The Reason to Reflect

The Reason to Reflect

This year, I am taking more time to reflect on Easter and what it truly means. I will be traveling over Easter weekend this year, so I will not be partaking in the usual activities and services that I normally would.

My first thought was around missing our big family get-together where we enjoy good food, conversation, and an Easter egg hunt for the kids, and a rather serious and competitive one for the adults. Even though this is something I will miss dearly, I do not want it to be the only thing I think about when I think about the Easter season.

Easter is a momentous occasion and should be thought of as such. It is not just a holiday to forget, but one to be saddened and overjoyed and celebrated for those in the Christian faith. There are several events that occur over the period of about a month and a half around this holiday, each with their own importance.

• Lent is a time to be devoted to fasting, abstinence, and penitence in commemoration of Christ's fasting in the wilderness. In the Western Church it runs from Ash Wednesday to Holy Saturday equates to forty weekdays.
• Ash Wednesday is the first day of Lent. This day there is a tradition of donning ashes as a sign of penitence that predates Jesus and is seen in the Old Testament of the Bible. It is a reminder of our mortality and need to be reconciled with God.
• Palm Sunday is the start of Holy Week. It is a remembrance of when Jesus arrived in Jerusalem and people greeted him with by calling him Hosanna, savior, and waving palm branches. Palm branches were symbols of victory and triumph at the time.
• Good Friday is the Friday before Easter. This commemorates the day of Jesus' crucifixion, death and burial. This day is a reminder of God's love for us by His sacrifice of His son. With Jesus' death, it fulfills the Old Testament prophecy.
• Easter is the celebration of Jesus Christ's resurrection form the grave. Three days after His death, He fulfilled His promise to come back to the world as our Savior and hope. By raising from the grave, he showed His divinity as God's son. This day ends Holy Week.

I hope this gives you a reason to celebrate and reflect on this season a little differently this year.

"Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ form the dead, and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade. This inheritance is kept in heaven for you, who through faith are shielded by God's power until the coming of the salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time." --1 PETER 1:3-5