Why Easter Is My Favorite Holiday

A couple weeks ago, around Easter, I had it in mind to write about why Easter is important to me. Then I got very busy with other things, then we went away for spring break, then I made excuses about not having enough focused time and energy to do it. So here I am a few weeks removed from the holiday, but still thinking of it often. I need to write this. It’s as if the Holy Spirit keeps prodding me to do this. So here I am. Let me explain why Easter is my favorite holiday.

I love Easter for the same reasons most people do. Family gets together to eat lots of great food and hang out. Kids of all ages color eggs.  Gifts are given & received. Little plastic eggs are hidden everywhere for the kids to find. I personally enjoy hiding the eggs. The weather is warming up from winter so we can play outside and enjoy the warm sun.  There might be an extended family picture taken because everyone got dressed up for church. Little nephews play with my face.  Oh, maybe that’s just me. I digress.

Lots of people get dressed up for church on Easter. More people attend church Easter Sunday than any other time of the year. But why? Do people even know what is celebrated on Easter Sunday? If so, do they take the time to really think about what it means? I confess that I didn’t REALLY think about Easter too much until I was in college when a friend broke it down for me for the first time. Now, 20+ years later, Easter seems to mean more to me every year. Let me explain.

There is a component of Easter that involves the exchanging of gifts. We love to receive gifts, and we love to give good gifts as well. At Easter, we celebrate being given the best gift imaginable. All we have to do is receive it. The gift, of course, is Jesus. That might not mean anything to you because you don’t (yet) know who Jesus is. I won’t dive too deep into who Jesus is here, but trust me when I tell you that Jesus is love. The gift is his love. His love is so great for you and me that he willingly died a horrible death on a Roman cross to pay the sin debt we all owe to a holy, perfect, and righteous God. The crucifixion was on Good Friday. Then 3 days later on Easter Sunday, Jesus defeated death by rising from the dead! Jesus did this so we could be with him forever in paradise. Without his loving sacrifice and resurrection from the dead, we are all condemned to an eternity separated from God in hell.

Yep. This is truth whether you accept it or not.

There is no gift more valuable than that. And it is offered to us all. It is what we celebrate at Easter.

You probably have heard the children’s Sunday School song that says, “Jesus loves me, this I know. For the Bible tells me so.” This is also true. The Bible is all about God’s love for his greatest creation – you and me. Here is one example:

1 John 4:9-10 “God showed how much he loved us by sending his one and only Son into the world so that we might have eternal life through him. This is real love – not that we loved God, but that he first loved us and sent his Son as a sacrifice to take away our sins.”

What makes Easter more impactful for me every year is this fact that God loves me. Not only that, but he wants a personal relationship with me. He wants me to spend eternity with him in heaven. He knows I mess up, and make lots of mistakes, and act selfishly and full of pride at times, but he loves me still. There isn’t anything I can do to earn his love, or for him to stop loving me. That’s God. The ultimate creator of all the world is a personal friend of mine.

Dang. That is awesome.

The older I get, the more I realize how amazing this love is. It compels me to love God in return. Not because he needs it or demands it from me, but because he is so good and I am not. His love compels me to be a better person, to love others, and serve God with my life. It’s a journey I’m happy to be on. It is THE journey. I can’t imagine life without God.

I could go on and on about this love of God for me, site a list of Scripture to prove it, and share clever quotes from professional writers, bible scholars, and preachers to formulate the perfect argument for how awesome God is and why you are missing out if you don’t believe what I do. But I won’t.

This is my story, written from my heart for the purpose of being transparent with you and hopefully encouraging you in some way. If that is the case, I’d love to hear from you. One of my favorite things to do is have real conversations with people about Jesus and his working in our lives.