Life, Death, and RESURRECTION!

Predictably, the Armstrong Churches of God are currently all on the anti-Easter bandwagon. According to them, this Christian holiday has pagan origins, and it ignores Christ's instruction to celebrate his death. However, their teachings about Easter ignore and mischaracterize a whole lot of Christian theology and tradition. The truth of the matter is that the Eucharist (celebration of Christ's death) is a prominent ritual in ALL of the various denominations/organizations of the traditional Christian Church. Moreover, the scriptural and historical evidence available to us demonstrates that Christ's resurrection has always been celebrated by Christians.

As for the differences in timing between the ACOG observance of the "Christian Passover" and the traditional observance of Easter, I would like to recommend a post from the As Bereans Did blog titled Primer to the Quartodeciman Controversy. In addition to this controversy over the timing of the feast, we should also note that many Christians celebrate the Eucharist every week (as in communion for Roman Catholics), while others celebrate it quarterly (as in the Baptist tradition). In other words, the once every year tradition has never been the universal standard for Christians. After all, Paul did write to the Christians at Corinth that "every time you eat this bread and drink this cup, you are announcing the Lord’s death until he comes again" (I Corinthians 11:26). In other words, whenever you partake of those symbols as part of his ekklesia, you are portraying Christ's death.

Now, while Christ certainly did institute the symbols of the Eucharist on the night before he was crucified, it is also true that all four Gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke, John) have accounts of his resurrection. Moreover, the other writings of the New Testament clearly underscore just how important that event (the resurrection) was to the First Century Church. Indeed, when the original apostles sought to replace Judas Iscariot, we read in the account that "Whoever is chosen will join us as a witness of Jesus’ resurrection." (Acts 1:22, NLT here and throughout) Likewise, in Peter's inaugural sermon at Pentecost, we read that he said: "God raised Jesus from the dead, and we are all witnesses of this." (Acts 2:32) Later, after Peter and John had been arrested and released, we read that "The apostles testified powerfully to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and God’s great blessing was upon them all." (Acts 4:33) Hence, we see that the resurrection of Christ was considered by the apostles to be an important element of the gospel message.

From Paul's perspective, the resurrection of Jesus Christ was the very thing which declared him to be the Son of God (Romans 1:4)! Paul also believed that Christ's resurrection made it possible for him and Christ's other disciples to be resurrected someday from the dead (Romans 6:5 and I Corinthians 15:12-26) Hence, just as Christ's original disciples rejoiced and celebrated his resurrection from the dead, there is nothing wrong with Christians in the present age doing the same thing!

And, finally, if we are going to get bent out of shape by a few vestiges of pagan symbols of Spring fertility and regeneration, then we might want to rethink our acceptance of the story of Christ's regeneration and what that portends for all of us - his disciples! Thus, the Easter holiday embodies the renewal of life and Christ's victory over death.