Celebrating a Defining moment.
Holidays are loved and celebrated by many all around the world. One of these great holidays is Easter. Like any other holiday different people celebrate it for different reasons and in different ways. For some it is just another holiday to take time out and rest from their busy schedule, for some it is time for family reunions and gatherings characterised with big meals and fun activities and many others with different views also celebrate it differently.
However, for us the followers of Jesus, Easter is a season of remembering and celebrating a defining moment for the entire human race. It is a time that we reflect and celebrate the death burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ. This is a very special event in the Christendom. Besides the spectacular happenings around the event, the death of Jesus on the cross is the event that made “life in Abundance” available and possible for humanity. It is the death burial and resurrection of Jesus that changed the fate of humanity. We were all doomed to eternal damnation, but the death burial and resurrection of Jesus averted it all. Now we have access again to eternal life because of what transpired on this event we celebrate as Easter. This is the reason why I call it a defining moment.
Let us look at a few things that happen around the death of Jesus;
1. Scripture tells us that as Jesus was being crucified there was darkness all over the land, the sun could not give its light for a while. Mark15:33 NIV. “At noon, darkness came over the whole land until three in the afternoon.” This is how powerful the event was. There hasn’t been an event that has shut down the sun for three hours straight ever since the history of man let alone a few minutes. We have had solar eclipses which only lasts a few minutes, but to have complete darkness for three hours shows the intensity of the event that was happening.
2. The veil of the temple was torn from top to bottom. Matthew 27:51 NIV. “At that moment the curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. The earth shook, the rocks split” Scholars and historians all agree that the veil of the temple which was torn at the death of Jesus was not a simple everyday curtain that could be easily torn. It was a heavy fabric that took tremendous effort to tear it apart. Therefore, having it tear by in the manner described by the scripture signifies some divine activity in it. This happening while Jesus is dying is a sure sign of something supernatural being accomplished by the death of Jesus.
I believe that occurrences mentioned above are just some of the physical expressions of a more superior event that was taking place in the unseen world. As Jesus died on that cross there was a spiritual transaction that was happening. The sins of humanity were being atoned. Remember that John the Baptist had attested to that effect in the earlier stages of Jesus’ ministry. John 1:29 KJV “The next day John seeth Jesus coming unto him, and saith, Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world”. The spiritual debt that we owed was paid for by the death of Christ on the Christ. The whole human race that was doomed and heading to eternal damnation got the fate reversed to all those who will believe in the work that Jesus did on the cross. John 3:16 KJV says “For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whosoever believes in him will not perish but have everlasting life”.
Therefore, when we celebrate Easter, we are celebrating a defining moment, we are celebrating the demonstration of God’s love for us all. We are celebrating the way we have been given to eternal life, and we are celebrating all that Jesus accomplished for us on the cross.
Joseph Dhlakama
