The following is a brief reflection I wrote on the season of Eastertide for our church’s newsletter.

The time-shattering event of Easter is too much to take in in only one Sunday. Indeed, there is a sense in which every Sunday is Easter. The reason the earliest church gathered on Sunday, what the apostle John called “the Lord’s Day” (Rev. 1:10), was precisely to mark, both outwardly and inwardly, the new creation inaugurated in Christ’s resurrection from the dead on the first day of the week. But in the historic church calendar, seven Sundays are especially designated as the season of “Eastertide,” from Easter Sunday to the feast of the Ascension forty days later (Thursday, May 21, this year), with one final Sunday as a capstone before Pentecost Sunday the following week. This liturgical rhythm mimics the forty days in which Jesus appeared to his disciples after the resurrection (Acts 1:3), and it provides an extended time for the church to reflect on the mystery revealed in the resurrection of the Son of God.

Christians can usually quite readily explain the meaning of Christ’s atoning death, but we often struggle to articulate the saving significance of his resurrection. We may understand its apologetic importance as the linchpin historical event holding the Christian faith together, but we don’t always grasp its theological importance: what saving benefits accrue to believers on the basis of the resurrection? Eastertide is an excellent opportunity for meditation on precisely this question. As a guide to your meditation, consider this helpful distillation from the nineteenth-century Dutch Reformed theologian, Herman Bavinck:

According to Scripture, therefore, the significance of the physical resurrection of Christ is inexhaustibly rich. Briefly summarized, that resurrection is (1) proof of Jesus’ messiahship, the coronation of the Servant of the Lord to be Christ and Lord, the Prince of life and Judge (Acts 2:36; 3:13–15; 5:31; 10:42; etc.); (2) a seal of his eternal divine sonship (Acts 13:33; Rom. 1:3): (3) a divine endorsement of his mediatorial work, a declaration of the power and value of his death, the “Amen!” of the Father upon the “It is finished!” of the Son (Acts 2:23–24; 4:11; 5:31; Rom. 6:4, 10; etc.); (4) the inauguration of the exaltation he accomplished by his suffering (Luke 24:26; Acts 2:33; Rom. 6:4; Phil. 2:9; etc); (5) the guarantee of our forgiveness and justification (Acts 5:31; Rum. 4:25): (6) the fountain of numerous spiritual blessings: the gift of the Spirit (Acts 2:33), repentance (Acts 5:31), spiritual eternal life (Rom. 6:4f.), salvation in its totality (Acts 4:12); (7) the principle and pledge of our blessed and glorious resurrection (Acts 4:2; Rom. 8:11; 1 Cor. 6:14; etc); (8) the foundation of apostolic Christianity (1 Cor 15:12ff.). –Reformed Dogmatics, 3:442.

You might consider using the remainder of this Eastertide to reflect on these themes and Scriptures, either individually or as families.