Saturday, April 15, 2006

The Significance of Easter

When it’s Christmas time, the stores go nuts. Decorated trees and other junk are slapped onto walls while “Christmas” related stuff plays on TV. It’s a nice time to feel good. Awww, a little baby was born in a manger. Angels were singing and some wise men gave gifts to the newborn babe. Awww. No one minds hearing about that.

But whoah ho ho. Then a few months later it’s “Easter” time. Do you see decorations everywhere? Do TV stations put “Easter” related stuff on TV? No. Easter just becomes a time where we get a statutory holiday and little kids get to eat chocolate and find eggs, because some stupid rabbit hid them over night. Rabbits? Eggs? Chocolate? I have yet to find a good explanation that will make sense of these things.

There is no emphasis that I have observed in general society of what Easter is really about. It’s not taught about in public schools because that’s a no-no and it’s religious. We don’t want to offend anyone right? However, there is the occasional report on the news, where some person will say something like, “Today ‘Christians’ around the world are marking Good Friday….and the pope lead this and people watched him over here and blah blah blah.” Big whoop.

Why do I think the true reason behind Easter is not shown on TV? Or taught in schools? Or talked about by general society on the street? Because there’s a little something called the truth and people don’t like to face up to it because it hurts. That’s why the real meaning of Easter is pushed aside and brushed over with some namby-pamby politically correct monkey crap.

This page explains best what Easter truly is about and I’ve taken some explanations from there. The Bible says that everyone has sinned. Everyone includes you and me. We all have committed some act that was selfish therefore have missed God’s perfect standards to be able to have a personal relationship with Him. The Bible also says that there is a consequence for sin, which is death. Not just physically, but death here is spiritual separation from God. When we don’t have a personal relationship with God, that’s what death is. That’s the truth and it hurts.

Easter is the time we take note of the fact, that on Good Friday, Jesus Christ, God in human form, was nailed to a cross and crucified as a payment on behalf of our sins. Why? The consequence of our sins demanded that a sacrifice be made. Jesus lived a perfect life when He physically walked on earth and His death, both physical and spiritual, was accepted by God so that no one else had to die for their own sins, because Jesus already had done it. Right before He died He said, “It is finished.”

But on the third day, Jesus miraculously rose from the dead showing He was more than just a man. Who knows how many tens of thousands (or more) of people who have been crucified in the past. They all stayed in the ground. When Jesus resurrected from His grave, it was forever. Sin had been dealt with and everyone is now able to truly know God. We still can't live up to His perfect standards, but Jesus’ death and resurrection has justified us to be innocent of our past wrongdoings (sin) in God's eyes. We don't need to experience spiritual death!

Easter is supposed to be a time of celebration of the fact that (spiritual) death has been conquered and that we can have life. We can accept and believe what Jesus Christ did for us and know God personally. That’s a lot better than any rabbit, egg, or piece of chocolate.

4 comments:

Bernice said...

That was a nice reality check through all of the "non-Christian" parts of Easter. You said it very nicely, Tim. I'm going to put it on my blogspot if you don't mind =).

Tim said...

bernice - knock yourself out (not literally)

jill - and then did you slap her?

jacmert - eprops...natch.

steph said...

good post, timmy boy! =D

Anonymous said...

you missed smth..
what's significant about easter?
Amy's baptism! haha~