| | It's funny how people tend to just blow this day off. I don't think people realize the true significance this day has on humanity as a whole, whether you are religious or not. Unlike most of my entries since I've been back from my mission, this particular topic I can't trace back to a single moment to care about it so much like the others have. This has been a gradual climb, almost as if it was growing in my heart my entire life. But I'm getting off track here...
Easter is a day, I feel that should be celebrated more than Christmas. You can cue the collective gasps....now. Let me explain why: For most of the Christian world, Christmastime is a time to celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ. Whether or not his birth was really in December, it's hard to tell. Although there is more evidence that points to 6 April. Just saying. Anyway, while I do not mind the excitement that Christmas brings, in fact I welcome it, I am bothered by how commercialized it's gotten and how we seem to forget the real reason we celebrate it.
I want to go through those eight days that will live forever, in a Reader's Digest kind of way. On Sunday, the Savior was heralded into Jerusalem while riding a donkey, being praised as a king, as was foretold by prophecy. Meanwhile, the Sanhedrin, a council of Jews made up of Pharisees and Sadducees, had finally found a way to "convict" Him, but they wouldn't dare, since the people looked up to this guy.
On Monday, He went to the temple and drove out the moneychangers, crying out in righteous indignation, "Ye have made [my house] into a den of thieves". Tuesday, He taught the disciples as a whole. Wednesday, pulling the Twelve Apostles aside, told them that the time was soon at hand, He would be delivered into the hands of evil men and put to death.
Thursday, a room was prepared for the feast of the passover. The Savior started the first sacrament and showed the Twelve how to administer it. He washed their feet in loving service. By this time, Judas Iscariot, one of His own had left and had received 30 pieces of silver, a small amount of money, even by their standards, to betray Jesus of Nazareth into their hands.
Midnight came, and taking only the three senior Apostles (Peter, James, and John) with Him, went to the Garden of Gethsemane for three agonizing hours. It was here that the Atoning sacrifice was begun. Here where the Savior felt every pain imaginable. So much that He bled from every pore. Drop upon drop upon drop of blood fell to the ground as if it were nothing but sweat.
When it was finished, the mob came, and with a kiss, Jesus was taken prisoner and tried illegally before the Sanhedrin. Then taken back and forth between Pilot and Herod before finally the governors submitted to the crowd crying "Crucify him! Crucify him!"
He was beaten, scourged, and forced to carry a plank of wood up a hill, but He bore it. He was nailed to a cross, but he bore it. He hung for six hours, and bore it before giving up the ghost. The work He was sent to do as a mortal was finished.
He was buried in a tomb outside of Jerusalem near the Mount of Olives. A stone was rolled in front. A dark, dark Friday it was. Saturday passed without a sound. Then Sunday came...
Mary Magdalene, and three other women came to the tomb to change the wrappings on the body. When they arrived, it was gone. A man in white sat on the stone that was rolled away and told them "Why seek ye the living among the dead? He is not here but IS RISEN..."
Imagine the impact of those words: "He is not here but is risen..." What does that mean for us? How do we symbolize the resurrection, which should be the true hope of our faith? Not just that the Savior took upon Himself all of our sins, which is wonderful, do not misunderstand me, I do not mean to undermine that in anyway shape or form, but that He rose from the dead so that WE WILL RISE AGAIN, never to die. Our bodies will become just like His; glorified and perfected. Physical ailments gone, physical deformities repaired, all will become right and whole. That is the victory that Jesus of Nazareth, Jesus the CHRIST, won - victory over sin AND death.
I think sometimes we forget that if it wasn't for Easter, like President Gordon B. Hinkley said, there would be no Christmas. It would just be another birth. But it wasn't. And because of Easter we celebrate Christmas. So I ask us all, should we not place just as much emphasis on Easter in our hearts and lives, if not more so, as we do with Christmas? |
| | Posted 4/13/2009 1:29 AM - 6 Views - 0 eProps - 0 comments
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