RESURRECTION

If you're a follower of Christ, TODAY is the greatest day of the year. Because today we celebrate the most important event in all human history.

Here's why. Christianity is not built on the teachings of an individual. That’s news for some of you. ‘I thought it WAS built on someone’s teachings.’ But it isn't. It's built on one factual event in history ... the resurrection of Jesus. In fact, if you were to pull this one event out of Christianity, there would be nothing left – it would completely deflate. We may as well sell our church buildings and go to the lake next weekend. The whole thing rises and falls, not on a teaching – not on a view of heaven or hell or eternal life – but on something that happened on one single day in history – the big event.

After Jesus' resurrection and ascencion, every time His disciples stood before people, they weren’t saying, “Jesus was a good man,’ or ‘Jesus taught us to pray,’ or ‘Jesus said some really great things about forgiveness." The driving force of their faith and communication was the EVENT, the EVENT, the EVENT ... Jesus rose from the dead.

So why do we celebrate with such confidence that today is the best day of all - that it is the most important event in the history of the universe? Because this is the event that made it possible for us to say, ‘I can be loved and accepted and cared for and forgiven ... and I can actually love others and accept others and care for others and forgive others ... because I'm following a resurrected Savior.'

He has changed my life. I’m not the same person I was before ... and I’ll never be the same again. And it isn't that Christ followers think they're better than anyone else, we just think we're better OFF than we used to be because we've met Jesus ... and we LIKE what He's done inside us.

And so we celebrate this day. Celebrate Jesus. He is risen.

And be blessed.