What do you think about when someone says, “Easter.” So many thoughts come to my mind …
Easter eggs… Easter candy (yummm!)… Easter church service… family… fantastic food… Many great memories run through my mind when thinking about this day.
Easter… the day that Christ rose from the dead… this day is a BIG DEAL. Churches, in good measure, pull out all the stops with Easter pageantry. You can tell the pastor has prepared extra long this week.
The message is simple, right? I don’t understand the greek words or all the connections from the old testament to the new testament or the …yada, yada… but what I do understand is that…
Jesus… helped me. He rescued me. He pulled me out of confusion.
Jesus saved me!
Saved – as in – I would be dead. As if a fish was taken out of water and left to flop around on the ground. Jesus put me back in the water – in the place I belong.
Outside of the water there is brokenness, pain, suffering, and hurt. Not that we won’t go through suffering but we live in a broken world that no matter how much fame or fortune we have – it will not add up to bringing us into eternity.
This message is the message that changed my life forever. For eternity. It is because of someone telling me this saving message that I understand what is important in this life.
The simple message of Jesus. He died and rose again to set the sinner free.
This is how much God loved the world: He gave his Son, his one and only Son. And this is why: so that no one need be destroyed; by believing in him, anyone can have a whole and lasting life. God didn’t go to all the trouble of sending his Son merely to point an accusing finger, telling the world how bad it was. He came to help, to put the world right again. Anyone who trusts in him is acquitted (John 3:16 MSG)
It can be so easy to forget the love he has for us. This Christ who died and is LIVING. This is a good day to confirm Christ living in US. It’s a good reminder:
Are we keeping Christ alive in our lives?
In our morning meetings John has been discussing the following quote:
“How did you go bankrupt?”
Two ways. Gradually, then suddenly.
- Ernest Hemingway, The Sun Also Rises
It can be easy to fall away and forget what Christ did for us. It can happen gradually yet suddenly. We discussed how you come across an actor you used to watch on TV and be surprised, “Wow, he looks so old!” Really he gradually got older just as we all have but it seemed to happen so suddenly.
In our daily lives we can gradually slip away from remembering his love for us. I believe Easter is a great time to re-focus and remember what Jesus went through in order so we could be saved!
I posted this earlier – It’s a great skit to remind us that we can return to his love even if we feel we have fallen away.
The full Eastor story can be read here.
Yesterday was the sickest I (Ryan) have felt in many years. I woke up in the morning with a massive stomach ache. Then almost right away I proceeded to jettisoning the chunky cargo. During the next four hours I hurled another few times. Stayed in bed with my stomach turning. Then the rest of the day I had some quality time sitting with the toilet. We really bonded. I cannot remember ever being that sick before. I started on