Easter—the holiday—comes with a lot of expectations. You expect a good sermon (good and short.) You expect a dinner with all the fixings. Kids expect an egg hunt, but not like the one a mom gave the last time Easter fell on April Fool’s day when she combined the two days by sending her kids out to look for eggs she hadn’t hid. Kids come hunting for eggs. Why not—tradition says eggs represent life. And Easter is about life. So, there is nothing wrong with an Easter Hunt.
There was a hunt that first Easter, more than 2,000 years ago. Disciples, friends and even enemies of Christ came hunting for the one who promised He would rise from the grave. Some went away disappointed; others, blessed.
Easter was a hunt then, and it’s a hunt now—not for eggs—but for the Christ—a Christ you can’t see, but you can believe. So, Easter is really a hunt for faith; not just any faith, but an Easter Faith that blesses.
John 20:24-30 is an Easter faith hunt by a man called Didymus. You may know him as Doubting Thomas. He discovered that, like eggs, not all faiths are the same. Some faiths are “over-easy”—a faith that cracks under pressure. But there is one faith that is “hard-boiled”—a resurrection faith that will not disappoint.
Some come to Easter hunt with a fragile faith where seeing is believing. I call it an Easy Faith (24-25). Thomas came to Easter with signs of this fragile faith:
Absence is a sign of easy, fragile faith. Thomas was missing as the disciples were hiding in an upper room, fearful, disappointed. The tomb was empty; Jesus, missing, but not for long. He walked through the walls, breathed on them to empower them with the Holy Spirit to go into the world. Thomas missed it because he wasn’t there. Pollsters report that only 37% of Americans attend church once a week. You miss the power when you’re not present.
Doubt is also a sign of easy, fragile faith. When Thomas finally showed up, the disciples told him of their encounter with the resurrected Jesus. But Thomas doubted their sound testimony. Weak faith will do that: shut your ears to the testimony of the power of Christ.
Finally, the insistence on “seeing before believing” is a sign of a fragile, easy faith. Thomas demanded:
. . . "Unless I see the nail marks in his hands and put my finger where the nails were, and put my hand into his side, I will not believe it." John 20:25
What he was saying was: “I have to see it to believe it.” But that’s not faith at all according Hebrews 11:1 that says: Faith is the evidence of things not seen. A “seeing first” faith will crack under pressure of life’s disappointments.
But an Easter faith—hard-boiled—is a blessing faith that comes from a real encounter with Christ, where believing is seeing. Thomas encountered Christ a week later when Jesus showed up again in the upper room. He went right to Thomas:
Then he said to Thomas, "Put your finger here; see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it into my side. Stop doubting and believe." John 20:27
Then Jesus forever defined an Easter faith as a blessing faith in verse 29:
Then Jesus told him, "Because you have seen me, you have believed; blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed." John 20:29
With that the harder, better “believing is seeing” faith:
•Thomas went from a doubter to evangelizing India.
•Peter went from denying Christ to preaching Christ— 3,000 were saved.
•Paul, once a persecutor, became the greatest promoter of the Church.
Christ is not like the mean-spirited woman who combined Easter with April Fool’s Day, sending her children out for an empty hunt. Have a real encounter with Christ; believe without seeing. Your basket will be blessed to bless others.
Comments