easter re:visited

The resurrection is the focal point of the Christian faith. Going hand-in-hand with Jesus’ torture and death, the resurrection serves as a signpost to something great going on in our world. I can’t count on my fingers the number of sermons I’ve heard or read that tell us that Jesus’ resurrection took place to show us that we will go to heaven when we die, and that we can have hope in this life that things will get better in the next. This is perhaps one of the greatest misconceptions about the resurrection that I have ever heard. So give me a moment and let me tell you what I think the resurrection is all about, and why Easter should be celebrated everyday. So, behold: my *current* interpretation of “Easter.”

The early Christians called Jesus “the Christ.” Christ is a Greek word for Messiah. “Who is the Messiah?” Jesus believed he was the Messiah, and Christians believe, too, that he is the Messiah. To understand the implications of Jesus’ identity as the Messiah, we need to look down through the centuries of ancient Jewish thought, where a theology of waiting for the Messiah developed. The Jews anxiously awaited the Meshiach (or Messiah in Hebrew), and the Israelite poets and prophets spoke of this Messiah. They prophesied that he would be a human figure who was somehow divine, they believed that through the Messiah God would truly become king of the entire universe, and this would take place when God would overthrow the oppressing world empires (in the days of Jesus, the great oppressing empire was the Empire of Rome). These empires—these “monsters”—would be judged by the Messiah, and this would be the beginning of the coming of God’s kingdom, where God would rule the world in a sovereign and evident way, judging evil, vindicating His people, putting everything to rights, and making the world beautiful. The resurrection, I believe, is a testament to the true arrival of God’s kingdom, and thus a testament to one of the greatest themes of the kingdom of God: the new creation.

When we speak of the “new creation” in the biblical sense, we are not speaking of something entirely new. Rather, we are speaking of a creation that will be restored, rejuvenated, regenerated, made complete. The prophets spoke of the Messiah coming and bringing justice, restoring the Temple, re:invigorating the Law, and bringing worldwide peace and prosperity as he “replants” the Garden of Eden (the clearest picture of this “new creation” is not found in Revelation, as many surmise, but in Genesis 1-3). The Messiah will enact a great reversal, a “homecoming” of Eden, and Christians understand this “new creation” to be taking place in Christ. Has Christ completed the new creation? No. He is currently at work bringing this new creation to work, working through the Holy Spirit and through his followers, Christians. When the new creation is finally complete (something theologians call the “consummation”), the universe will be restored to its original beauty and grandeur: the inhabitants and its cities will be beautiful, peaceful animals will fill the countryside, and the mountains and hills will sing for joy.

When Christ rose from the dead, the new creation began. A new era in the history of humanity dawned. It was the era the prophets spoke about, the era of the birthing of a new creation. As I write this, God is at work in the world, spinning the universe into a mosaic of beauty (many of you may wonder if I am postmillennialist; in answer to that question, I respond, “I’m not sure.”). As Christians, we should look at the resurrection of Christ as the beginning of the new creation, a restored universe that includes everything from the tiniest microbes to the vastest galaxy clusters. And we should see the greatest beauty in this new creation: our restored relationship with God. Eden is being reversed; the greatest curse laid upon us by God for our grave rebellion was becoming cut-off from His friendship. But now, through the suffering and resurrection of the Messiah, we are able to become friends with Him if we so desire. The resurrection invites us—no, summons us—to embrace the reality of the new creation, letting it saturate our lives, and to co-labor with God in bringing His new creation to pass.