Which day do you think is more important in the life of a Christian? I posed this question to my students. Many students said Christmas, why without Christmas Jesus Christ would not have been born. More said Easter, without the Resurrection there would be no Christians. My answer is Easter.
Christmas is very important Jesus Christ needed to be born into this world. However, Jesus had free will. Jesus could choose to follow God’s guidance in his life or to walk away from it. Before his first miracle he told his mother it was not his time yet and declined to become involved with the wine. After a bit of encouragement he changed his mind, but he obviously had free will. In the garden the night before his passion he wept blood, he was so torn by the decision he knew that he would make. He actually requested that God take that cup away from him. However, after he accepted the will of his father through his own free will he was calm and endured the passion. Jesus could have said no any where along the way from childhood all the way to the cross, he had the free will to choose that path. He choose the more difficult journey.
Jesus overcame the violence of the persecution through dying on the cross but rising from the dead. If he had just died been buried and remembered there would be NO CHRISTIANS. It was the resurrection that changed the world. He overcame the clutches and chains of death by rising from the dead into new life. He took our sins and forgave us so that we might have that same eternal life at the end of our journey, that we may overcome death as well.
Christmas is very important to the life of the Church. Easter is essential to the origin, and continued belief of a Christian, without Easter there would be no Christians.
