When someone asks, “What’s your favorite holiday?”, it’s really hard to think of anything else but Christmas. I mean, what’s not to like about Christmas? The Christmas season lasts for over a month (if you do it right), and its filled with twinkly lights, cozy sweaters, joyous music, fun parties, cantatas, special events, banquets, gift-giving, and special visits from family and friends. Most importantly, Christmas is a season set aside to remember the most miraculous and history-making birth ever—Christ’s birth! But celebrating Christ’s birth is really just part one of an even more miraculous and important holiday.
The only thing more miraculous than the virgin birth of Jesus Christ is His bodily resurrection from the dead. Christmas is like the prelude to an awesome concert; it’s the tantalizing appetizer to the main course. Christmas was always for the purpose of Easter. As Christians, we make a big deal about Christmas, and we should! But we should make Easter a big deal, too, because it is the foundation of our faith. Without the resurrection of Christ, there would be no Christian faith.
The problem with all the world religions is that the object of their faith is dead, buried, and inanimate. Mohammed is dead. Buddha is inanimate. Brahma isn’t living. Joseph Smith is perished. What sets Christianity apart as a true and living faith is the true and living Savior in which it is placed. In I Corinthians 15, Paul reminds us of the weight that the resurrection carries in our faith. I Corinthians 15:19 says, “If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable.” In other words, the resurrection either makes or breaks our faith. If the object of our faith is in a tomb, then we are a miserable bunch. Just ask the Corinthian Christians what a difference that would make! In their culture they were marginalized, maligned, and persecuted for their faith. If their faith was just a matter of wishful thinking, theirs would be a pointless and miserable existence. It would have been much more logical to live like an Epicurean. As Paul noted in verse 32, “If after the manner of men I have fought with beasts at Ephasus, what advantageth it me, if the dead rise not? Let us eat and drink; for to morrow we die.” Living for a dead Christ is absurd. I’d rather be an atheist!
Yet Paul doesn’t stop with an if statement. After the if of verse 19, Paul presents the is of verse 20, “But now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the firstfruits of them that slept.” Because Jesus Christ is risen, our hope is real and our faith is reasonable. Because Christ is risen, we can know that we will rise also! This is statement makes all the difference in the world, now and in eternity. As C.S. Lewis put it in one of his essays, “Christianity, if false, is of no importance, and if true, of infinite importance. The only thing it cannot be is moderately important.”[1] Being ambivalent about Christianity is absurd. If living the Christian lifestyle is just a personal preference or just another religious culture, then I want no part of that. The Christian life can be hard! If we are celebrating a metaphorical idea on Easter, then it doesn’t really matter how we live on Monday. However, if we are celebrating a reality on Easter, then that should dictate the way we live on Monday.
In I Corinthians 15, Paul reminds us that if Christ be risen, then our faith is reasonable and that because He is risen our faith is imperative. In I Corinthians 15:33-34, Paul writes, “Be not deceived: evil communications corrupt good manners. Awake to righteousness, and sin not; for some have not the knowledge of God: I speak this to your shame.” Paul admonishes us to live every day like it’s Easter. This means that we live to know Christ and make Him known to others. It means that living a righteous lifestyle matters immensely because that will either hinder or further the life-changing, earth-shattering truth of the gospel!
So, this Easter holiday, ask yourself if you are living like it’s Easter. Are you living like your faith is placed in a living Savior? Are you living like He has an opinion on what you do with your time, gifts, and opportunities? Are you living like you will soon be face-to-face with your Savior? Are you living like everyone you meet will all be raised from the grave and face the One who hath “put all enemies under his feet” (v. 25)? Are you living like “death is swallowed up in victory . . . though our Lord Jesus Christ” (vv. 54, 57)? Are you still living in the if statement rather than living boldly in the is statement of Easter? Since Christ is risen, Paul says in verse 58, “Therefore, my beloved brethren, be ye steadfast, unmovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord.” There is a reason to live the hard, arduous, wonderful, and rewarding Christian life.
On Easter Sunday, let’s enjoy our ham and yams, our new Easter outfits, and our egg hunts. But let’s remember that it is a Holy Day of remembrance. Then on Monday, let’s live like it’s Easter. Because it is.
[1] C. S. Lewis. God in the Dock. (Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B Eerdmans Publishing, 2014), 102.