What's new with you? A post-Easter reflection

“Well then, should we keep on sinning so that God can show us more and more kindness and forgiveness? Of course not! Since we have died to sin, how can we continue to live in it? Or have you forgotten that when we became Christians and were baptized to become one with Christ Jesus, we died with him? For we died and were buried with Christ by baptism. And just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glorious power of the Father, now we also may live new lives.” - Paul the Apostle to the Romans (6:1-4 NLT)

I’ll have to admit that I find it perplexing to discover that the reason many celebrate Easter is because it finishes a period of 40 days of self-styled holiness, only so that they can now go back to what they were doing before. Is that really why Jesus went to the cross and rose from the dead – so that we could live the same ol’ same ol’?

In the passage above Paul was addressing a spin that some were putting on the idea that because God had forgiven their sins, and it was their sins that initiated God’s grace, that it made perfect sense to sin even more so that they could experience even more of God’s grace. So he addresses that twisted logic with “Of course not!” My personal paraphrase would be “No way, Jose!”

Here’s why. When you or I trust in Christ’s death as payment for our failures (aka “sins”) to live a good life that meets God’s standards He in turn gives us freely His forgiveness. That means our slate is wiped clean. It means that by trusting in His power to erase our wrongs, we are accepting His death for sin as our death to sin. That’s why he writes, “We died with Him”. Not in a historical sense, obviously. But in a spiritual sense.

In the same way Easter, the remembrance of Jesus’ resurrection follows Good Friday, the remembrance of His death, our relationship with Him doesn’t end with the cross, either. That act of faith in Christ’s provision and death to sin was also a new birth. Paul compares it to a personal spiritual resurrection and the opportunity given to us by God to live new lives, not to go back to what we were doing before.

And if you were to continue to read what Paul had to say (and I encourage you to do so) you’ll find that your new life means you now have the power to walk away from old habits, practices and attitudes that you know weren’t right or healthy. You’ve been given a new nature.

But here’s the catch. We can always return to those old ways; to those chains that had us bound and imprisoned. And I love Paul’s transparency. Continuing this same thought the great Apostle admits that he had his own struggles with doing the things he knew were wrong, while at the same time not doing the things that he knew were right. He even called himself “wretched”.

Real Christianity is a new life, not a temporary 40 day abstinence from some fleshly desire. (I still laugh at the idea that God is impressed if I give up chocolate for a few weeks, like chocolate is a wedge between Him and me.) But neither does genuine Christianity allow me to say, “I have no struggles with wrong thoughts or behaviors”.

Instead, it appears that the real evidence of a new life is the desire to live with a newness while possessing the humility to realize that at any moment I could stumble and fall back into something from which Jesus freed me.

Easter is over. But what real difference did it make in your life this year? Paul wrote to the Philippian church that he longed to know the “power of the resurrection” – that new life and freedom it provides. So, what’s new with you?


© 2008 Rick Lawrenson