Happy Easter!!! Easter is the greatest am I right? The bright colors, the Reese’s Eggs, family, and of course spring dresses! Spring is in the air! (or at least on somedays it feels that way…Midwest life am I right?) The trees are blooming, I can hear the birds chirping in the mornings, and it smells…well, it smells so fresh outside.

Spring has always been my favorite season. I love the symbolism. In the winter everything feels lifeless and colorless, but God is faithful! Every spring, new life blooms out and what was once dormant and dreary becomes alive and beautiful once again. It’s so very symbolic of Jesus’ life and resurrection. After He was crucified, Jesus spent three days in the grave. During this time, the disciples faced tremendous sorrow, confusion, and fear. It’s easy to see why. They had given everything. They gave their very lives to follow the man whom they believed to be the Christ and then saw Him be crucified. I’m sure they fought doubts of “what now?” or “was it all for nothing” or “was He really the Christ” or “am I next?”.

It was a very scary, very dark time for them I’m sure. Then…Jesus shows Himself alive bringing celebration, joy, and boldness and….LIGHT! Yessss! The thing is, Jesus didn’t triumphantly parade Himself around. He came in humility (gosh He is so consistent isn’t he?). He revealed Himself gently and only to those who had already believed. He empowered the disciples by endowing them with the Holy Spirit. Jesus defeated the grave and rose victoriously to be seated at the right hand of the Father. This very thing is what separates Christianity from any other religion. Because He is alive! The Bible is the living word and we serve a living God! How awesome is that?!

Often it is very hard to share holidays with family and decide who we are doing what with. Not because we don’t want to share, but because for the first time in our lives we have to decide. That’s actually been one of the toughest things about marriage. It’s heartbreaking having to choose! Both families are so important and we have so much love for them. So with that being said, Kirby and I have decided that Easter will be our holiday with no traveling and no choosing but rather inviting everyone to join us. It is so important to us that we are going to do Easter BIG. Our hope is to make it the holiday that our children someday can reflect back on their lives and remember Easter as being the most exciting, fun and anticipated holiday celebrated in our home.

Why? Because without the sacrifice Jesus made for us, we would never be able to experience the love, mercy, forgiveness, grace, and relationship with God that we now do. We live in a blessed time in history. Jesus lived the life we could never live and died the death each of us deserved. He was perfect and kind. He was spit on, mocked, beaten and crucified by the people He was hanging on that cross to save. He physically became all sickness and disease. The Bible says that He sweat drops of blood. I looked that up once and found that that is often a sign that the heart has ruptured. Why did He go through with it? ……because He saw you. He saw that it was worth it for you. THAT is worth celebrating.

I hope you all have had an absolutely magnificent Easter with your family! I hope you make the prettiest dyed Easter eggs. I hope you ladies pulled out your Spring outfits from storage that are begging to be worn. I hope you splurge on a few Reeses and find all of the eggs in the hunt. Most importantly, I hope today that you have found new meaning or a renewed enthusiasm for what Easter means. You are so immensely loved. Happy Easter sweet friends!

PS. Please be sure to check out my husband’s new video project called Wake by Faith. It premiers tomorrow on alliancewake.com.  We have put our hearts into this project for months and tremendously excited to finally release it. The video is accompanied by a devotional I wrote with Kirby’s help that is specific to wakeboarders. You can download the devotional at kirbysschoolofwake.com/blog