The meaning of Easter – What does it mean to you?
The meaning of Easter is Jesus Christ’s victory over death. His resurrection symbolizes the eternal life that is granted to all who believe in Him. The meaning of Easter also symbolizes the complete verification of all that Jesus preached and taught during His three-year ministry. If He had not risen from the dead, if He had merely died and not been resurrected, He would have been considered just another teacher or Rabbi. However, His resurrection changed all that and gave final and irrefutable proof that He was really the Son of God and that He had conquered death once and for all.
However, Easter did not always symbolize Christ’s resurrection from the dead and the meaning of Easter was quite different than what Christians celebrate today. The feast day of Easter was originally a pagan celebration of renewal and rebirth. Celebrated in the early spring, it honored the pagan Saxon goddess Eastre. When the early missionaries converted the Saxons to Christianity, the holiday, since it fell around the same time as the traditional memorial of Christ’s resurrection from the dead, was merged with the pagan celebration, and became know as Easter. The meaning of Easter was also changed to reflect its new Christian orientation.
Today, the meaning of Easter, for million of Christians, is that of honoring and recognizing Jesus Christ’s resurrection from the dead, and His glorious promises of eternal life for all who believe in Him.
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Excellent post!
Nothing more important than reflecting on the Creator and what He has done for us and that our hope is found in Him.
One issue since as Christian Patriots we all know that words mean something and we should always strive to be as precise as possible when using them. Unlike the relativistic ultra-liberal cultural Marxists words mean whatever they choose them to mean. Therefore, I would hope that the pagan term “Easter” be dropped in favor of Resurrection Day since that connotes the proper meaning. Easter was a Christianized term used by the Roman church to designate this greatest day of the year. All Easter means to many people these last days is a relationship to fertility (bunnies), candy, and watching sports on TV with or without family – Paganism. All this was lost on Romanism when the day was usurped.
As a Christian Patriot I propose that the term “Easter’ be changed to Resurrection Sunday. The term “Easter” has it origins in paganism as the Roman church went around Christianizing pagan feasts to make them more palatable to the fledgling Christian church at the time. We are paying a huge price for that relativism now at this time in Post-Christian history and it is time to reclaim much lost ground if it’s not already too late!