{"id":1539,"date":"2017-04-14T15:57:02","date_gmt":"2017-04-14T20:57:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/belovedlove.org\/reflections\/?p=1539"},"modified":"2019-05-17T15:13:12","modified_gmt":"2019-05-17T20:13:12","slug":"dreading-easter","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/belovedlove.org\/reflections\/2017\/04\/14\/dreading-easter\/","title":{"rendered":"Dreading Easter"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/belovedlove.org\/reflections\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/41417-Dreading-Easter.jpeg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone wp-image-1541 size-full\" src=\"http:\/\/belovedlove.org\/reflections\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/41417-Dreading-Easter.jpeg\" alt=\"Stained Glass church windows with title &quot;Dreading Easter&quot;\" width=\"640\" height=\"427\" srcset=\"https:\/\/belovedlove.org\/reflections\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/41417-Dreading-Easter.jpeg 640w, https:\/\/belovedlove.org\/reflections\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/41417-Dreading-Easter-300x200.jpeg 300w, https:\/\/belovedlove.org\/reflections\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/41417-Dreading-Easter-624x416.jpeg 624w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px\" \/><\/a>by Lydia Floren<\/p>\n<p>When I was little kid, I had very mixed emotions about Easter. I loved the part where I got to decorate eggs, eat chocolate, and dress up in a pretty new outfit. But, I dreaded going to church on Easter.\u00a0 They said the Easter story was good news, but it didn\u2019t seem good to me. It was the story of how mean people made fun of Jesus, and beat Him up, and then killed Him, and that somehow, it was all my fault.\u00a0 What was good about that?<\/p>\n<p>But I know something now that I didn&#8217;t know then: I didn&#8217;t kill Jesus.<\/p>\n<p>Jesus made the decision to die entirely on His own. In fact, He could have changed His mind anywhere along the way.\u00a0 For example, I can easily imagine this scenario happening in the middle of Jesus\u2019 torture:<\/p>\n<p><i>Jesus lifts his chin and focuses straight ahead.\u00a0 Suddenly everything stops, suspended mid-motion. The roar of the crowd turns to silence. The razorlike whip, a mere 2 inches from His torn flesh, dangles in midair like strands of Spanish moss.\u00a0He rips off His cruel crown and tosses it aside. In three long strides, He reaches the men stooped over his robe. He grabs the garment from frozen hands, donning it as He walks away, slicing through the stilled crowd like a hot knife through butter. \u00a0<\/i><\/p>\n<p>This could have happened. \u00a0Jesus had plenty of power to do this and more. But He didn&#8217;t.\u00a0 Every single moment of His life, and every second leading up to His death, He made the same decision over and over again. To stay. To endure. I can almost see Him gazing at each person in that vicious crowd, and as their eyes met, His murmuring, \u201cYou are worth it.\u201d\u00a0 He is still saying it to each of us. \u201cI love you. You were worth it then, and you are worth it now. I have called you by name. You are mine.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>This Easter season, stop at the cross for a while, not to pile on guilt, but so you can be rid it. Let God banish those lies swirling around in your head: &#8220;You are worthless.\u201d \u201cYou are a screw-up.\u201d \u201cYou don\u2019t deserve to be loved.\u201d \u00a0 Ditch the lie I believed as a child, \u201cI killed Jesus.\u201d \u00a0 Stay at the cross for a while and absorb the truth: \u201cJesus chose to die because He loved me, and wanted me with Him forever. That\u2019s how important I am to Him.\u201d\u00a0 \u201cI am totally worth it.\u00a0 He said so with His words, and by His actions.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Shed the lies. Accept the truth. And then move on. Live your life in the freedom that Christ paid so dearly for. Freedom from condemnation and shame. Freedom in the knowledge that you are loved, valued, wanted, and worth dying for.<\/p>\n<p><i>There is therefore now <\/i><b><i>no condemnation<\/i><\/b><i> for those who are in Christ Jesus. Romans 8:1<\/i><\/p>\n<p><i>It is <\/i><b><i>for freedom<\/i><\/b><i> that Christ has set you free. Gal 5:1<\/i><\/p>\n<p>There is no dread in Easter. Only joy.<\/p>\n<p>His joy is us.<\/p>\n<p><i>Fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, <\/i><b><i>who for the joy set before Him<\/i><\/b><i> endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. Hebrews 12:2 NASB<\/i><\/p>\n<p>Our joy is Him.<\/p>\n<p><i>I have told you this so that <\/i><b><i>my\u00a0joy\u00a0may be in you and that your\u00a0joy\u00a0may be complete<\/i><\/b><i>. John 15:11<\/i><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/belovedlove.org\/reflections\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/41417-If-the-son.jpeg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-1542\" src=\"http:\/\/belovedlove.org\/reflections\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/41417-If-the-son.jpeg\" alt=\"\" width=\"640\" height=\"427\" srcset=\"https:\/\/belovedlove.org\/reflections\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/41417-If-the-son.jpeg 640w, https:\/\/belovedlove.org\/reflections\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/41417-If-the-son-300x200.jpeg 300w, https:\/\/belovedlove.org\/reflections\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/41417-If-the-son-624x416.jpeg 624w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>by Lydia Floren When I was little kid, I had very mixed emotions about Easter. I loved the part where I got to decorate eggs, eat chocolate, and dress up in a pretty new outfit. But, I dreaded going to church on Easter.\u00a0 They said the Easter story was good news, but it didn\u2019t seem [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[78,464],"tags":[74,266,225,10,29],"class_list":["post-1539","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-belonging-2","category-finding-yourself","tag-belonging-to-god","tag-easter","tag-jesus","tag-joy","tag-love"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v24.2 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Dreading Easter - Belovedlove<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/belovedlove.org\/reflections\/2017\/04\/14\/dreading-easter\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Dreading Easter - Belovedlove\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"by Lydia Floren When I was little kid, I had very mixed emotions about Easter. 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