i have 8 minutes before Easter is officially over with, so i figured i’d better hurry up and do my Easter blog update.
what do you think about when you hear the word “Easter”; chocolate bunnies, jelly beans, easter eggs, good food, family, the new fad: colored chicks and ducks, time off work…what? its not wrong to think about all those things, as long as you don’t bury the real meaning under all that the world has put out there. so with that said, what is the real meaning of Easter? what if this holiday as we know it, never came into existence, what would that mean for us as Christians? we all know the story, and most of us know what the general significance is for this holiday; Good Friday is the day we remember that Jesus died on the cross and Easter is the day we celebrate his resurrection. you would think hearing the same story over and over again would get tiring, but its not…to me, i seem to see it a little more clearly every time i hear it….
how many of us stop and think about the true meaning of this holiday? how often do we stop and think about the sacrifices that were made for us and what they really mean? we all have those people in our lives that we “don’t like”, but how many of us would be willing to give up our lives for that person? well, that’s exactly what Jesus did for use…we don’t deserve what He’s given us, we don’t deserve to have the chance to live with Him eternally…there are so many things we have/or are offered, that we don’t deserve. we are sinful, arrogant, prideful, selfish, wicked people. there are times when we completely turn our backs on Him…there times when we ask for things and when He says “no” we get angry…i have listed a lot of stuff that we don’t deserve, but there is something we do deserve…we deserve to spend eternity in Hell…but what can keep us from that? we often hear Jesus referred to as our propitiation, but what does that really mean? well, webster puts it this way:
when God sent his Son Jesus Christ to die on the cross He took the wrath of God upon himself so we wouldn’t have to take it upon ourselves….he shielded us from what was intended to harm us. because of Jesus’ suffering we are able to have that chance to come to know him and spend eternity with Him in heaven, He is our atoning sacrifice and He is the perfect and spotless lamb.
something i’ve heard a lot from our pastor lately is this, we are free to choose but we are forced to decide. we are free to choose whether or not we want Jesus to be ruler of our lives, we are free to choose whether or not we want to spend the rest of our lives with Him…it’s our choice, but eventually we are forced to make the decision….we are forced to “pick sides”.
who are you going serve? where are you going to spend eternity?
think about it! but not just during the Easter Holidy, Christ should be on our minds all the time! as Christians we should be living for Him, we should be making His name known. we should be making it clear who we are going to serve and where we are going to spend the rest of our lives…..
