By Dale Jones
Editor
Right up there with Christmas, I’ve always loved Easter. As a kid, the anticipation of waking up on Easter morning ran a very close second to waking up on Christmas morning.
Oddly enough, as much as I loved the excitement of Easter morning, anxiously waiting to see how big of a chocolate bunny Peter Cottontail left
for me, I’ve never liked jelly beans. About two weeks ago, after a fine meal at the Cracker Barrel, the cashier decided to try to upsell me with some jelly beans. And even though I stood there and told her I didn’t like jelly beans, I bought some anyway.
Hey – who knows? Maybe my taste for the colorful, bean-shaped Turkish delight had changed over the years. I mean, I used to hate broccoli, but now it’s my “go to” veggie, so maybe the years have changed my palate when it comes to jelly beans.
I bought a pack and I ate one. No, not one pack, I ate one jelly bean. Immediately I realized that nothing had changed.
But I digress.
Who amongst us has never enjoyed a good old fashioned Easter egg hunt, using the colorfully designed hard boiled eggs that we dyed with our mom just a couple of nights before? I’ve never sat on the Easter Bunny’s lap and had my picture made, but today, in every shopping mall across the country, it’s an option.
Recently, I read an article where some organization had ranked the top cities in the United States when it comes to Easter celebrations. I was not too surprised to find that the Birmingham area was ranked No. 5.
The article also said that 80 percent of Americans celebrate Easter every year.
Interesting.
Just like Christmas, I think a lot of people celebrate Easter, but don’t really understand why.
Just like Christmas, the commercialism of the holiday has become so enticing, especially to the little ones, that we completely ignore what the celebration is all about.
I’d love to think how different our world might be today if those 80 percent of Americans just stopped for a moment to realize that Easter isn’t about a fictitious bunny, or eggs, or decorations, or a table full of food, or those disgusting jelly beans.
Easter is the celebration of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. It was the moment in time when the relationship between God and man completely changed.
What if people truly recognized the importance of what that very first “Easter” represented to us and to our future.
I apologize if you are reading this and asking yourself why I am preaching a sermon. That’s really not my intention.
I just know this. After dying the eggs, hunting the eggs, devouring the chocolate bunny, and putting on my new Easter clothes, my parents always did something else. They took me to church. They allowed me to enjoy being a child and marveling at the fun that Easter morning brought, but then they made sure I was exposed to what it was really about.
My parents are gone now, but I just want them to know how thankful I am for making sure I recognized what and who I was celebrating.
As for why they continued to put jelly beans in my basket year after year is beyond me.
Happy Easter everybody.