Lessons from an Easter Basket

Easter has come and gone, and now it is beautiful Bright Week. As per tradition, I planned baskets for the girls. I went a little bit more 'commercial' and candy-fied than Easter baskets of previous years, but I mostly maintained principle integrity with the Easter baskets.

This year I was inspired to relate previous years' Easter lessons as well as give a Christian reference point to a cultural one. I was inspired, after seeing some people disparage bunnies and eggs as having nothing to do with the REAL meaning of Easter, to defeat the commercialism, 'pagan' roots and other silliness by restoring the meanings of the objects or redeeming them.



Because just how, exactly, do bunnies and butterflies and eggs NOT have anything to do with Jesus? I mean, the Lord God made them, and He called them GOOD. Bunnies don't change into horrible, evil creatures for the duration of the Easter season and then go back to being *acceptable* decorations, pets, and sources of food. You know? The thing is, I argue that God used eggs and bunnies and chocolate first. Since, you know, He made them and all. Just because later, other religious groups picked them up and said "Gee, this could totally be symbolic for me of whatever!" doesn't make them bad, and in fact doesn't mean that they *aren't* symbolic. I mean, the Bible says that the heavens declare the glory of God; so if people are seeing the innate message about new life and perpetual life in things like bunnies and eggs, it isn't because that is crazy and weird, but because God painted that message right into His works. I can hardly fault them for that. Just like I can hardly be faulted for using them the way they were meant to be used in the first place, or if you prefer, reclaiming their use. ;)



It just seems so pointless, such a 'food sacrificed to idols' kind of deal, this picking and choosing. For instance, I always did wonder why Christians were so ready to throw out Christmas trees but wore wedding rings. That is a tradition totally rooted in unchristian things.

Not to mention, for consistency's sake, if rabbits were worshiped as symbols of fertility and therefore associating with all of that is so evil, why were we ok with eating them, having them as pets, using them as non-Easter decorations, etc.? Are rabbits evil? Are they only temporarily evil at Easter? Are rabbit decorations kosher until the month-long period they remind people of Easter? PUT AWAY ZE BUNNIES, OR WE WILL BE LIKE PAGANS.

Yeah, not so much. God made dirt and dirt don't hurt. Wait, I mean, God made bunnies and just because some people missed the point and worshiped creation instead of Creator doesn't mean I have to buy into their fallacies. I refuse to dignify the idea and therefore give it credence by shunning it; this only legitimizes the idea!

Another point...animal sacrifice was practiced, by God's order, in the Bible. Yet at the same time, say, the priests of Baal were sacrificing animals to him (and humans, but that's another story). So...either God is neurotic or it's possible for things to be godly to some people and twisted to others. If we are to 'flee' from evil, wouldn't that include animal sacrifice? I mean, that's the very pinnacle of communing with demons, at least back then. And darkness and light have no fellowship, right? ;) Yet, God commanded the Israelites to do so. Hmmm. ;) And as another friend pointed out, if you look hard enough, you can find 'pagan' or commercial or non-christian roots to just about anything. However, you don't have to look very hard to see creation's TRUE roots, which are God's design and workmanship.

Anyways, just what does this have to do with bunnies and butterflies? And what do bunnies and butterflies and hollow eggs have to do with Jesus and Easter?

I'm getting to that ;)

As I said, I took the traditional symbols of Easter, both religious and non-religious, and used them to illustrate the message of the Resurrection. Spring, the very season itself, is God's love-note to us that there is hope. There is new life. There is rebirth. And believe it or not, even butterflies and bunnies attest to God's plan of salvation.

Bunnies:

Among other treasures, bunny stickers and sweet little stuffed bunnies were included in the basket


Easter, the term, is said to have come from an ancient pagan rite. There are several stories about how this came to be, but you know what? It doesn't actually matter; what spring and Easter mean to us as Christians have nothing to do with however other people chose to celebrate it. Some of what that celebration was about, apparently, involved fertility and the new awakening life.

Well, I apologize if this is news to anyone, but A) spring was God's idea; B) fertility was God's idea, and is encouraged and celebrated in His Word; and C) the Resurrection, what we celebrate on Easter, was also God's idea from the very beginning. As Carl Sandburg said, "A baby is God's opinion that the world should go on." One such spring symbol not typically accepted as 'Christian' are bunnies. Because another thing that people noticed is, bunnies reproduce. A lot. Especially in the spring. Pretty darn good poster animals for fertility, those rabbits. And God designed them that way.

And what is Easter but new life? Furthermore, what is the point of Easter without reproduction? All men die; but to live again thanks to Christ's resurrection is something else entirely! God's power reproducing itself in our daily lives is a pretty awesome thing. So I bought the kids little stuffed bunnies, and attached the following verses to illuminate what bunnies illustrate for us at Easter:


Psalm 127:3 Children are a gift from the Lord: they are a reward from him.
Genesis 1:28 Be fruitful and multiply
Matthew 28:19-20 Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.
Romans 6 Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with Him

You see, fertility is an important Christian concept. Physical fertility, aka children; spiritual fertility, aka Christ's message soaking into our fertile heart-ground and being made new in Him; and the marching order for EVERY Christian, spreading the hope and message of Easter, the Gospel of Good News, to those who have not yet heard. And that is the mini-lesson I conveyed to my kids while I held up their new little bunnies (now named Fluffy and Tika).

Easter Eggs:
Honestly, Easter Eggs could not *be* more rife with rich Christian symbolism. Hollow eggs could be used to illustrate the tomb, or with a treasure, the treasure in the field parable. Or with a treasure inside, the hope of the empty tomb. Of course, eggs are ALSO symbols of new life. But I went somewhere different. I conveyed two truths using eggs, one using regular eggs and one using Easter Eggs.

Regular eggs can be used just like St. Patrick used shamrocks...an egg is one whole thing, yet has three distinct parts that can be called an egg even apart from each other. Just like God is one in His eternal essence, but has chosen to manifest Himself in three separate individuals...God the Son, God the Father, and God the Holy Spirit. For this I made a 'texture' toy. I traced an egg shape on some off-white upholstery vinyl and cut it out, zig-zagging around the edges, wrong sides together, to represent the shell. I cut out a smaller egg shape out of some super-slippery-smooth shiny polyester vinyl to represent the egg white, and a smaller circle out of buttery fleece (two per egg) to represent the yolk. I zig-zagged the yolk to the white (wrong sides together, the extra piece won't show but adds depth and softness), and then zig-zagged the white to one side of the shell. Viola! One whole egg, undivided, and yet three distinct parts.

You can see the egg in the bottom right corner of the basket


Then, I painted a cardboard/plastic egg for each child, to look like an Easter Egg. Then I cut the egg almost in half, or a 'door' out, and glued a small wooden cross inside one half and a pull-out paper on the other half. The pull-out paper had a picture of the child's face, whichever child's egg it was, and a verse. For example, "Ginger is hidden with Christ. Colossians 3:1-4 'Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.'" I then talked about what it means to be hidden in Christ, and just as we hide things in the eggs and hide the eggs themselves, our sins are hidden from God's view because when He sees us, He sees Christ. We also talked about hiding God's word in our hearts, and how just like there is treasure in eggs, so there is treasure in His word.



On a few treat-filled plastic eggs I placed the following verses: "Oh taste and see that the Lord is good!" Psalm 34:8 and Psalm 119:11 "I have hidden your word in my heart that I might not sin against you." etc.

Colors/Rainbows:
Rainbows are God's promise to mankind that He will never again wipe us from the face of the earth with a flood. Rainbows are also a common spring apparition. Color bursts forth in nearly every realm, from creation itself to the fashion industry. Color represents many things, Biblically. God gave us the access to escape ultimate destruction in Jesus Christ, and colors have long been used to describe and represent this. I chose to represent this in the Wordless Book, which I made myself for the kids and "read" through with them.



Flowers:
Another common spring and also Easter theme is flowers. In the language of flowers, tulips represent new life, spring, and romance/fertility. Lilies represent purity, heaven, new life, and resurrection. These are common Easter/spring flowers. Isn't God just so masterful? I bought the girls packets of flower seeds, which were conveniently also butterfly-attracting flowers, since butterflies was sort of the main piece in the theme I created. For flowers, I used these verses:

John 12:24 "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit."
1 Corinthians 15:20-22 But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. For since death came through a man, the resurrection of the dead comes also through a man. For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive.

Just as flowers, unless we die...to our sins, the old man, with Christ--participating in his death so somehow to attain to the resurrection--, we cannot live and be fruitful. (fruitful and multiply...see how it ALL ties together? Genius I tell you!). This is another picture of the Resurrection, another picture of Jesus' sacrifice and what that means for us 2,000 years later. New life, anyone?! New life in Christ here on earth, perpetual New Life in heaven.

Lambs:


Baby animals of all kinds are trotted out in non-religious Easter themes. After all, spring is a common new-baby-animal kind of time! Again with the new life theme, of course. But lambs in particular have a special significance to the Christian's Easter celebrations. After all, it is because of Christ crucified as the Sacrificial Lamb for our sins that we have hope, that the Resurrection even means anything. Lazarus also rose from the dead, but he didn't first pay the ultimate penalty for mankind, defeating sin and death itself first. So, this year I made the girls lamb headbands. I bought some cute headbands from Target, then sewed on a little felt lamb. When we put on the Lamb's sacrifice, we are forgiven. I attached these verses to the headband:

John 1:29 The next day (John) saw Jesus coming to him and said, "Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!
1 Peter 1:18-20 For you know that God paid a ransom to save you from the empty life you inherited from your ancestors. And the ransom he paid was not mere gold or silver. It was the precious blood of Christ, the sinless, spotless Lamb of God. God chose him as your ransom long before the world began, but he has now revealed him to you in these last days.

Butterflies:
This was my original theme, so many of the things I purchased initially had to do with butterflies. But it fit quite nicely into the overall theme I went with! I also was tickled to discover that I wasn't the only one with this idea.



Butterflies are interesting creatures...they start out as wingless, ugly, hair caterpillars, go into a dark and sealed place, and emerge as elegant new creatures called butterflies. I honestly can hardly think of a better natural picture of the reality of the Resurrection than this, and a better picture of how we are changed and put on the "new man". We are new creatures in Christ. We are changed, complete, grown up in Him. Where once we could crawl, now we can soar. For butterflies, I got a variety of butterfly paraphenalia. The most important pieces were live caterpillars, to go into their butterfly garden from last year, and a natural hand-crafted wooden butterfly life cycle set. I got Ginger the cutesy one from one of my favorite Etsyans, and I got Sparrow the more realistic one from Anne Moze. The verses attached read:

Romans 6:4-5, 8-10 Therefore we have been buried with Him through baptism into death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life. For if we have become united with Him in the likeness of His death, certainly we shall also be in the likeness of His resurrection…Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with Him, knowing that Christ, having been raised from the dead, is never to die again; death no longer is master over Him. For the death that He died, He died to sin once for all; but the life that He lives, He lives to God"



Along with a cute book about an Easter animal and adding to our religious Easter library, plus some other fun surprises, I put all of these treasures into flower pots for my two girls. Just like last year, when I reused the baskets for planters (still in use), I figured these flower pots would be the perfect place to grow the flowers given as an object lesson about new life, rebirth, and multiplying. This was one of the 'green', consumer-conscious things that went into the planning of their Easter baskets.

Sparrow's basket:


Ginger's basket:


Altogether:


We really had a fruitful, wonderful time slowly exploring all the treasures and taking in the lessons. I feel like I accomplished my main goal, which was defining these symbols for the girls and using God's creation to explain and illustrate His master plan. :)

One fruitful thing that happened on the very day of Easter was that little Ginger made a commitment to Christ! :) At the end of service, the pastor gave an invitation to any who had never received Christ to raise their hand and do so. She raised her hand. I put it down, thinking she was being silly, but I "heard" the still small voice urging me to let her, so after a few whispers I did. And she kept her little hand stuck up there the whole time, and prayed the sinner's prayer! Afterward we had conversations about it, and her faith is real. Her love for Jesus is real. It was a genuine conversion experience, and I am rejoicing with the angels right now! I received Christ at a young age (3, and Sparrow also received Christ at age 3), and have been blessed with the fruit of that my whole life. Praise God! :)