This post by John McLamb plus a phone call from my friend, Brent, got me thinking about Easter and the subdued celebration we give it. Think of the incarnation. (a.k.a. Christmas) For some reason this holiday has become a worldwide phenomenon. I am not wanting anything like this for Easter, [almost everything about Christmas has gotten out of hand] but it would be great if Easter involved a little more celebration. As it is, it as become only an excuse for little girls to get new dresses. Remember that Christmas wouldn’t matter if there was no Easter.
Let’s read 1 Cor 15
17And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins. 18Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. 19If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied. (ESV)
The fact is, if there is no Easter than our religion is hopeless. We really should have a greater celebration. Something better than just canceling pm worship, or maybe hunting eggs.
I think part of the problem is that it is a celebration of something we often forget to celebrate. We have a tendency to See Jesus as only the “Lamb upon the cross.” (Remember The Passion of the Christ, 127.5 minutes of beatings and blood, 30 seconds of the resurrection but people think it is the greatest film ever made.) Even on Easter day we have a tendency to speak about Christ’s death more than His resurrection. Don’t get me wrong His death is very important. But without the resurrection it would be wasteful.
So next year, at least on Resurrection day, let’s truly celebrate the resurrection:
I would like to start a movement to reclaim the name of Easter. Have it be called Resurrection day. I began to think about this on Thursday after leaving the following comment on Scott & Briana’s blog.
Much like the Chocolate & peanut butter bunnies, we have mixed up our paganism with our Christianity.
It starts with the name Easter, an englishification of a pagan word. From Wikipedia - The name refers to the Eostur-monath, a month of the Germanic Year which may have been named for the goddess Eastre in Germanic paganism. -
We should call it resurrection Sunday, or something similar to that.
As for the bunny laying eggs. If you are a pagan and worship fertility, (as all pagan religions do) what is a better symbol for fertility than a bunny? How about an egg? If you mix the two, you get an Easter bunny.
Just don't teach your kids to worship fertility in the springtime when everything is coming to life after the long winter and you will be ok even if you eat Easter eggs, and get a visit from the bunny. :-)
But I'll leave that up to someone with more influence.