Easter is unique among holidays in that it skips around on the calendar. It depends on the vernal equinox and a full moon. Regardless, it comes in spring. Which is perfect. New life, resurrection, birth, greening of nature: all of a piece.
There was one Easter morning in history. But we remember and celebrate that single event every year. It’s interesting that we humans commemorate things at regular times on our planet’s journey around the sun. It is a way to make sense of the eternal by connecting it to time and days we can understand.
It doesn’t get old. I’ve lived sixty-eight of these and feel the emotions as strongly as ever. Long ago, Easter included the excitement of an Easter basket and candy that I didn’t get the rest of the year. Now it is the quiet excitement of a deeper connection to the creator.
Dying eggs, hiding baskets, dressing up for church, preparing and gathering around a special meal might be parts of your Easter. If you are fortunate enough to spend time with family or friends, and not everyone is, it is a type of blessing.
Somewhere in all of it, we take a moment with ourselves to remember the why of the day. Jesus’ rising from the dead, the empty tomb, the road to Emmaus: in those is the entire reason we are Christians. It is the root and the stem.
We honor and respect the other religions of the world. There are valuable traditions in those to guide their believers. But this one morning 2,000-some years ago is ours. As Christians, everything spins from that most unlikely and miraculous of happenings.
Like much of Jesus’ life, it is beyond our small brains to comprehend. We can know a lot of what he felt in his time on Earth. It was God’s plan that Jesus would share our humanity with us. His pain, his happiness, his sorrow are like ours. But we certainly can’t perform miracles, and we surely won’t rise from the dead.
I have thought though, that life gives us a metaphor for the first Easter. If we imagine our sleep as kind of a death, then morning is a resurrection, at least to the conscious world. With that thought, our waking becomes a brief morning benediction. “Thank you, God, for this, another day. It is a gift, my little resurrection.”
Back to the first resurrection. After so many of these Easters, it can be possible to lose focus to its majesty. As hard as it may be, we can try to put ourselves back in time at the first Easter. It would be confusing at first. The rock rolled away, Jesus not in the tomb. What the heck happened here?
In that most amazing moment in history, our response would not be small. When the clouds of doubt faded and our minds cleared, and we saw with our own eyes the risen Christ, how could we not fall to the ground at Jesus’ feet?
With the advantage of 2,000 years, we know now that everything changed then and there. Death and sin defeated, salvation for our species. But right then, in the exact moment, it would not have made immediate sense. That’s alright; it was all part of a divine plan.
I try to perform that mental exercise every Easter, going to Jerusalem in my imagination. And when I do, I come to this. I want to be better. How could I not want to be the best person I could possibly be after Jesus suffered for me on that cross and broke the grip of sin on the world with his resurrection?
It is said that we Christians are “Easter people.” I wondered about that phrase and looked it up. St. Augustine first used that around 400 AD, “We are Easter people and ‘Alleluia’ is our song. Let us sing here and now in this life, even though we are oppressed by various worries, so that we may sing it one day in the world to come, when we are set free from all anxiety.”
St. Augustine lived in northern Africa in a challenging time, not unlike ours. He is known as St. Augustine of Hippo, which your children would find amusing. Hippo was the ancient name of the city of Annaba in Algeria. St. Augustine is the patron saint of brewers. So, a toast to him is in order next time you have a Schells Deer Brand, Sleepy Eye Cream Ale, or a Brau Brothers.
Being Easter people points to the centrality of the resurrection to Christianity. I said I wanted to be better because of Easter. More specifically, I want to be better because I am a disciple of Jesus.
How then?
Sure, there are rules to follow. Some of those we argue about, and interpretations will shift. There are rules to live by, and then there are laws we create. But one thing is clear. Jesus commands us to love.
“Commands” is a strong word. But there it is. John 15:12: “My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you.”
That seems straight forward, no interpretation required. Paul gives us one anyway in Corinthians, words we have heard a thousand times: “Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails.”
There are 2.4 billion Christians on Earth. That’s 2.4 billion Easter people. This Easter morning, if each of us loves just a little bit more than the day before, that’s 2.4 billion little bits. That’s a lot of love. Happy Easter.