My pastor asked me to participate in the Easter service tomorrow by sharing my testimony. We’re wrapping up a series, and the topic for this Sunday is “Because of Easter …” I was glad to do it, and although I’m a little nervous, I’m hopeful that people will be ministered to by what I have to say.

On a lighthearted note, I mentioned to my 9yo that I would be helping out during the sermon, so he proudly announced to his brothers: “Hey guys! Guess what? Mama’s preachin’!”  😉  I love that he didn’t think that would be the least bit out of the ordinary.

Anyway, I thought I would share my notes with you. I don’t plan to read it verbatim, but I typed out my thoughts just in case I freeze up on the stage.  :p

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I thought it would help if I introduced myself, to start. I am a writer – technical writing for work and creative writing (in my free time, ha) to keep my sanity. I’m raising 5 boys – currently solo, b/c my husband is deployed to Iraq until next spring, but I have a great support system here at Crossroads and with family and other friends nearby. Our unique family dynamic is due to the fact that I lost my little brother (who was a single dad) just over a year ago, and although I miss him every single day, I am learning to move forward with the life that God has given me to live.

We’ve been in the situation where we lived paycheck-to-almost-another-paycheck. I could spend the rest of the afternoon telling you all the tangible ways that God has blessed us. Am I thankful for a better job, bigger house & so on? Absolutely, but I don’t want that to be the focus. I get frustrated when I hear people (including talking heads from the pulpit) insinuate that if God REALLY loves you … if you are REALLY following the Lord as you should, then he’s going to bless you financially. I could rant all afternoon about that, too, but the point is: Because of Easter, we have enough … period. Period!

Paul – one of the most sold-out Christians of all time – wrote the letter of Philippians from prison. In Chapter 4, he says, “I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want.” And what is that secret? He goes on to say: “I can do everything through him who gives me strength.”

In the car recently, my youngest caught a word of a song on the radio and asked me, “What does ‘circumstance’ mean?” I explained that it means the stuff that is happening in your life – what’s going on right now around you. I told him that the song says we need to remember to thank God even when our circumstances – whatever is happening in our lives, make us feel sad or mad.

As I tried to explain this big word to two inquisitive preschoolers, I thought about I Thessalonians 5:18 (another one of Paul’s letters), where it says to “give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.”

Man, that’s easier said than done sometimes, isn’t it? Sometimes, life is all sunshine & pretty little Easter bonnets, and things are tootling along just fine (*hold up hollowed decorated Easter egg). But then, what about the times when the dark clouds roll in, and our happy little world crumbles to pieces? (*smash egg in hands and pick out pieces)

• What about when your marriage crumbles?
• What about when the oncologist asks you to come back in for another biopsy?
• What about the pregnancy test that is negative … again?
• What about the pregnancy test that is positive?!
• What about when you lose a loved one?
• What about the days … weeks … years?!? … when life is plain hard and just doesn’t make sense?

The Bible tells us in Hebrews (13:8) that Christ is the same today as he was yesterday and no different from how he’ll be tomorrow. If that is true (and I believe it is), then doesn’t it stand to reason that even our tragedies somehow – in ways we may never understand – fit into God’s bigger plan for our lives … for others’ lives … for the world? It’s difficult when we’re so close to a situation and the pain is so raw to be able to see how it might fit into the big picture of God’s will.

I will never know why God saved my brother once from a very serious car accident two days before my wedding [What a nightmare that was!] yet let him die in a different type of accident a decade later. However, I do know that God can (and has … and will …) use the situation to his glory.

If I’ve learned anything through the suffering that I have experienced in my life, it is that I exist for God’s pleasure, not the other way around. God is not a magic genie who grants wishes and assures me a life of luxury. If I can’t praise God when I’m broken and weary, then what good is my worship of him when life is swell and I feel on top of the world? Wouldn’t that just be lip service? It sure wouldn’t be authentic.

Revelation 21:4. It is promises like this that I cling to on dark days. When I have days that I don’t feel like praising God at all and just want to have a pity party, I have to willfully praise God in the midst of my troubles. God is who he is, regardless of how I am feeling at the moment; therefore, he is always worthy of my praise.

Because of Easter … it doesn’t have to make sense to me right now.

Our stories aren’t finished yet. Day after day, we write more of that story. I just have to trust that the same God who loved me and led me on Jan. 22, 2009, did not change during the dark hours of Jan. 23 and the numb days that followed, hasn’t changed during the time that Lane has been away from home and will be the same God who loves and leads me tomorrow and the day after that.

Easter is a glorious story of God’s intervention and his salvation plan for our lives. It is certainly a time of celebration and remembrance of God’s unconditional love for us. However, the very reason why we have Easter … the reason Jesus needed to come, in the first place … is because we are broken in our sin. Easter is for the broken. (*hold up crumbled egg shell)

Because of Easter, we have the hope of eternal life with Christ.

What an amazing, brain-boggling concept, when you really think about it! The Bible even says in Romans Chapter 8 that to be apart from the body is to be alive with Christ. It describes our lives as grass, which grows and dies with the seasons. Our season here on Earth is limited, but we have been given a promise that life doesn’t end with our last breath.

There are still going to be days when I want to wallow a while in self-pity – when I miss my brother so desperately that it hurts down to my bones … or when the boys are driving me crazy and I wish Lane could be home to help. I never dreamed that my family unit would look quite like this. Because of Easter, though, I don’t have to have all the answers … I don’t have to have it all together … because of Easter, I already have enough.

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So, dear friends, how would you finish that statement? “Because of Easter …”