What's The Big Deal About Easter?

What if Christ is not raised:

Jesus is dead.  Can you imagine, “Sorry folks, Easter has been canceled.  We’ve found the body.”  It was all a sham!  If He is dead then you and I are left alone.  On your own.  No one to talk to.  No one to guide us.  No one to listen to us.  No one to pray to.  No connection with real life – spiritual life.  Satan won.  We are eternally separated from God.  Jesus was just a mere man who tried to do good.  Greatest tragedy ever.  God sending His Son into the world and the mission failed.  Worse yet,  all other religious leaders are dead as well.  He would be just like Mohammed, Buddha, Confucius, Moses, All the gurus of the past.  He would be dead like them.  Said a few good things but nothing else.  No different.  No power.  Dead.

Jesus was a liar.  He said that He would rise from the dead in three days.  He outright claimed blasphemy – the crime which they did kill Him for.  He deceived many and those who follow Him now are deceived.  His promises are worthless.  He gave false hope.  He was the most wicked man ever or suffered from sever illusions of grandeur.  He was a liar or a lunatic.  I can never place my trust in one who has lied to me.  If He wanted to rise and did not then He is incapable of anything worthwhile for me, thus untrustworthy.

The Bible is useless.  The resurrection is the central theme of the NT.  Thus, all it’s teachings are meaningless.  They are just worthless sayings and promises that man made up.  If the central theme is amiss then I have to throw the whole thing out.  Even the OT must be discounted because it must prophecies speaking of His return from the dead and His reign over all the earth.  My bible would be just a good as a horoscope book.

Death and evil reign.  We can count on death – forever.  Loved ones – dead – forever.  Separated eternally from all that is good, all that is loving and caring.  Evil has triumphed.  Love lost.  Face it – I am damned forever.  

We are stuck in our sin.  My worst enemy – my self – will always reign.  All my past will always be before me.  No matter how hard I try my past will haunt me.  My sin will never be covered.  I will be held accountable for all I did and will do.  There is no hope for me to overcome my faults.  I will forever live in shame and guilt before God and others for what I have done.  Why try to be good?  Might as well have fun and sin up a storm – which of course it is not.

Life is meaningless.  Eat and drink for tomorrow you die.  No purpose to live but to live for the now.  No reason to do good.  No reason to care for others except to get something from them.  Why care about anyone or anything?  Do what is good for you.

Our faith is futile.  The bible says if Christ not be raised then our faith is futile and we are to be most pitied.  Our faith is absolutely pointless.  Christianity becomes the greatest joke ever pulled on humanity.  You and I wasted our time believing.  

Because Christ is raised:

Jesus is alive.   Interact, pray, someone to lay your trust in, communion with Him, worship Him, hear from Him.  Be guided and directed by Him.  I can speak to Him.  He can work on my behalf.  I am not alone.  My Lord lives.  My Lord is with me at all times.  

Jesus kept His word.  What does that mean for me?  All His promises He made I can count on.  “Come to me all you who are heaving laden and I will give you rest.”  “Ask anything according to my will and I will do it.”  “Abide in me and you will bear much fruit.”  “I will never leave you nor forsake you.” He kept His promise.  Jesus will always keep His word to you.  His promises are as good as done.  What He says is reality.  Everything He said is true.

The Bible is true.  Every part.  If I need a dose of reality, there it is.  It will guide me, comfort me, transform me, correct me, inform me.  It will show me what God sees.  This becomes one thing in life I can trust in whole heartedly.  It will never let me down.  

Jesus won.  He took Satan’s best shot, humanities cruelest punishment, and died then rose again.  He was given the most intense of temptations to sin, the most severe of sufferings and he overcame them all.  He did not fail.  He conquered.  Sin was defeated.  Death was crushed.  The enemy beaten.  Christ was victorious.  Love won.  And I am on the winning side.  

We have forgiveness.  My past, my failures, my shame, my guilt, my sin has been forgiven.  God raising His Son from the dead showed His acceptance of Christ’s ultimate sacrifice on our behalf.  We have been made clean, pure, holy, life made anew.  I have been made righteous by what He has done.  Christ sealed it for us once and for all.  All my sin has been covered, forgiven, not held against me.  My guilt has been removed.  My shame has been replaced with righteousness.  God has heard my cry for mercy.

We have eternal life.  To all who receive Him He gave the right to become children of God.  If Christ is risen, I will rise if I am in Him.  Death has no final hold on me.  I am assured an eternal home with God in Heaven.  It is a promise.  Not only for me but also for those who have died.  I will indeed see them again.  For those who I love and care for and have given their lives to follow Jesus, there is a real hope.  I have a firm hope to hold on to.  ……….To all who reject Him, He is now the judge.  He will not ignore the fact that for our sin He suffered and died.  We receive Him as Lord or we will indeed experience His judgment and wrath.  There is hope.  We will rise again – guaranteed.  I will be in heaven – assured.  I will see loved ones again – count on it.  My future is secure if it is in Him.  The end of my story will indeed be, “And he lived happily ever after.”

We have victory over sin.  I no longer have to sin.  I am free.  Free to live as God intended.  Free to love others without sin and selfishness getting in my way.  I can do great things for God now.  I can be good now.  The power of His resurrection.  Power to live righteously.  Power to do good things, great things.  Power to affect the lives of others.  Power to make a difference.  I am not under the slavery of having to meet my own needs.  Sin has no hold on me.  His resurrection and victory over sin has become my victory.  Free at last, free at last.  Thank God Almighty I am free at last.  

God's Word says it best - 

1 Corinthians 15

Now, brothers, I want to remind you of the gospel I preached to you, which you received and on which you have taken your stand. By this gospel you are saved, if you hold firmly to the word I preached to you. Otherwise, you have believed in vain. 

For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, 5and that he appeared to Peter, and then to the Twelve. After that, he appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers at the same time, most of whom are still living, though some have fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles, and last of all he appeared to me also, as to one abnormally born. 

12 But if it is preached that Christ has been raised from the dead, how can some of you say that there is no resurrection of the dead? If there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ has been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith. More than that, we are then found to be false witnesses about God, for we have testified about God that he raised Christ from the dead. But he did not raise him if in fact the dead are not raised. For if the dead are not raised, then Christ has not been raised either. And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins. Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ are lost. If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are to be pitied more than all men. 

But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. For since death came through a man, the resurrection of the dead comes also through a man. For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive.

51 Listen, I tell you a mystery: We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed— in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed. For the perishable must clothe itself with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality. When the perishable has been clothed with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality, then the saying that is written will come true: “Death has been swallowed up in victory.” 

“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. 

Therefore, my dear brothers, stand firm. Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain.