He is Risen

 

Easter dresses, yummy lunches, plenty of chocolate. Easter is fun, but it’s also so heavy. 

I was thinking about what those three days would look like, what they would feel like. I can hardly bear the thought of what it would be like to stand in the crowd and hear Jesus get mocked and brutally whipped, to watch Him hang on that cross. I was thinking about what the pain would be to mourn His loss. 

Most of all, I wonder what it would feel like to return to His tomb and find it empty. To find that He rose and to find His promises to be truth.

Easter is a beautiful beautiful holiday for so many reasons. But it is the greatest holiday for the mere reminder that He loves YOU. So often we get caught up in life and we forget that this life is just a vapor and it doesn’t compare to eternity. And as a Christian, i know if I were to consider eternity in each and every conversation, they would circle back to the heaviness of the raw reality of eternity and the Truth and grace and love of Jesus. Hell is a real place, a place that God wants so badly for no one to go to that He made a way, the only way, for you to live eternity with Him. He died not so that you can live 80 years on earth living for yourself and for what feels good and what feels right. He died for you not so that you can make it to heaven by being a “good person”, but so that you can live with a freedom and a love for all of eternity with Him through grace alone. 

He is freedom. He is love. He is truth. The Resurrection story is not just a bunch of words in a historical book. It’s an eternity changing reality about a Man who gave His life for you. Knowing He knows me and loves me and died for me and rose for me just like He did so intently for each person in that crowd, there is no more beautiful gift, no more wonderful feeling than to be known and loved so purposefully. He is bold and so should we be. This is the good news, the great news, the best news. Happy happy Easter everyone!

He IS risen.