If you are celebrating Easter this weekend, you are likely thinking about and preparing for either an Easter lunch or dinner with family and friends. If you are hosting, you are making a list of groceries to buy, cleaning the house for company, or (likely for most men) you are making sure you know where you are supposed to be when the lunch or dinner takes place.
 
Even if you are not hosting people in your house, you still ought to be thinking of how you can celebrate this coming weekend. What’s so special about Easter? Easter Sunday does not have some mystical or magical element that makes it “better” than other Sundays. God does not tell us to treat one Sunday with more reverence than another Sunday. Why? Because every Sabbath day ought to be treated as holy (Ex.20:8-11).
 
Yet, because our Christian faith is centered on the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus, setting aside a weekend to celebrate it is more than fitting. In fact, before Easter God established a yearly routine of celebrating and remembering His saving work in our lives. It was known as the Passover. After the Israelites had been rescued by God from Egyptian slavery, He told them, “this day shall be for you a memorial day, and you shall keep it as a feast to the LORD; throughout your generations, as a statute forever, you shall keep it as a feast” (Ex. 12:14).
 
Jesus was in Jerusalem celebrating the Passover with his disciples when he was crucified. Jesus became our sacrificial Lamb of God that saved us from our sin. So, remember why we are celebrating Easter this weekend. God thought of it. Jesus is worthy of it. We are forever grateful for it.
 
Chad