What Easter Is Not...

My wife and I received this card today in the mail to celebrate the Easter holiday.  It is a very pretty card with lots of color and really cool writing.  Nice and pleasant things are written to the reader which is to promote a warm and fuzzy feeling inside.  And, oh yes, it's made by Hallmark with it's gold seal of approval on the back of the envelope.  But here is what it said...

From time to time-
and Easter's A good time-
It's nice to hear
that you're loved, admired, valued, thought about, and prayed for...
It's nice to know that people notice what a REALLY GOOD PERSON you are.
And you are REALLY.
Happy Easter
 

   If this card was written for a birthday or some special day like a new baby or a pay raise, I may have let it go.  May have. But it wasn't.  It was written for Easter to celebrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ.  So why does this card bother me so much.  It defys everything about what Easter and the ressurrection stands for.  For here is the problem, if people are "good", then there would be no need for Christ be crucified, die, be burried, and risen.  Because if people are good enough, then there would be no need to be saved, and people would go to heaven free and clear because it would be deserved. 

The truth is that people are not good.  This is what the bible says about people who are left to themselves without God:

10 There is none righteous, no not one;
11 There is none who understands;
There is none who seeks after God.
12 They have all turned aside;
They have together become unprofitable;
There is none who does good, no, not one.
13 Their throat is an open tomb;
With thier tongues they have practiced deceit;
The poison of asps is under their lips;
14 Whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness.
15 Thier feet are swift to shed blood;
16 Destruction and misery are in their ways;
17 And the way of peace they have not known. 
18 There is no fear of God before thier eyes.

- Romans 3:10-18 NASB

 

This is basically what God thinks of people left to their own devices, and in their own strength without God.  It is God's indictment against humanity taken from Psalm 14 and 53.  Verses 10-12 is man's character...evil, stupid, blind, useless, and deserters of God.  Verses  13-14 is against what man says with hurtful words full of lies.  Verses 15-18 is against what man does.  He is quick to injure and kill; pain and suffering are in his path and people don't know harmony and tranquility is.  Left to themselves, they will always be at war with God, without fear of Him before their eyes. 

The Epistle to the Romans is a great place to start for anyone.  Whether they are a new Christian, the hater of God, or someone in the middle.  Chapter 1 deals with the wrath of God against the wicked.  Chapter 2 deals with the wrath of God against the Jew and moral man, and Chapter 3 states that everyone is guilty before God...including the Christian apart from Christ's forgiveness (Romans 3:5-9).  The truth is no one is inncoent before God.  We ALL have fallen short of God's glory. 

But the beutiful thing about all of this is that even though we were still sinners, Christ died for us (Romans 5:8). 

23 For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,
24 being justified as a gift by His grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus;
25 whom God displayed pubilaly as a propitiation in His blood through faith.  This was to demonstrate His righteousness, because in the forbearance of God, He passed over the sins previously committed;
26 for the demonstration I say, of His righteousness at the present time, so that He would be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.

- Romans 3:23-26 NASB

 

Jesus was God's gift to us so that we can be justified in His sight, and we would have redemption and be with Him forever.  No one can boast in what only God is able to do.  God is the one who gave Christ to us.  It is by Christ that we are free from the curse of sin and death.  Praise God who is the only one who should be praised.  Thank the Lord for His mighty work in that even though we are all sinners deserving of hell, that He gave us an escape through His Son Jesus, so that He should recieve all glory.  Praise God and Happy Easter.