Savannah Guthrie opens up about her personal ‘season of trial’ in emotional Easter message

NEW YORK CITY, NEW YORK: Savannah Guthrie shared an emotional video message during a digital Easter gathering with a Manhattan church, admitting that while the holiday is meant for joy, this year’s celebration was “season of trial” for her and her family.

The veteran news anchor is set to return to her co-hosting duties on ‘The Today Show’ this Monday following a two-month absence caused by the suspected abduction of her 84-year-old mother, Nancy Guthrie, who remains missing from her Tucson home.

Savannah admits finding joy difficult this holiday

During her video message to the ‘Good Shepherd New York church,’ Savannah spoke candidly about how difficult it has been to find joy during the holiday. 

She explained that while Easter is usually a time of hope, her current reality makes those feelings difficult to reach. 

‘We celebrate today the promise of a new life that never ends in death,’ Savannah began. 

“But standing here today, I have to tell you, there are moments in which that promise seems irretrievably far away, when life itself seems far harder than death. These moments of deep disappointment with God, the feeling of utter abandonment for most of us, there will come a time in our life when these feelings hold sway.”

Savannah questions if Jesus feels her pain

Savannah shared that she was raised with the belief that “Jesus, in his short life, experienced every single emotion that we humans can feel.” 

However, she admitted that the mystery surrounding her mother’s fate made her doubt if anyone could truly understand her specific type of grief. 

She described her current situation as a “season of trial” and confessed that she has “questioned whether Jesus really ever experienced this particular wound that I feel, this grievous and uniquely cruel injury of not knowing, of uncertainty and confusion and answers withheld in those darkest moments.”

Savannah compares her pain to Jesus’ suffering

As she continued her message, Savannah reflected on the final moments of Jesus and realized that his suffering might have included the same confusion she feels now. 

She looked at his final words as proof that he understood the pain of being left without answers. 

Guthrie continued, "But after Jesus died, after he breathed his last, what did he actually know on the cross? He cried out, 'My God, my God. Why have you forsaken me?' That is the anguished cry of someone who does not know the answers," she observed. 

She thought about the days following his death, questioning if he, too, felt the weight of time stretching out in his suffering.

“Where did his soul and his spirit go in those days in between? And what was he thinking? Did he think his time in the grave would be a day or two, or 1,000 years in the grave? Does his agony seem indefinite to him? That torment of uncertainty, the way indefinite pain can feel eternal. Perhaps he did know this feeling after all.”