It’s one day past Easter.  As my dad would often say, I'm a day late and a dollar short.  Forgive me.  We’ve been busy traveling for both spring and Easter break, and my writing time has been hijacked by airport security lines and way too much turbulence.  Still, the most Holy day of the year has been on my mind constantly for the past few weeks.  It still is in fact, because this year, more than ever before, I see the discrepancy in Easter.

Everywhere I look lately, I see bunnies.  Chocolate bunnies.  Ceramic bunnies.  Glass bunnies.  Bunnies holding baskets. Bunnies holding eggs.  Bunnies holding jellybeans. They’re in Pottery Barn and Target and Homegoods and Publix.  Bunnies are everywhere right now, and I get it.  Bunnies are a symbol of Easter, and I’m fine with that.  Bunnies are cute and soft and cuddly. (I’ve also heard they poop more than any creature on earth, but we’ll just overlook that for the sake of tradition.)  

The funny thing is . . . Easter isn’t about a bunny.  Easter is about a lamb.  Easter is about the lamb.

Back in Old Testament days, lambs were used for sacrificial purposes.  People came to the temple with their very best lambs, ones that were perfect, unblemished, and they presented their flawless specimens to the high priests to atone for their sins.  You can blame the whole thing on Adam and Eve if you’d like – remember they were the ones that fell first – they were disobedient to God and the next thing ya know, their friends in the garden, those helpless little lambs were in serious trouble.  They became a creature man handed over to show his need for repentance.  The lambs were slaughtered, their blood shed to remind man that the consequence of sin is death. 

“without shedding of blood there is no remission of sins” (Hebrews 9:22, 26)

Of course, because we were blessed to be born A.D. (can I get a hallelujah for that?), we know that this old testament law of sacrifices was a mere hint of what was to come.  It reminded humans that sin separates us from God, and at the same time, it planted the seed of a bold new idea – that there must be another way . . . a better way.

That way is Jesus.

And he did the unthinkable. 

No, I’m not talking about giving sight to the blind or healing the lame or feeding thousands with food meant for one.  I’m not even talking about raising the dead, though he did that too.  Jesus loved so many people while he walked on earth - -people no one else thought to love.  People considered unlovable.  Jesus sat with them and taught them and broke bread with them and changed them.  Back then . . . still now . . . the way Jesus loved was unthinkable. 

There’s more.

Jesus spoke the unthinkable too.  He challenged the old rules and laws and mentalities.  He turned authority upside down with his radicalism.  He preached love, peace, forgiveness, unity, sacrifice.  His ideas were preposterous to many, exciting to some, and far-reaching even in a time when the spreading of the word came only through the mouths of wanderers.  No phones.  No email.  No newspapers or television or text messaging.  Yet all over the land, they heard about this man and his crazy ideas from those with feet willing to go and share.

At the end, even those who believed began to question.  His followers, the ones he hand-picked and diligently prepared – they didn’t understand.  Jesus can’t die, they said.  That’s simply unthinkable.  He is God’s only Son, Lord over all.  He can do whatever he wants.  He can save himself if it comes down to the brutality he suggests.  

Their unthinkable happened anyway, and it was even more brutal than they could have imagined.  It was savage and horrid and painful and bloody and tortuous and it was exactly what he said he had come to do.  When Jesus breathed his last on that cross at Calvary, naked and beaten, he accomplished his mission.  He did the will of the Father.  He established the new covenant, just as God planned from the very beginning.  His sinners . . . all sinners . . . had a Savior.  Lambs would never again need to be sacrificed.  Jesus was the ultimate sacrifice, the sacrificial Lamb of God. 

He lived an unthinkable life.  He died an unthinkable death.  And yet, the most unthinkable thing about it all is that Jesus lived this life, and died this death . . . for me.

You see that is the discrepancy in Easter.  It’s not the bunnies taking center stage when it’s all about a lamb.  The discrepancy is in the fact that the lamb hung on that cross to save me.  And when everything I’ve done and said and not done and not said screams that I’m not worth it, the lamb on that cross says otherwise.  He says my debts are paid.  He says I’m forgiven and free.  He says I’m a beloved daughter of God forever and ever and ever and ever.

Me . . . beloved?

Unthinkable. 

Except there’s Easter.  And there's Jesus.  And with Jesus, the unthinkable becomes truth.  With Jesus, the unthinkable becomes God's greatest gifts.  The gifts of redemption . . . of salvation . . . of grace . . . of eternal life. 

For me. 

For you. 

For the entire world. 

Happy Easter.