Resurrection Proliferation

Easter is to Satan what nuclear weapons were to the Japanese emperor of '45. Easter is checkmate. And while nuclear weapons represent the worst of human destructive potential, Easter is reserved for destroying destruction itself. It is the ultimate in guided missiles and never destroys innocent civilians. In fact, when it explodes it creates innocent civilians. It blows away the penalty of sin while leaving the sinner clean.

Ground zero of Easter is death itself, removing it's stranglehold on the human race and stretching a ladder that reaches from the burning building of this world's system to the light and glory of God's presence. Easter offers freedom, and the fragrance of the resurrection flower is a strange smell to those who pack the concentration camps of Satan's kingdom. The kingdoms of the millions of churches around the world are to the enemy the terrible sound of warplanes thundering destruction from the air to the tyranny of darkness.

The truth of the resurrection offers freedom to the captive, and we are all born captive. Bondage keeps us from experiencing freedom, from desiring freedom, and even from understanding freedom.

We are the frog born in the kettle. We live in the filth and degradation of sin and don't feel it because we are accustomed to it and know nothing else. We're like the woman who has had migraine headaches for 30 years and lived with it because she thought it was normal. Once she received treatment to relieve her pain, she awakened to a new world.

We are the children born into the crazy, religious cult, who live in fear and convinced we are undeserving of anything better. We take our meager scraps of existence from our master until grace sets us free. And even still, we must re-learn to live life in the new world.

We are the addict, whose world grows ever more narrow until there is nothing but the drug. No family, no sunshine, no joy can penetrate our world. We serve the next fix, and the dealer who owns our souls. So when Easter detoxifies our souls we still must learn to live without the familiar, and get to know family, and understand overwhelming joy.

When Jesus comes, we find a thirst for freedom we didn't know we had. Most preachers talk about how people came to the cross thirsty and tired of their wretched lives of sin. Some certainly do, but most don't realize just how thirsty and wretched their lives were until they taste the freedom in Christ. Once we taste we want more, in direct proportion to the bondage we were in.  Jesus pointed out "he who is forgiven much, loves much."

May the bomb of grace explode in our lives, destroying what we thought we couldn't live without and replacing it with genuine joy and freedom; and especially an affection for our creator that absorbs our attention like Facebook absorbs so many teenagers.

God loves people.