THE EMPTY CHAIR

The “Empty Chair” speaks different things to different people. To someone, it was simply a broken piece of furniture—discarded, unwanted, left beside the road for another to pick up and carry to the heap. To another, the empty chair is painful. It marks the place where someone used to sit. A voice once came from there. Laughter once filled that space. A hand once rested on its arm. But now the chair is empty, and its emptiness speaks of someone deeply loved who is no longer there.

To someone else, the chair speaks of the one who walked away. The place is still there, but the person is gone. Perhaps the door remains open. Perhaps the heart still hopes. The empty chair quietly waits for a prodigal to come home or a dream to be realized. To another, it represents someone who has not yet arrived. There is a place at the table, but the chair remains unoccupied. It is a space reserved for a face not yet seen, a story not yet known, a relationship that has not yet begun. And sometimes an empty chair is an invitation still unanswered. The place has been prepared. The table has been set. The invitation has been extended. Yet the chair remains empty.

But there is another empty chair. For centuries, at the Passover table, Jewish tradition has remembered Elijah with a place of expectation. That empty chair does not merely speak of someone who is gone. It speaks of someone who is expected. And that changes everything, because there is a vast difference between absence and anticipation. An empty chair can say, “Someone was here,” but it can also say, “Someone is coming.”

For the Christian, that is where the empty chair becomes a symbol of hope. We gather around the table remembering One who came, who gave Himself for us, who died, rose again, and ascended into heaven. Yet we do not merely look backward. We look forward. We remember His promise: “I will come again.” The chair is empty—but not forever. The silence is temporary. The waiting has an end. The One who came in humility will come again in glory. The One who was rejected will return as King. The One whose hands were pierced will be seen by every eye.

And when He comes, He will not come alone. Scripture tells us that those who sleep in Jesus will come with Him, and that the dead in Christ will rise and we who remain will be caught up together with them to meet the Lord. The great hope of Christ’s return is not only that He is coming, but that His coming will finally answer the ache, longing, and loneliness represented by so many of our empty chairs. The chair left vacant by someone we loved will not always speak with the same sorrow. The separation is real, but it is not forever. There is coming a day when the long ache of absence will give way to the joy of reunion, when death will surrender what it has taken, when tears will be wiped away, and when the loneliness of the empty chair will be swallowed up in the presence of Christ.

So perhaps the empty chair is not always something to mourn. Perhaps sometimes it is something to watch, to wait beside, and to keep ready. It may remind us of someone who was here. It may carry the ache of someone who is gone. But for those who belong to Christ, even our emptiest places are touched by hope. The empty chair does not have the final word.

Someone is coming.

And when He comes, He will bring with Him the answer to every ache represented by that empty chair. Faith does not merely remember the One who has been here. Faith keeps a place for the One who is coming—and trusts that when He comes, He will make all things whole. ©

–PGR