Easter or Eastre is a Norse goddess whose pagan festival celebrates the spring equinox (see Bible Dictionary). The word “Easter” appears only once in the New Testament in Acts 12:4. A more appropriate translation is “Passover.” Christ is the Passover. He is the Creator of spring, as God “created all things by Jesus Christ” (Eph. 3:9).
After ordering the scourging of our Lord, Pilate brought Him before the angry mob. Arrayed in a purple robe and crowned with bloody thorns, Jesus silently bore Pilate’s declaration, “Behold the man!” (John 19:5).
Man of Holiness is one of Christ’s names. (see Moses 7:35). Unwittingly, Pilate had borne a second witness of the Savior’s divinity. Seeking to release Jesus, Pilate would later petition the crowd: “What will ye then that I shall do unto him whom ye call King of the Jews?” (Mark 15:12).
From the chief priests came the condemning reply: “We have no king but Caesar” (John 19:15). So it has ever been with the world’s witness. We have no king but Caesar: the king of power, the king of greed, the king of pride; all kingdoms of the natural man.
Our dear Lord was condemned by men fearful that if they “let him thus alone, all men will believe on him, and the Romans shall come and take away both our place and our nation” (John 11:48).
The historian Josephus tells us that at the Feast of the Passover, upwards of 256,500 lambs were slaughtered in and around Jerusalem. Christ, as the emblem of the Passover, is the true lamb whose sacrifice is universal. As John earlier declared: “Behold, the Lamb of God!” (John 1:36). Innocent, holy, without spot, our Lord was “lifted up by men so that all men might be lifted up by the Father” (3 Ne. 27:14).
With the declaration of angels, “Why seek ye the living among the dead?” (Luke 24:5), comes the supernal answer to Job’s question: “If a man die, shall he live again?” (Job 14:14)
Christ is the Firstborn and Only Begotten Son of the Father, “the firstfruits of them that slept” (1 Cor. 15:20). Ironically, the sands of Golgotha pelted Roman and rebel alike, yet Christ is the only refuge from the storm.
In an ever-approaching day, Pilate, Herod, the chief priests and all men shall know what Paul declared: “O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?” (1 Cor. 15:55).
Without Jesus, the Caesar’s of our blood rule the natural man. Without Jesus, there is no lasting joy in life because there is no eternal purpose in death. Without Jesus, spring would have no contrast with the long adagio of winter–both in the temporal and spiritual sense.
Jesus is the renewal of life through His supreme sacrifice. He is the Lamb of God, the true Passover, the King of kings.