trying to take me home, to get me away from here, from watching him… But I can’t go. I must feel some need to finish this. He said a moment ago… “It is finished.” Or, that’s what they said he said. I couldn’t hear him. His voice was so faint…
But still I can’t leave. Not yet. It wasn’t like I could ever forget that there would be an end like this. I just didn’t ever know how or when it would be. I always knew that he was a gift with strings attached. From the beginning, what that angel, or whatever he was, said to me, “He will be great, and will be called the son of the Most High… his kingdom will never end.” And the whole way he just suddenly... was there, in me… And his birth, those crazed shepherds running, finding us, yelling about choirs of angels on the hills…
I always knew he was no ordinary child; I always knew he was never mine to keep. But this – this was not a day I ever imagined, to see my own first son, flesh of my flesh, there…naked, pinned… suffocating… In agony. And yet I can’t leave.
A little while ago he spoke again. Oh God, he barely had the strength to lift his voice. He was looking at me, he wanted me. And there was nothing I could do for him! They took me by the arm, Joanna and Mary, they led me closer. I felt I could have touched him – could have reached out and touched his feet, those feet that were once so small they fit into my hand, those toes I used to tickle, and he would laugh and laugh like an angel… And there they were, and a spike… Oh God, what have you done?
He looked at John, his faithful friend. He looked at me. “Woman, behold your son,” he said. “No, you are my son!” I wanted to cry out. “Take him down!”
Then he said to John, “Here is your mother.” I thought my heart would stop. To be given away, even for my own care? Like the time he wouldn’t see us, his brothers and me. He said those who followed him, his disciples, those were his mothers and his brothers now. And I tried to understand… he was never mine to keep.
But what was it all for? The crowds, the miracles, the healings? All those amazing stories that he told, about forgiveness and the Kingdom of God? Where is all that now? That’s what I want to know. Maybe that’s why I can’t look away – I’ve been waiting to see what he does now! God, where are you now? Your moment to intervene just passed, it seems. Are you going to finish what you started?
A soldier spoke a moment ago, a Roman. He said, “I am sure this man was the Son of God.” That’s what that angel said, so long ago, the words are seared into my memory: “The Holy One to be born will be called the Son of God.” So how did this Roman know? Did God tell him too? Maybe it is all true! I believed once and said yes; can I believe again? Maybe God hasn’t finished? Maybe the story isn’t over…
Ah, now John wants to usher me away, already taking up his duties. I am staying till they take him down. They have promised to take care of the body, these women, these Marys, his friends, my friends. And some important men – Joseph, who gave us the tomb; Nicodemus, another one of the Sanhedrin. They brought the ointments and cloths – 75 pounds of myrrh and aloes, Mary said.
I will help. We can't anoint his body with oil until after the Sabbath, but I will touch his bruised skin one more time, look at his face, now just an empty space, before they put him away in that tomb in the garden. Then I will go home.
What has been your greatest loss?
Have you let God into that heartache? Let God fill that space with something that brings life? We can't rush it - but in time, our greatest pain will be overshadowed by the Life of God that cannot be quenched, even in death...
Wait for it. Wait with Mary.
© Kate Heichler, 2026. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for Good Friday. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
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