Billy Ray Parrish
Easter is one of the most important holidays in the world and is one of the favorites within the United States as many people get together to honor and celebrate the day together; it is about more than just cookouts and picnics. The remembrance begins with Good Friday which honors the day that Christ came to Earth to die for the sins of all people. The fact that Christ came to die for His creation is just one reason why it is called the “Greatest Story ever told.”
While the story is great, many people, including many Christian, find it hard to grasp the concept of why God had to come to Earth to die for His creation in order to save them. After all, God can do all things, right? Of course, God is able to do all things but God is a gentleman and does not force anyone to do anything and the best example of this is Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden as the original creation was designed for perfection between man and God.
However, when Adam and Eve disobeyed God by eating from the tree of knowledge of good and evil (Genesis 2 -3), man was separated from God and has been ever since. In order for His creation to be eternally saved, a sacrifice had to be made so God sent a great flood to destroy the wickedness of His creation (Genesis 6-9). While the flood did destroy the wickedness and evil upon the Earth, it did not work one hundred percent.
In other words, while God did repopulate the Earth with Noah and his family; beginning with a pure bloodline, there was still something missing as the new population still possessed wickedness just like before. Rather than sending another natural disaster, God took things into His own hands and became man and was born of a virgin birth.
No other story in the history of the Earth tells of such a magnificent scene as the creator of the Earth, the King of all Kings, who is all perfect became flesh and was born a very modest birth in a stable (Matthew 1:18-25). In today’s world, just as in previous generations, those with money and power were apart of luxury beyond what most have known or will ever know but the birth of Christ was much different just as the life that He lived.
The lesson here is that God had to become man, in the form of Christ, and become the sacrifice in place of man and die on a cross in Golgotha or the place of the skull. Luke 23:33 of the King James Version uses Cavalry in reference to this location: ”And when they were come to the place, which is called Calvary, there they crucified him, and the malefactors, one on the right hand, and the other on the left.”
The story of Easter is truly a very humbling and heart wrenching story for not just Christians but those of all faiths as Christ is the only person in the history of the world to come to Earth, profess to be God, and died for that cause. While Christ was not the first person to be crucified on this Earth as crucifixion was a popular form of execution during this period of time, without question, His is the most important one.
Therefore, the story of Easter is much more than one of salvation but of love. If Christ had not come to Earth to die and save us from what we, as sinners, deserve then none of us would have an opportunity for salvation. Romans 6:23 reminds us that “For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.”
Regardless of how good we think we are, compared to God, our righteousness is like rags and we are told as much in Isaiah 64:6 “But we are as an unclean thing. And all our righteousness’s are as filthy rags; And we all do fade as a leaf; And our iniquities, like the wind, have taken us away” but through Christ’s ultimate sacrifice, we are saved through God’s grace: “For Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit” (1 Peter 3:18).
And when they were come to the place, which is called Calvary, there they crucified him, and the malefactors, one on the right hand, and the other on the left.”
–Luke 23:33
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