Isn’t it amazing how the weeks following the Easter holiday just slides back into routine? We find our children crashing from their sugar buzz from all the chocolate eggs and the new clothes aren’t new anymore. The family festivities all pass into sweet memories as well as the inspiring messages and church celebrations. The reality of the whole purpose also seems to fade so quickly into the next appointment on our agenda. I can’t help but think that this isn’t all Easter should be. A matter of fact, I believe the scriptural theme backs up a total different outcome. Easter wasn’t ever intended to be over and done with, but to increase more and more.
Several days of celebrating Jesus being falsely accused, scourged, crucified, buried and then risen from the dead for us, doesn’t fulfill the scripture purpose. Don’t get me wrong it’s good to celebrate and have a day of focus; but the whole reason for Christ dying and rising again is to give you and I a life more abundantly (Jn 10:10) as He intended not just an annual event. All of us were caught in inherited sin from Adam in the Garden of Eden, and plunged into a spiraling devolution. Paul describes all humanity
Christ’s death and resurrection is to give you and I a life more abundantly as He intended not just an annual event.
in Rom 3:10 as, “there is none righteous” and in Eph 2:17 “you who are far off”. Bottom line is that we received a sin problem that separated us from our Heavenly Father, which we inherited through Adam. (Rom. 5:12) But through the incredible gracious and merciful free gift of God through Jesus sacrifice we are declared righteous and reconciled back to God. (Eph. 2:13, 1 Cor. 6:11) Yes, we definitely have a great reason to be thankful and to celebrate our deliverance from enslavement of sin. But scripture teaches that being justified isn’t the end but a beginning of a glorious journey. Paul describes it as a great transfer. (Rom. 5:19) In what most acknowledge as Paul’s finest and most thorough work on doctrine, we find where he says in his letter to the Roman’s, in chapter 5:18 “Therefore, as through one man’s offense judgment came to all men, … even so through one Man’s righteous act the free gift came to all men, resulting in justification of life”.
The purpose of Easter celebration, which is about our justification through Christ’s death and resurrection, is much more than a holy week or day. God’s intent was a change in the way we live, “a justification of life”. We are purchased from the kingdom of darkness into the Kingdom of light, from death unto new life. Paul says in 2 Cor 5:17 “if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away…” and in Rom 6:4 he says “…even so we also should walk in newness of life”. The cross is the beginning of
I choose to live a life of victory not just be a Easter believer
every Christian’s walk of faith. God doesn’t want us to stay at the tomb of Jesus who died for us. Jesus wants us to identify with His resurrection and live a life unto righteousness. We shouldn’t go back to the humdrum of mediocrity after Easter, but we need to move forward in victory of life. (Rom 12:2, 2 Cor 3:18) If we have been purchased by Christ’s own blood shouldn’t we live a life that reflex’s His great mercy and power. Yet, that can only be achieved when are eyes are opened to the living Christ. The two disciples were sad and perplexed in their journey to Emmaus until their eyes were opened to the risen Savior that walked with them. (Jn 21:13-35) It’s time to walk each day in the power of the risen Lord! (Titus 2:13-14)
I remember while I was in junior high school, I tried out for the basketball team. Though I made the team, it was to my disappointment that I was only good enough to be on the B-team. The coach challenged us saying that if we worked hard in practice that we might get promoted up to the A-team. I took the challenge to heart and began to practice my hardest, only to find that I was still on the secondary team. After several weeks had gone by, with no advancement, I began to let my disappointment get the best of me. I soon began to settle for my lot in life, so I thought, and got content with being on the B-team, not trying anymore to be promoted. I knew at least I would get a letter at the awards banquet for participating.
Stranger things have happened, but the story we read in Gen 16 can definitely be counted among that category. We drop in on a story that started much earlier with the God of the universe putting a divine stamp or call on Abraham and his wife Sarah. God had called them out from among their own people to a land that they had not been and then downloads a promise that they are going to be blessed beyond measure (Gen 12:1-3), as well as, their own personal family to be numbered as the stars of the sky (Gen 15:5). In Gen 16:1-2, 4 we read, “…Abram’s wife, had borne him no children…” which at this point had been some time from God’s initial promise.
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