There Is A RedeemerSýnishorn

Happy Christmas!

On Easter morning when I walked into church I saw my friend and greeted her, “Happy Christmas!” I quickly corrected myself. “I mean, Happy Easter!”

“Can’t have one without the other,” she smiled. How true! Without Christmas, there wouldn’t be an Easter. And without the resurrection, this day would be just another day. In fact, we wouldn’t even be in church.

Christmas and Easter are the most joyful celebrations of the year for the Christian. In the first, we celebrate the incarnation (God taking on flesh and coming into the world). “For this is how God loved the world: He gave his one and only Son” (John 3:16).

In the second, we celebrate Jesus’s resurrection. “He isn’t here! He is risen from the dead!” the angel said (Luke 24:6). From the beginning of time, these two days were inextricably linked in the master plan of the Father. Jesus was born to die for our sins and to conquer death so that we could live.

Which is more important? Christmas—the birth of the infant Jesus? Or Easter—the death and resurrection of the man, God’s Son? Both are essential—and both are clear evidence of the Father’s love for us.

Happy Christmas! And Happy Easter! CINDY HESS KASPER

Christmas and Easter—two chapters of the same Book.