Ten Minute Bible Talks Devotional Bible Study - It Doesn't Feel Like Easter | Keith and Patrick

Starting point is 00:00:00 Welcome to 10 minute Bible Talks, where we connect the Bible to your life and the time it takes to get to work. I'm Keith Simon. And I'm Patrick Miller. This weekend is Easter, and a lot of people I'm talking to have felt the exact same sentiment. This just doesn't feel like Easter. It's strange to be inside. It's weird to be thinking about worshipping from our homes on Sunday. And so today we want to talk about maybe why it is that this feels weird, maybe challenge some of that weirdness and also talk about some practical ways that we can, if we really want to, make this feel like Easter. So Keith, I know you've been thinking a lot. about this topic and you said you had a nice little dinner rant with your family last night. Let us sit. Okay. So look, I want to acknowledge that first, it is a big deal to not be able to meet for Easter. I don't want to minimize that, that we can't gather together in the same spot. I think it's legitimate to mourn that, to be really disappointed about that.

Starting point is 00:01:00 Good, because I'm feeling pretty disappointed. Well, I just don't get the sense that when people say it doesn't feel like Easter, that's what they're referring to. To those who are, well, of course, then I agree with you. It doesn't feel like any Sunday the way it's supposed to be when we can't meet together. But what I hear when people say it doesn't feel like Easter is, it doesn't feel like the tradition that my family has done on Easter. It doesn't seem like it's Easter because I haven't gone out shopping for new Easter outfits. It doesn't feel like Easter because I haven't got Easter baskets and signed up for an Easter egg hunt around town. It doesn't feel like Easter

Starting point is 00:01:39 because I can't have my family over for the ham dinner afterwards. It doesn't feel like Easter because we can't do Easter brunch. My daughter has this little book. I don't know where we got it from. I'm pretty sure it's from the library and stripped the page out of it, so we had to keep it. But it's a book about Easter. And I hate the book because the whole book hardly says anything about Jesus in the resurrection. It's about how, oh, it's Easter Day, so we're going to go put on our nice clothes. Oh, it's Easter Day. So we're going to go do an egg. hunt. Oh, it's Easter days. We have this nice meal with our family. And I'm not saying those are bad things on their own. But every time I read it to her, I'm like, I should probably throw away this

Starting point is 00:02:12 book. But that's not actually really what Easter is all about. But according to this book, Easter's just a nice little tradition that we can go do and celebrate as a culture and a family. And isn't that wonderful? I saw essentially the same thing. It was on the Today Show. I just saw a link off of a website. I clicked on it. And they went through how to make Easter meaningful. And it was all about food. And I'm beginning to lose my mind. over this because is that what Easter really was about for us all these years? Are we finding out that what we're really disappointed in has nothing to do with the Christian meaning of Easter and has everything to do with an American holiday of Easter? Are we starting to find out that what we

Starting point is 00:02:54 really cared about were family and nostalgia and creating photos that will help us in our memories or put together a great scrapbook for our kids' childhood? I'm just afraid that we're finding out is that our celebrations of Easter have not been very Christian. And this could even be true in churches. I mean, this is not going to be an Easter Sunday in which the crossing or any other church breaks an attendance record, right? We're going to have to focus on the right things and not the wrong things. But let's just go back through this. Everything that is important about Easter is still true today as it was any other Easter.

Starting point is 00:03:31 I think you're making an interesting point, which is in some ways this can pull. back the veil on a kind of cultural Christianity. You know, it shows that actually, for some of us, the reason why we were going to church didn't have much to do with Jesus. It had a lot to do with, oh, this is something that my family should do, or something that my family should do with other families, or maybe it's part of how I network and stay connected to people. And now that that's gone all of a sudden, again, it's pulling back the veil and showing, you know why we worship? We worship because Jesus rose from the dead, period, end of sentence, don't add anything after it. That's the reason why.

Starting point is 00:04:04 All the things that are really important to a Christian worship at Easter, Jesus rose from the dead, Jesus is king, Jesus triumphed over his sin and Satan and death. All those things are still true today that they were on any other Easter. But is that what Easter is about to us? Because if it is, we should be as worshipful, as excited, as pumped, as anticipating this Easter as any previous Easter. You know, I wonder if to some degree God is using this catastrophe of coronavirus in our culture to slim the church down. And that might sound like a weird thing to say. I mean, as a pastor, I've never wanted my church to be smaller. As a pastor, I always want the gospel to reach more people.

Starting point is 00:04:47 And yet if you reach a Bible really carefully, there is instance after instance after instance where God uses difficult circumstances to purify his people. This little passage comes from Isaiah 121. It's a little salty, so hopefully you can enjoy it. This is a little bit of what God says, how the faithful city, he's talking about Jerusalem, has become a whore. She who is full of justice, righteousness lodged in her, but now murderers. Your silver has become dross, your best wine mixed with water. I will turn my hand against you, and I will smelt away your dross as with lie, and remove your alloy, and I will restore your judges as at the first, and your counselors as at the beginning. Afterward, you shall be called the city of righteousness,

Starting point is 00:05:29 the faithful city. It's kind of an interesting passage because it has a turnaround, right? It's saying, look, you Jerusalem are supposed to be the holy city, the city full of righteousness and justice and goodness, but you're the exact opposite. You've gotten fat with selfishness and injustice and unkindness and all the things that come along with that. And God says, I'm going to smelt you, right? So if you don't know anything about metallurgy, if you take metal, you get it really hot, you can separate the good metal from the bad metal. You can skim off the top, all the bad stuff, and you only get the purest metal at the end. And that's what God says he's going to do. He says he's going to bring oppression against the city to heat things up so that he can remove the dross. Now, all this to say,

Starting point is 00:06:06 I wonder if to some degree this is one of those points in the church's history where God's going to heat things up and we're going to find out who's the true metal and who's the alloy. One thing you can be sure of is that coronavirus is not going to be the end of the church. When Jesus promised that he's establishing the church and the gates of hell will not overcome it, I'm pretty sure that coronavirus falls underneath that. We're not going to see the true church take a significant hit here. We're not going to see the defeat of Jesus' church. What we might find is that what takes the hit is cultural, nominal, easy, comfortable Christianity. I mean, think about the things that the church has had to survive. I mean, even if Cameron was last year,

Starting point is 00:06:45 a few years ago, the Easter bombings or people who are living in countries like Iraq that ISIS basically ran over in the last five years. These are people who, on Easter Sunday, they're running away because their house has been burnt down, as their churches have been torched. They are living as refugees. And again, at the end of the day, it's going to show something. If you remain faithful to Jesus under those kinds of circumstances, you can know, I'm the real deal. This is the real metal. And there were people who turned in. They said, I don't want to lose my house. Jesus really isn't worth it. And I just want to stay where I'm at. And they can play along and sell Jesus out. And again, I think this is what it's going to show in our lives as we are trying to worship on life.

Starting point is 00:07:25 and responding to this? I guess I would think about Christians in the past or Christians around the world today who have endured, like you said, persecution, but have also endured pandemics, who have experienced extreme poverty, who have seen really difficult times, and how would they respond to us in our particular situation? And I just had this feeling that they would call us a bunch of whiners. Not because we want to meet and can't. No, I'm not saying that that person is whining who really wishes we could all be together on Sunday. I'm talking about the whiners are the people like me who are complaining that it doesn't feel like Easter because it doesn't have all the cultural trappings of Easter. Again, that's never what Easter has been about. I had a seminary

Starting point is 00:08:12 professor who used to take trips to a African country where there was a communist regime in charge. And he remembered when the communist regime took over because at that time, Christianity became illegal. And the church, which was pretty large in the country before that, all of a sudden shrunk down to an incredibly small size, because now all of a sudden, following Jesus might mean you lose everything. You might lose all of your stuff. You might lose your family. You might even lose your life. And so, as you can imagine, there's just a lot less Christians. But if you talk to people who lived through that, they said, that was the best time. That was the best time for the church, because the people who were following Jesus were serious about following Jesus. They were serious about

Starting point is 00:08:51 laying down their lives for each other and for our community. The same professor was there when the communist regime fell. And when the regime fell, he saw the church all of a sudden explode again, right? People are coming back into the faith. But if you talk to people, I say, well, yes, it's wonderful that people were hearing about Jesus, but the church got fat. It got lazy. It got selfish and greedy.

Starting point is 00:09:14 And all the other negative things that can come with prosperity. And so again, I'm just looking at our situation and I'm wondering, this is not the same as a communist regime coming in charge. It's not even close to something like that happening. And yet, I think this is going to be something that God uses to smelt the church, to purify us. Let's go away back to the first Easter before it was ever called Easter. And what I mean is let's go back to the day that Jesus rose from the dead. And let's just remember the scene. The disciples are hiding. They're scared to death. The women are very brave and that they go to the tomb to prepare the body, and yet they're very emotional, very disappointed because Jesus is

Starting point is 00:09:53 dead. It's a pretty bleak situation. So if you want to say, how should Easter feel? What should Easter really feel like? Well, maybe Easter has the most power. Maybe Easter is most at home when the situation is the most bleak and difficult and challenging. See, maybe we've had it wrong all these years. When everything is going great and our health is good and we got wealth and we got friends and comfortable and a big meal, maybe that's the time that it doesn't really feel like Easter because everything's too good, too easy, too comfortable. Because Easter, the first Easter happened when times were bleak and difficult. See, Easter is hope in the middle of darkness.

Starting point is 00:10:36 It's hope when, at least based on human circumstances, everything feels hopeless. It's hope in pain to endure difficulty. and death, and it's hope in the middle of fear. See, Easter is the hope that Jesus won, that Jesus rose from the dead, that he is alive, that he is king, that this story extends beyond what we can see. This isn't the end. That no matter where you are in your life, no matter what difficulties you're going through, that Jesus is there with you, that there's hope in your situation. That's what Easter should feel like. Easter is most at home in difficult time. James. The gospel has always been the story that Jesus went through death. And just stop and thinking about that, that Jesus went through death and somehow by God's power came out the other side. And the way that he wants us to witness to the world, to show the world that this is true is by following in the exact same pattern. Our lives need to be a display of the fact that through death comes life, that through self-sacrifice, taking up our cross, comes resurrection, comes something new. You know, I don't think Jesus,

Starting point is 00:11:45 was messing around when he called us to take up our crosses. And so, you know, as we look at, what do we want to do to make this feel more like Easter? Well, I think the first thing we can say is take up a cross. Take up a cross in your life. Maybe that looks like serving people in a significant and costly personal way. Maybe that looks like calling someone who is alone. Maybe it looks like finding a local food bank that still needs help to serve. Finding ways to actually be a part of laying down your life for the sake of others. Again, let's go back to how the kingdom of God started in the church after the resurrection of Jesus.

Starting point is 00:12:21 What happened? Well, people went out and they announced that Jesus is king. And how can you do that? You wanted to feel like Easter? Well, announced to the people you know that Jesus is alive. Maybe that means you get to promote things on your Facebook page or Twitter that you wouldn't normally get to promote because, well, it's. a holiday and everybody kind of gets a free pass. I've got a buddy on Twitter who's got thousands of

Starting point is 00:12:47 followers and he's a very serious, committed Christian, but he doesn't tweet about it, talk about it all the time. But he says on holidays, especially Easter, he feels like he gets a free pass and he's not afraid to use it. It's inevitable that he could easily lose followers that people might start fights with him, might not like what he has to say, but he says, no, it's Easter. I'm going to announce the good news that Jesus really isn't dead, no matter what the cost is to my following. Walking by sight says that we look around us and say, well, look, circumstances are hard. I bet that this is going to shrink the church or the church is going to lose followers or adherence or money or whatever.

Starting point is 00:13:25 But I think the eyes of faith look and say, well, every time there's hardship that comes, God somehow uses it to advance his kingdom, to advance the gospel, whether it's in our personal lives, our families, our community, or the world. So we could be praying and even be a part of that. by announcing the good news of the kingdom. Yeah, the gospel isn't chained by hardship. The gospel is unleashed by hardship. That's what Jesus' cross shows us, right? If the way to life and resurrection and establishing God's kingdom was Jesus coming in on his horse and defeating the Jerusalem elite and the Romans who were oppressing the people, that's what Jesus would have done. But he said,

Starting point is 00:14:02 no, the way that this kingdom is unleashed is by me undergoing death. When Paul gets put in prison in the New Testament, it looks like that the gospel has, quote, unquote, been chained. I mean, here he is, the apostle, the main guy who's the leading the church, and he's in chain. So surely the gospel has changed. But the opposite is true. What we read in the New Testament is that it was through Paul's chains and imprisonment that the gospel gets into Caesar's household and into the upper echelon of the leadership in Rome. So again, through human eyes, it looks like God is losing here. The gospel is losing, the church is losing, but Christ's church. makes progress in difficult times, and God is at work here. Let's be a part of it. Let's don't sit

Starting point is 00:14:48 on the sidelines and wish we'd have been a part. Let's get in the game with what God is doing in our community. This might be kind of weird, but we've been studying Revelation, and one of the things that happens inside of that book, one of the various kind of symbolic things that John sees is these two witnesses, and they are witnessing to who Jesus is. And the fascinating part is that when they are preaching repentance in the name of Jesus, but they're doing it with signs of power. So they're preaching repent, but it comes with power and prestige and everything that comes along with that. John says that no one converts. No one believes. No one turns away. You keep reading the story, though, and eventually those witnesses are destroyed by the dragon. They're defeated and

Starting point is 00:15:30 conquered by Satan. And that's where things get really interesting, because what John says is, is at that point, It's precisely at that point that people actually turn to Jesus. The way the world is going to come to know Jesus, the way our country is going to come to know Jesus is not by us being the ones who are in power and take charge. It's going to come to know Jesus through faithful witness, through suffering, through this kind of suffering, and who knows what other kinds of suffering God might bring upon us. But it's ultimately for the good of his kingdom and to draw many people to himself. Okay, Patrick, let's knock out some ways that people can make Easter meaningful, even though we can't gather together. Let me set it up by this. Yesterday, Christine and I were out for a walk and

Starting point is 00:16:11 there was a birthday party. What people are calling driveway birthday parties, maybe you've seen it, but a girl I would guess around 10, 12 years old, something like that was standing out of their driveway with her parents and her friends were all coming by, honking, had signs, were throwing out like a card or some sort of small gift in the driveway. And what it showed me is that when there's a desire to make something meaningful, like a birthday, that people are pretty ingenious in figuring out ways to make that a meaningful day for this girl and props to them. Fantastic for them. They would help her celebrate her birthday in that way.

Starting point is 00:16:48 But I think we as Christians can maybe use some of that ingenuity to make Easter meaningful. If we can make a birthday meaningful, well, I bet you we can make Easter meaningful this Sunday, even though we're not all going to be together worshiping in the same spot. throughout the history of the church, the period leading up to Easter has always been a time when Christians have meditated. They've meditated on the cross, what it means that Jesus died for us, that he rose for us. And we've created a lot of stuff to help you do exactly that. We've got a devotional, and we'll link to everything we say in the show notes. But we've got a week-long devotional that goes directly to your email that walks you through the last week

Starting point is 00:17:24 of Jesus' life with pictures. And it helps you reflect on what he did and what he was announcing. Likewise, we've got, I think, a really interesting email devotional on the resurrection. Why does the resurrection matter? I mean, the resurrection isn't just a sign that Jesus is God or a sign that he is who he said he is. The resurrection is far more than that. And so we've got, again, a little week-long email devotional. Take this time to actually meditate on God's word and think about what Easter means for your life. That'll make it feel like Easter. Another email devotional that we have was written by one of our pastors on the last week of Jesus's life. And he just walks you through, what would each day have looked like for Jesus? And Kyle, the pastor doing this, has been to Israel. He's got some great pictures. And Good Friday has always been an important part of

Starting point is 00:18:10 Holy Week. And I've always said that Easter will be far more meaningful if you will take part in the Good Friday service. Meditating on the death of Christ makes his resurrection, well, that much more powerful. So we can't be together and do it, but we're going to have Good Friday services. And I promise you that spending some time with us on Good Friday thinking about Jesus' death will make Sunday more powerful to you. So this Good Friday, again, ways that you can make it feel like Easter, we won't only have a service that you can watch online. We're going to be doing communion digitally, and that's going to be a new experience for everyone, but we think it's a great thing for us to be doing together. And likewise, we're actually going to be doing a Good Friday fast and pray. Now, for a lot of

Starting point is 00:18:57 people listening to this, you may have never fasted in your life, but the reason why people fast is kind of twofold. One is to remind ourselves that just like we have a hunger for food and water, we all have a spiritual hunger for God that only he can satisfy. And so by allowing our bodies to fast, we are reminding ourselves of our longing for God, but it's not just that. People have always fasted as a way of interceding. And right now we have a world in terrible need. And so there's actually Christians across multiple denominations, Christians all over our country, all over the world right now, who are going to be fasting together on Good Friday, and we're going to join them to pray for God to end the coronavirus and to be with people who are suffering. And so that's,

Starting point is 00:19:38 it's an amazing way to kind of live into what happened on Good Friday, going through a bit of suffering, no food yourself, to remember what Jesus did for us on the cross and pray that God would be with people. Patrick, when our kids were younger, we used to do kind of family devotionals the week of Easter. Same thing around the week of Christmas, but it's been a while since we've done those. What's your family doing? I know Crossing Kids is putting out some good stuff, but how are you guys using it? Yeah, so this year we put out a little e-book called The Resurrection Tree, and it's really cool, but what it is, is it's got a little devotional for every day of Easter week, and your kiddo, my little three-year-old, gets to color in an ornament, and there's a little lesson that goes along with it,

Starting point is 00:20:20 where you talk about who Jesus is and what Jesus has done, and after they're done, you you hang that little ornament on a branch. And it's all very symbolic because, you know, we tell Iris, hey, look, this branch is dead, but it's going, Jesus is the one who can bring it to life. Jesus is the one who can give it life. And it's been interesting for me as a parent because, you know, again, I can easily say it doesn't feel like Easter. The thing that has made it feel most like Easter is sitting down, slowing down with my daughter, and talking with her about this stuff. So again, we'll link to that little e-book. And even if you, you know, haven't gotten, gotten to start it. It doesn't matter. Start tomorrow. Start the next day. Sit down with your kids

Starting point is 00:20:58 and do some of those ornaments and do some of those lessons together. If you have older kids, there's a couple different ideas. I already mentioned Kyle's devotional walking through the last week of Jesus' life. That'd make a great dinner discussion. Another one of the members of the Crossing has put together a devotional based on the videos that we've been sending out every day. Kind of video devotional. She puts together some questions that are targeted. I'd say, I'd say middle school, seventh, eighth grade, and you might want to check those out as a family. All these things will be linked to, again, in our show notes. But I think what you're seeing is that there are a lot of resources out there.

Starting point is 00:21:38 We have said before here that when this coronavirus thing hit and we could meet together, that in a lot of ways, we became an online church, temporarily, but temporarily became an online church, and you temporarily became an online Christian. And that means that you're going to have to aggressively seek out things to help your family. You can't just sit back. It's not going to come to you. You've got to be a part of making it happen. If you're single, maybe a great thing to do is find another single friend and celebrate Easter together.

Starting point is 00:22:07 I mean, right now we've got a band for people meeting over 10, but two people meeting together, that's a great thing. Or if you're a family and you've got a single friend, this would be a great time to invite that person to come and be a part of your family to celebrate Easter together. And maybe likewise, in our neighborhood, everybody's been getting out on their lawn chairs and sitting in their driveways and talking with each other. Easter has always been a time to celebrate together and to, you know, even feast together. And so maybe if you've got a neighbor nearby, you could socially distance, but bring some food and celebrate Easter together on your driveway. So, of course, there are other ways that are maybe obvious, but maybe not. So let's just say them. You could read a book on the resurrection.

Starting point is 00:22:48 Lee Strobel has a really short one called The Case for Easter, where you're, just walks through arguments of why we should believe that Easter, the first resurrection, was a historical reality, a real historical event. That would make it feel more and more like Easter. You could maybe concentrate on playing worship music in your house this week to focus your mind and your heart on Christ. We've already said serving someone in the name of Christ. Here's the deal. I know this, is that if we can make a kid's birthday party happen, because that's a special day, we can make Easter a meaningful because it is the most special day of any of our lives. And then finally, I would conclude by saying you can for sure eat more peeps. That's been on the

Starting point is 00:23:33 grocery list at my house for a long time. Well, that's the best thing about Easter, I think, is the peeps. And so I've been showling on some peeps. I hate peeps. Well, that's a you problem. I admit. I mean, peeps are delicious. The texture, the flavor. They're so processed. I mean, just you wonder how are these things made? How do these exist? There's nothing natural about them. Well, who cares? They taste awesome and I love them. And so every night I prepare for Easter by eating some peeps. Oh, peeps community. Yellow peeps, blue peeps, pink peeps. Oh, wow. Bunny peeps, duck peeps. I honestly had no idea that there were this many different kinds of people. Well, here's the best kind of peep is the duck that has the milk chocolate on the bottom. And yet I can't

Starting point is 00:24:18 find those. And so, I mean, this is where this coronavirus is really cramping my style. I can't find the kind with the milk chocolate. So that's my chance to tell you to stop wanting. I just want to say, if you can find those, buy me some, drop it off of the church, and I will thank you later. Yeah. In all seriousness, like he said earlier, Easter is the single most important holiday in all of the Christian calendar, because it's the day where we remember the thing that matters the most in our Christian story. Death couldn't hold Jesus. Jesus died and he came out the other side. He rose from the dead, and that's the promise that he's given to all of us. Not just in the future that one day after we die, we'll be raised with him in a renewed creation. It's the promise he's given to us in the right

Starting point is 00:25:02 here right now. His spirit is giving us resurrection life so that we can follow him and walk with him. And that means there's hope in whatever situation you're in. Cling to Jesus. Put your hope in him. Your hope doesn't come from doctors. It doesn't come from government. It doesn't come that eventually everything will be okay. Your hope comes and that we worship a risen Savior. We worship a king. And therefore, no one should be so discouraged that they give up because Christ is alive. That's a lot to celebrate. That's a lot to be excited for. Whether we can be together or not, we of all people should be people of hope and people of joy. If you've enjoyed this content, please subscribe and give us a rating. That helps others find this podcast more easily. Also ask yourself who you could share this podcast with. Texting an episode to a friend or family member is a great way to help them grow spiritually. If you want to go deeper, check out our show notes for book recommendations.

Ten Minute Bible Talks Devotional Bible Study - It Doesn't Feel Like Easter | Keith and Patrick

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