A Bridge to Safety
Easter is almost upon us. Hot cross buns have been in the shops since Boxing Day. Easter eggs, chocolate rabbits, and chocolate bilbies line the shelves. But are these what is Easter really all about?
During the recent rains, I attended a wedding at Mount Tomah, in the Blue Mountains. On the way to the wedding, we crossed the Hawkesbury River at North Richmond only hours before the bridge was covered by rising floodwaters. After the wedding, we headed west, toward Lithgow and Bathurst on our way home. A few hours later, the road we had just taken was closed due to landslides and road collapse. Timing was on our side. If we had started our journey just a few hours later we might have been trapped in the mountains with no way out, a long, long way from home.
What has any of this got to do with Easter? The simple reality is that many of us choose to live our lives as far away from God as we can get. Over time, we have forgotten that God exists, or, if he does, we think that he is utterly irrelevant to our lives in Australia in 2021. And even if we wanted to change that, we can’t, because we’ve forgotten the way back to him, if we ever knew it.
At Easter, God looked on this world a saw people who were trapped a long, long way from home with no hope of escape and no chance of finding their way back to him. So, he embarked on the greatest rescue mission of all time. He came into this world, in the person of Jesus, to open up an escape route, a bridge to safety over the floodwaters of sin and death. This rescue mission cost Jesus his life and it’s what we remember and give thanks for every Easter. The bible put it like this…
"…remember that at that time you were separate from Christ… without hope and without God in the world. But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far away have been brought near by the blood of Christ. For he himself is our peace… He has made the two groups one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility… He came and preached peace to you who were far away and peace to those who were near. For through him we have access to the Father by one Spirit" (Ephesians 2:12-14, 17-18).
This is the real meaning of Easter.
Neil Percival
During the recent rains, I attended a wedding at Mount Tomah, in the Blue Mountains. On the way to the wedding, we crossed the Hawkesbury River at North Richmond only hours before the bridge was covered by rising floodwaters. After the wedding, we headed west, toward Lithgow and Bathurst on our way home. A few hours later, the road we had just taken was closed due to landslides and road collapse. Timing was on our side. If we had started our journey just a few hours later we might have been trapped in the mountains with no way out, a long, long way from home.
What has any of this got to do with Easter? The simple reality is that many of us choose to live our lives as far away from God as we can get. Over time, we have forgotten that God exists, or, if he does, we think that he is utterly irrelevant to our lives in Australia in 2021. And even if we wanted to change that, we can’t, because we’ve forgotten the way back to him, if we ever knew it.
At Easter, God looked on this world a saw people who were trapped a long, long way from home with no hope of escape and no chance of finding their way back to him. So, he embarked on the greatest rescue mission of all time. He came into this world, in the person of Jesus, to open up an escape route, a bridge to safety over the floodwaters of sin and death. This rescue mission cost Jesus his life and it’s what we remember and give thanks for every Easter. The bible put it like this…
"…remember that at that time you were separate from Christ… without hope and without God in the world. But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far away have been brought near by the blood of Christ. For he himself is our peace… He has made the two groups one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility… He came and preached peace to you who were far away and peace to those who were near. For through him we have access to the Father by one Spirit" (Ephesians 2:12-14, 17-18).
This is the real meaning of Easter.
Neil Percival