Without a doubt, Easter has looked a little different these last two years than it has in years past. Like never before, we’re forced to strip down the manmade version of the holiday filled with fancy Sunday dresses, Easter egg hunts and big family gatherings to the bare essentials: the cross, an empty tomb and our Risen Lord.
Yes, this Easter, more than ever, will be about intimate time with our Savior—a time to reflect on the life that conquered death, triumph over hell, the greatest prophecy ever fulfilled, and victory over the sin that should have nailed us to that very cross.
Though the words were spoken many years ago, this riveting message by Dr. S.M. Lockridge could not be pronounced at a more timely age:
“The Pharisees couldn’t stand him, but they found out they couldn’t stop him. Pilate couldn’t find any fault in him. Herod couldn’t kill him. Death couldn’t handle him. And the grave couldn’t hold him. THAT’S MY KING!”
“I wonder if you know him?” asks Lockridge. “He’s the key to knowledge. He’s the wellspring of wisdom. He’s the doorway of deliverance. He’s the pathway of peace. He’s the roadway of righteousness. He’s the highway of holiness. He’s the gateway of glory!”
Matthew 28:6 says, “He has risen, just as He said.”
What would I ever do if someone I knew came back from the dead? Especially if he had said he would, and if he had spent a couple nights in a grave already?
Seriously, what would I do? What would you do? Wouldn’t I blab to everyone I know – and most people I don’t – about this miraculous event? Heck, I tell everyone when I’m feeling under the weather or when I saw a good movie.
Then factor in that the same guy was now telling us that because of what he had done, none of the rest of us would ever have to suffer death. What’s more, simply by believing what we had seen, no matter our background, history, race or education, we could restore our long-lost connection with the Almighty and live forever.
Man… unfortunately, I’m having a hard time conceiving what I would do. Or, even if I can conceive it, I can’t quite believe it, because honestly, I have seen this, I do believe this and yet my daily reaction to it doesn’t exactly line up with The Acts of the Apostles.
Has the news of a resurrected savior really become passé?
Why don’t I want to read Acts?
What am I afraid of?
That I’ll be rejected?
That I won’t be powerful enough?
That the good news isn’t relevant enough?
Salvation and the message of the resurrection, the miracle of born again-ness, is a salve to all wounds.
This Easter I’ll join choruses like “He’s Alive” while pondering and praising the miracle, but when it comes time for the next day of my life to begin, a day and a life that means nothing if not lived for my Savior, it’ll be all about me again and my troubles and making my way and who cut me off and what I have to get done and who I don’t like and what can we complain about today.
Yuck!
I want this Easter to be real. Because I did see it happen (so to speak; the resulting spread of those who ran to the corners of the earth to tell the story with no regard for personal safety is traceable to this day), it is real, and I’m cheating life and people God loves if I’m not shouting those facts from every corner and rooftop I can find.
Everything else is just window dressing; “Christian living” is often just how we pass all our extra time in this country where so many of our basic needs are so easily met, and where we can cordon ourselves off from each other. What matters in life.
That there is life, and…
how it came about that there might never be death, but…
there are still dead men walking.
Really, why else are we here if not to keep excitedly shouting the truth of the miracle as if we’d just experienced it with our own eyes yesterday?