For “Scripture Sunday”
What Easter Doesn’t Tell You
“Do Easter traditions leave something missing in the story of Jesus Christ? What is it that Easter doesn’t tell you about Christ’s life, death and resurrection?
ginosphotos/Thinkstock
Christ died as our Passover Lamb, in fulfillment of the biblical prophecies that foretold His coming, His suffering, His death and His resurrection.
This may sound shocking to you, but did you know that Easter as a celebration has nothing to do with Jesus Christ?
The name itself does not mean “resurrection of Christ” like you may believe. The word Easter actually comes from the name of a goddess of fertility, spring and the dawn worshipped in ancient times. You can go online and quickly learn the origins of Easter bunnies, colored eggs, hot cross buns and the sunrise service. You’ll find these modern parts of the Easter celebration come from ancient pre-Christian religions. They were around a long time before the time of Christ, and they have nothing to do with biblical practice or the Church!
Maybe that doesn’t matter to you. Maybe you believe it’s okay to incorporate these things as part of the worship of Christ. But let me show you from God’s Word why you should rethink the observance of Easter.
Warnings in the early Church
The Church Jesus founded had a very clear understanding of who He was and how to worship Him. But over many decades things changed. Increasing numbers of Christians became confused during this period and lost many aspects of earlier teachings.
How could people possibly let that happen? It’s a sad fact that we have a natural tendency to forget the things we learn. Early Christians learned their true faith by the teachings of Christ and the apostles. But very early, as we can tell from the writings of the apostles to the early Church, heresy reared its ugly head. False teachings began to creep into the Church.
Paul warned the Church members in Asia Minor (modern-day Turkey) that they were flirting with a false gospel (Galatians 1:6). The apostle Peter warned that false teachers among the Christians would “secretly bring in destructive heresies, even denying the Lord who bought them” (2 Peter 2:1, emphasis added throughout).
Gradually, through the years after the death of the original apostles, other teachings began creeping into the Church. Among these false teachings was a distortion and corruption of the truth about the death and the resurrection of Jesus.
Again, Peter warned Church members that there was a danger of “denying the Lord who bought them.” He warned against replacing the clear truth of Jesus Christ with pagan myth and false teaching. Yet in spite of Peter’s clear warning, people bought into the denial.
So, what does all this have to do with Easter?
Easter evolved from a story based on an ancient Babylonian god named Tammuz. The story of Tammuz is at the heart of the pagan world—and at the heart of Easter. It’s a story of a never-ending circle of life without meaning, direction or purpose. The ancient Babylonians believed that Tammuz died every year and that spring showed his “resurrection” by a goddess named Ishtar.
The word Easter ultimately derives from the name of this ancient false goddess. Her worship was very popular, and spread far and wide from Babylon to other regions of the ancient world. A lot of modern Easter customs come directly from the way ancient people worshiped Ishtar.
Why and how did this happen? Continued at: https://www.ucg.org/beyond-today/beyond-today-magazine/what-easter-doesnt-tell-you
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Easter or Passover, Which Is Christian?
“Many believe that God's endorsement of Passover ended with Christ's death—and that He has since replaced it with the observance of Easter as a celebration of Christ's resurrection. But is that so?
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Have you ever compared the meanings and symbols of Passover and Easter? Have you ever asked what God thinks of the two?
On April 4 of this year, a billion or more people who identify themselves as Christian will celebrate Easter. The week before, a far smaller number will observe Passover.
How do these two scenarios compare? On the one hand, we have a fun-filled Easter egg hunt, Easter bunnies galore and an Easter Sunday sunrise service. On the other, a solemn Passover service that typically includes participants washing one another’s feet and partaking of unleavened bread and wine.
Easter seems more fun, more joyous; Passover seems old-fashioned and more serious. These are some differences that are obvious on the surface. Many other differences aren’t so obvious.
My own Easter story
My earliest recollections of Easter included searching for colored eggs that I helped paint and my mother hid. Since I loved hard-boiled eggs, finding and eating those colorfully decorated eggs was fun and quite a treat!
I never questioned the Easter season with its Easter eggs and Easter bunnies. This was supposed to be the most holy holiday of the year, but to me it was more about fun—just as merchants hoped it would be.
It wasn’t until my early 20s that I learned about the so-called “Jewish” Passover. The ministers I’d known earlier had given me no hint that Passover was something for Christians.
I now found this curious, since my Bible clearly showed that Jesus, a Jew, observed the Passover with His closest followers and instructed them, and us, to continue to keep it until His return (Matthew 26:26-29). I was also surprised to read that the apostle Paul explicitly told Church members in the Greek port city of Corinth—most of whom were not and never had been Jewish—to observe the Passover as a reminder and memorial of Jesus Christ’s death (1 Corinthians 11:23-26).
The Passover has great meaning for Christians, being as current and relevant today as it was when Jesus instituted its symbols and told His followers, “If you know these things, blessed are you if you do them” (John 13:17).
And try as I might, I couldn’t find anything in the Bible mentioning the apostles or early Church celebrating Easter. No eggs or rabbits anywhere. I even found that the one place where the word Easter is found in the Bible—Acts 12:4 in the King James Version—the original word there is actually Pascha, the Greek word for Passover!
I was at a loss to explain this. How was it that millions upon millions of people celebrated a holiday that clearly isn’t found in the Bible, while dutifully ignoring a holy observance that is in the Scriptures?
A valid replacement?
Have you ever compared the meanings and symbols of Passover and Easter? Have you ever asked what God thinks of the two?
If you celebrate Easter with sincerity (and many millions do), you likely regard Easter as a religious holiday that superseded the archaic Old Testament Passover. After all, that’s what most churches teach—that Easter has replaced the Passover. But is there more to the story than that?
Even the Catholic Encyclopedia acknowledges that Jesus and His apostles never celebrated Easter, observing instead the seventh-day Sabbath and the annual festivals of God, including the Passover, all listed in Leviticus 23 and mentioned in many other places in Scripture ( New Catholic Encyclopedia, Vol. 5, 1967, p. 867, “Early Christian Feasts”).
You might have heard that Easter came from pagan origins but may have simply dismissed this as irrelevant. After all, God surely wouldn’t mind if you celebrated this holiday to honor Him, would He? Yet He does mind. The Bible clearly states that God wants to be worshipped according to the way He instructs in the Scriptures (see Deuteronomy 12:29-32).” Continued at: https://www.ucg.org/the-good-news/easter-or-passover-which-is-christian
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Peter Rabbit Does Not Belong In A Cage
“Peter Rabbit is a well-known, mischievous rabbit who loves to run through the neighbor’s garden.
He is the star in his own just-released 3D movie, Peter Rabbit. Peter has been around in books since 1901, when his author, Beatrix Potter, drew him and started his adventure.
Animal shelters across the world are nervous because they believe the movie will increase the amount of people wanting a pet rabbit. The timing could not be worse as Easter is approaching, and that also brings an increase in pet rabbits. Not all animal shelters will or can take an unwanted rabbit.”
Continued at: https://blog.theanimalrescuesite.com/peter-rabbit-movie/
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Update:
On Sunday, the yard really needed to be mowed, but it is considered a Sabbth to some folk, so Zack my neighbor, and I deep-cleaned the air conditioner fronts, coils, filters and the ceiling fans. That takes a little step ladder, so I don’t do stuff like that when I am on my own.
Tuesday, as it was going to be the day with the least wind, it was ‘yard day’, so we burned a couple of big piles of pine needles. Zack mowed, and I tried to weed-whack, but the whacker wouldn’t advance the line, so I gave up on that. On Wednesday I took Zack to Conroe for his doctor appointment, and we did a bit of shopping.
We now have the 15-light door that is going between the living room and bedroom in the mini-house all painted, but we haven’t re-hung it yet as it will be easier to lay the carpet without it in the way. Yes, we are ready for that, even though there is still a lot to do.
Claudia, Jay’s Mom, passed away in the hospital, so he is now on his own at 60 years old, and will have to pay his own bills. Hopefully, this will make him grow up and be more responsible and realize that he can’t spend all his money on beer, cigarettes and what-have-you. You would think that a grandfather would have more sense!
Finally, the van passed inspection with a new catalytic converter. That was expensive, even at the discount place, and the lady who was going to buy a door from me didn’t show up, so I can’t buy tags yet. I found out that it would be cheaper to buy the tags online than if you go the County office. Especially, if you use a credit card, so maybe that’s what I will do. Though I hate to charge stuff as I already had to charge the converter.
For the church potluck I made some eggplant into “facon”, that’s fake bacon for those who don’t eat pork or meat. I have made it out of tempeh before and it was quite good, but I must have done something wrong because the eggplant didn’t come out crispy even though it tasted good. So I didn’t take it to church. I dug around in my freezer and found three containers of already cooked chicken based dishes, put them in a pot on the stove to defrost, and took the result in my crockpot so it could be heated through when I got there. Everyone liked it, and some people took containers of it home with them. I also took a big bowl of a cantelope that I had cut up.
On Friday, the pastor’s wife called me as she had cooked some grass-fed ground beef and couldn’t quite make up her mind what to do with it. As I had cooked a large bowl of mashed potatoes, we made it a joint effort, a Shepherd’s Pie. On the Sabbath, we put the two together and reheated it in the church’s oven. I keep a food thermometer with me, so I check each dish to make sure that it has come up to 165°. There are always several other dishes, so I try to check them all. That goes back to when I have worked in various food establishments, like school cafeterias, my own Mini-Golf, and a restaurant and Officer’s Club on an American Air Force base. USAF rules are even more explicit than the regular Health Depts.
The Bible readings were Psa. 32 and 85, Exo. 38:21-40:38. 1 King. 7:51-8:21 and Heb. 1:1-14. The Teaching was about “The Messiah’s Suffering” and the terrible treatment that Christ endured for us, and how it was all foretold in the Old Testament. Isa. 53 and Psa. 22 to name a couple. More than 700 years before Jesus was even born, Isaiah provides details of His life and death which have come true.
More weird weather, heat one day and AC on the next day.
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