Shane Legler

My introduction to Easter or Pascha season came in the way of decorating eggs with my grandmother. I had no idea that there was anything to the holiday other than eggs, a bunny and loads of chocolate. On occasion, I’d be made to take a break from the “real” celebration; during which time, I was drug to a boring place called “church” and made to suffer, in my young mind, a long boring “talk.” When I think on the Easters of my childhood, I can only praise God that he rescued me from such ignorance and spiritual impoverishment.

When I was driven to the Lord Jesus as a teenager, I came to hold all of the nonsense that had robbed me of the true meaning of the holy day in contempt. I viewed it as Moses viewed the idolatrous golden calf that Aaron made for Israel to worship in the place of God. Let it be ground to dust. Nonetheless, in time, the tradition of the decorated egg (sans bunny) was restored to me as a symbol of the tomb of Christ and the rebirth of man in Christ. From the earliest years, the Christians used it to explain the Resurrection and the hope that it brought to mankind.

Augustine, who was born in the fourth century, compared Christ’s resurrection to a chick bursting from an egg, a comparison he expected to be understood. Some may nitpick with the analogy, but our Lord Jesus liked and used analogies quite frequently. The point is not that the two things are similar in every way. The point is to convey meaning through an object we can all see and touch. Christ broke forth from a sealed tomb 2,000 years ago and gave the hope of rebirth to all mankind, and in truth, to all of creation.

After the Advent of Christ, the resurrection is the greatest miracle and the greatest event in the history of creation. It is shocking to me when I hear reports of so-called “pastors” questioning the reality of the Resurrection of Jesus as a real historical event. To deny the resurrection is to deny the faith. There is no hope of forgiveness of sins, no hope of new life and no Christian faith at all apart from the resurrection.

As the Apostle Paul would contend, in 1 Corinthians 15:14-19, “If Christ is not risen, then our preaching is empty and your faith is also empty. Yes, and we are found false witnesses of God, because we have testified of God that he raised up Christ, whom he did not raise up — if in fact the dead do not rise. For if the dead do not rise, then Christ is not risen. And if Christ is not risen, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins! Then also those who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men the most pitiable.”

Yet, Paul would testify saying in 1 Corinthians 15:20-22, “But now Christ is risen from the dead, and has become the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. For since by man came death, by man also came the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ all shall be made alive.” It is the words witness and testify that are so important in this text. Although the empty tomb is a wonderful symbol of the resurrection of Christ, it is not the reason that we know that the resurrection really happened.

Rather, we know it happened because the risen Christ appeared, not just to the apostles, but to many of his followers. He appeared to Mary at the tomb, who surely took hold of his very real feet despite his objections. He made the one doubter among his apostles put his hand to his side and wrists to feel where the spear and nails had

pierced him, and he ate food in their presence to prove he was not a ghost. He also physically appeared to his half-brother James, disciples on the road to Emmaus, and 500 believers all at one time. After his ascension, he stopped Paul, who had been a great persecutor of Christians, in his tracks and called him to be an Apostle.

Indeed, he surely appeared to even more than these. As the Scripture declares of the resurrection, it was not “done in a corner,” or it would not have been proclaimed by those who beheld the risen Christ firsthand. Many, if not most, of those who bore witness were made to seal their testimony with their own blood.

In our time, we add our own testimonies to those who witnessed it firsthand. I bent my knee to Christ when I first heard the Gospel preached and believed it as a little child. Yet, when I believed, my living Lord delivered me from the oppression of demons and made me whole in both my mind and my body. Therefore, I know that he forgave my sin and that I will share in his resurrection, just as he promised in his word. The resurrection is as real of a historical fact as there can be. Do not be doubting but believing. Believe and live.

(Shane Legler is pastor at Powell Church of God.)