Being a Christian and Not Celebrating Easter

The title of this post might sound odd but there's a backstory that explains it. At least I hope so.

Growing up in the 60's & 70's the way we celebrated Easter was to open our Easter Baskets, then attend church in the morning (dressed in our "Easter best" because apparently that was [still is] a thing in American culture), then later, attend the Easter Egg hunt on the church lawn, weather permitting. 

Later in the afternoon we'd go to grandma & grandpa's house for supper & Easter desserts.

Growing up in those days, Easter was all about food, fashion & family traditions. 

Ironically, nothing about Easter was about Jesus, except the morning sermon references to Him that no one ever really remembered. 

In real time, it was all about dyed eggs, novelty shaped chocolate treats, your outfit, and everyone's favorite dinner & dessert items that were coming up later.  The Sunday morning church service was just sort of a technical thing everyone was expected to do, before really getting to the good stuff & enjoying all the Easter fun. As a kid, that was mostly just the candy & later on the holiday desserts after supper.

As I entered adulthood and had kids of my own, I carried on many of the same traditions (minus the church attendance - because I wasn't a Christian).  And then one day out of nowhere by the grace of God I actually got saved, became a genuine believer, and everything changed, quite radically. That was 1994. 

Somehow, I almost immediately became rather legalistic and balked at the idea of any "traditional" thing I'd ever grown up with, connected to Easter. The whole issue brought a great deal of sorrow and tears, mostly because I felt like we'd all been focusing on all the wrong things the entire time. What the actual heck were we even doing?  I was utterly confused about what anyone was really celebrating. Eggs? Bunnies? Chocolates? 

I couldn't walk into my local grocery store without seeing the "Easter" items being promoted, that had absolutely nothing to do with Christ's resurrection from the dead, without feeling like I was spiralling into this weird, "righteous anger" about what "Easter" was supposed to be about. It was the most complicated jumble of feelings I've ever dealt with when it comes to a simple "holiday".  At the same time, I didn't feel like I had any right to have any kind of "righteous anger" because I'm a rotten sinner just like anyone else. And yet, it was still there.  

Even though I have been a Christian for the last 32 years, my family has never celebrated Easter the way the world does, because none of those traditions have anything to do with Christ's resurrection.

I've only recently (in the last few years) come to learn that there are Christian families that celebrate our Savior's resurrection in a right and biblical and most God honoring way, and I'd love see tons more examples of that. Especially for young families & believers so that they can set up & plan their own traditions of celebrating the Resurrection of Christ in the best ways that honor Him. I wish I would have known these things 3 decades ago, so that I could have started my own Christ honoring traditions then. 

I think a lot about this stuff and it's been a weird and complicated and very unpleasant dissection of what this holiday really means.  I'm still trying to figure it all out.

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