Last Thursday Ian Dickie, Calum and myself went to Telford College to give out hot cross buns, palm crosses and a leaflet that talks about Easter to the students. It was good fun and we managed to distribute 100 buns, cross and leaflets in about an hour. What was really interesting was out of 100 people who got the freebies only about 3 to 4 mentioned anything to do with the Christian faith, for the rest it was just a free bun.
When this was advertised the wording they used was to describe what we were doing was to celebrate the long Easter holiday weekend; no word of Jesus or Christ or Christianity in there at all.
Our country is getting more and more secular; consequently Jesus is taking less and less prominence through the year. Think about how much Jesus is kept out of Christmas and it becomes seasons greeting. Now even in Easter he is slowly slipping out of it.
The thing is we do not know what to do with Jesus. Dan Brown in the Da Vinci Code wants us to believe Jesus moved to France, settled down the Mary Magdalene and founded the French Royal line. Another growing myth is actually that Jesus went to Kashmir in India and lived the rest of his days there as a holy man.
Main Argument
There is only one problem with this. It is not actually what he said:
Then Jesus said to them, “How foolish you are, how slow you are to believe everything the prophets said! Was it not necessary for the Messiah to suffer these things and then to enter his glory?”
(Luke 24:25-26)
He entered his glory, what on earth does that mean? Throughout his ministry he kept saying that he had come from the father and was going to return to the father. He kept talking about the future glory he would have with God the Father in heaven. So when he is talking here about entering his glory he is not talking about going to France or Kashmir or anywhere else except going back to heaven to be with his Father, once he had accomplished his mission.
This really is why Easter is so important, because it was the culmination of his mission. It was when everything came together and he did what he said he would do; including going back to heaven, going back into his glory.
One of the great messages of Easter is that our faith is not dead. We do not worship a corpse or a tomb or a grave. We worship a living God, Jesus Christ. Because he did what he said he would do and came back from the dead we can actually believe everything else he said.
We can also actually believe what was written about him because there is more historical evidence for the Bible being true than any other book from ancient times. The oldest copy we have is about 350AD which is really old and what you have in your Bible in front of you actually is the same as written then. You can believe it.
What does that mean for us?
Look closely at what Jesus actually said.
It’s interesting that the basic position of the Bible is that every single one of us, every single human being is incapable of making it to heaven on our own. Irrespective of how good you are, how many brownie points or air miles you might have gathered, you cannot get there yourself or by your own merit.
That is very different to other faiths. Muslims believe God holds a profit and loss account over your life. If at the end you are in loss it is straight to hell with you. The sad thing is some Muslim clerics are teaching young men that blowing up non Muslims is an automatic pass into heaven.
Buddhism and to a degree Hinduism is also about a profit or loss account. Depending on how you treat others, that is how the world will treat you. They call it Karma. At the end of your life your karma is weighed up and if you have lived a good life you are reincarnated in a higher being but if your karma is bad you come back as a lower being.
The ultimate aim is to achieve enlightenment through many cycles of reincarnation.
The scary thing is that enlightenment is oblivion, there is nothing but non-existence to aim for. Again though it is all on your merit.
Christianity is singular in that it is the only faith based not on your merit. There is nothing you can do that will cause God to owe you entry into heaven. Christianity is a faith based on the reality of being human. After all it was the reality of humanity that caused Jesus to come here in the first place.
So what?
Christians rely not on what we do but on what Jesus has done. It is faith in him, that he will fulfil yet more of his promises that is at the heart of this faith. That’s why we always say, all you have to do is believe. Yet as we know belief is the hardest part.
Conclusion
Easter is the affirmation of our faith. It is when we raise our voices to the sky and say Christ is Risen, He is Risen Indeed!
It is when we stand up and say I believe. It is when we nail our colours to the mast and proudly say we are Christians.
This is our faith and this is our time.
It is not a holiday, it is not a long weekend. It is a celebration of Jesus return to his glory having accomplished his mission. It is a living faith.
Centuries ago, Baptisms and new professions of faith were on Easter day because this was a day of new beginnings. If you are here then you have the chance to make this Easter a new beginning in your life. Trust in Jesus, believe in what he has done for you and know the experience of God for yourself.
Amen.
