Happy Easter (final Lenten post for 2024)

"Christ is risen," we say to each other on Easter.

"He is risen indeed," we respond.

Some people insist on calling this celebration "Resurrection Day." If we are identifying the event, that's what it is. I find it less important to change the name than to acknowledge its power and unique claims. History pivots on this day.

The addition of bunnies and eggs and tulips remain a mystery to me. When we came to our current place of service, I was asked about hosting the annual "Easter Egg Hunt."

"Is that an Indonesian tradition?" I asked. No, but the Americans who previously attended the church thought it was fun for their kids. (Most expats had repatriated.) It was a lot of work to add a foreign party game to a wonderful day and seemed like a distraction.

"What do Easter eggs have to do with the resurrection of Jesus?" I persisted. Nothing, I was told. So we dropped it.

Instead, we host a potluck like the early Church did. They celebrated "the body of Christ broken for us, and the blood of Christ shed for us" at memorial meals. Perhaps it felt like "Easter" or "Resurrection Day" every Sunday, a time of wonderment, worship, and teaching on the first day of the week. (Acts 20:7; 1 Corinthians 16:2)

So this Easter day, we sit around the tables in the hall. We talk about the mystery of God-with-us. We discuss what we look forward to when Jesus returns to usher into eternity those he has redeemed.

While some religions fear death, scripture tells us death has lost its victory and its sting. Jesus has reclaimed life and wholeness, paying the debts we accrued against God by our sins, disobedience, and willfulness. 

I leave happy and fed inside and out. We are reminded that the power that raised Christ from the dead is the same power that at work in us. He is risen! 

He is risen indeed. 

Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting? The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. (1 Corinthians 15:55-57)


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