That’s not all there was!

To Christians, Christmas is both a commemoration and celebration of the promise that “God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son so that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life.” If, however, that first Christmas was all there was, and there was no Easter, there would be no fulfillment of that promise.

But that’s not all there was!

Jesus lived and walked among men as a man. He faced the same temptations that all humanity faces, the same needs and desires, the same choices between good and evil, and had to deal with personal relationships and the other problems of simply being human. In the end, it was His supreme faith in God, prayer, willingness to submit Himself to God’s will, and love for us that led Him to the agony and humiliation of the cross.

As He anguished in the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus prayed, “My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from Me; yet not as I will, but as Thou wilt.” The “cup” was not the beatings, the crown of thorns, public humiliation, and scorn, or His agonizing crucifixion on the cross. Jesus suffered knowing he would be separated from his Father while bearing humanity’s sins and sacrificing himself for its redemption so that whoever believes in him might have eternal life.

If that were all there was, that Jesus died a horrible and painful death for that in which He believed, most of His followers would have considered Him a hero. Like thousands of heroes and martyrs before and after Him, He would have either been lost in the sands of time or, at best, become a memory in the pages of history.

But that’s not all there was!

At various times during His ministry, Jesus had predicted His suffering and death and that He “would be raised up on the third day.” The same political and religious power that led to His suffering and death on the cross went to great lengths to make sure that He stayed dead and would become a distant memory as soon as possible. They sealed His body in a tomb with a large rock and placed Roman soldiers to guard its entrance. In doing this, they provided the proof that “whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.”

As Mary Magdalene came to the tomb early on the third day, she found the rock rolled away and the tomb empty. The guards shook in fear, and an angel of God said, “He is not here, for He has risen, just as He said.” In the following days, His disciples and many others saw the living Lord, Christ, Jesus, the Son of God, alive and interacted with Him.

Praise God; We have a risen Lord! One who lives and loves every one of us enough to pay for our sins, those of yesterday, today and tomorrow, by sacrificing His own body and shedding the full measure of His blood on our behalf. All we have to do is accept His gift, for “God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son so that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life.”