Here comes the post dedicated to anyone who isn’t feeling all Easter-y today.  Somebody had to write it, right?

Worse…. what if you’re a Christian and you’re not feeling all Easter-y today?! Is that even allowed?

What if today some of us Christians aren’t contributing to the social media flood of “He is Risen!!!” because we honestly just don’t have it in us to put 3 exclamation points behind anything right now. 

If that’s you, come on in. You’re in the club now. We’re having a meeting. 

I’m in a sad season right now, you guys.  Hard things are happening.  Yesterday I was officially to the point where I was taking out my mood on all things “Easter”. 

I made a stupid egg casserole, and some dumb cinnamon rolls. 

I put up the lame decorations. 

I serial-killer laughed so hard at the Easter-egg dye kit.  Oh mannnnnn. I seriously think that kit thought that we were going to use it this year… That we would ACTUALLY do the dying of the eggs.  

And last night at 11pm when I was putting the kids’ baskets together, I cussed out EVERY SINGLE PLASTIC EGG that dared to not have a top.  I literally told the bottom half of a cute little yellow chick-egg that I would “see you in the fiery depths of hell.” 

This morning, however, I decided that I better change my attitude and be precious for my children and God.  I woke early and set the table for my not-stupid casserole.  I got out the fancy cups and poured the orange juice. 

When the kids got downstairs, I asked them to sit together on the couch so I could get one of those cute obligatory Easter morning pictures that everybody gets on Easter morning.  As you can see, that turned out awesome, and ended with a bloody nose. 

After cleaning what anyone would’ve believed to be a red-soaked crime scene, nobody wanted to eat my casserole because it had “weird white things in it.”  I explained that the white things were called “eggs”, but everyone thought I was lying.  As an added bonus, one of my kids went ahead and broke a plate, and another one dropped an entire 2-liter bottle of Sunkist on the cat. 

We still have 10 hours of daylight left over here, people.     

I don’t have a victorious Christian spirit today.  For the past month I have been emotionally and spiritually struggling HARD.  I feel it when I wake up.  It’s waiting for me sometimes before I even open my eyes, and it piggy-backs on me through the whole day.  Life has this supernatural weight to it right now. I’m sad. I’m worried.  I’m fearful.  And I basically feel like I’m losing. 

That’s what it is. 

I feel like I’m losing.

Maybe you feel that way too.  I mean….strictly “pandemic” speaking, the feeling of loss is rampant right now.  The entire world is in a collective state of mourning one thing or the other.

The kids are arm-wrestling out on the trampoline now, and the cat has run out of the house and disappeared.  If he’s smart, he’ll just keep running…far, far, away from this house, and find a new family that doesn’t drink Sunkist.  It’s only a matter of time before I’ll be asked to bandage another wound, or determine who is stronger than who, so I wanted to say this….

What do we do when we feel like we’re losing?  When nothing feels good, or right, or secure? What do we do when everything around us seems to be falling apart, and then all of a sudden Easter is here, and it has the nerve to be all up in our faces?!!!

Uh, well….this is what I did…. 

I told my kids to please not die for 30 minutes, and I went to my bathroom and locked the door.  I stood in front of the mirror looking at my pajamas and greasy hair, and just allowed myself to cry it out for a few minutes.   

One of the best gifts I’ve ever given myself is the permission to cry.  It has saved me in more ways than one.  If you haven’t given yourself this gift yet, I highly recommend it. 

Next, I decided to just completely dissect Easter. 

I stripped it all the way down. 

I took away all the casseroles, and the candy, and the cute Easter pictures.  I took away all the exclamation points, and the catchy popular sayings.   I took away the experience of church, and the pretty dresses, and the choirs singing.  I threw out all the expectations of how I thought I should be feeling as a “Christian on Easter Sunday.”  I just kept grabbing at things in my mind and tossing them to the side…like a teenage girl searching for her favorite necklace in a trashed-out bedroom. 

And this is what my strip-search left me with…

I’m not losing. 

None of us who are in relationship with Christ are losing, because it’s just not possible. 

The second He walked out of that tomb, the last sentence of my life story was written. 

So was yours.

We win.  Remember?

We. Totally. Win.

The fact that I don’t feel like a winner right now, means nothing.

I think there’s an extremely liberating maturity point in a Christian’s life when they begin to distinguish between what they’re feeling during a tough season, and what they know to be ultimate truth.  And  they will always choose the knowing over the feeling.  They will experience the walls crashing down around them, and feel the pain.  They will be scarred, and they will go through whole seasons of loss.  They will cry, and the hurt will be deep.  But they KNOW how it’s going to end.  And they choose the knowing.  And suddenly it’s okay to lose a few battles.  Because hey,…the war is already won.    

That’s the person I want to be. 

That’s the person I pray for all of us to be. 

I want us to know so hard, and so strong, that if we are in relationship with Christ, we will win our entire life.  We can lose relationships, jobs, money, health, material possessions…and still…we win. 

And so, I think this is what I decided Easter ACTUALLY means, when I was sitting in my bathroom this morning.  This is Easter stripped.  It is the work of Christ on the cross to give us an indestructibly fantastic WIN.  It is the one and only fast-forward button God has allowed to his people, to show them how it all ends.  To show us we win. 

This is the knowing, and the knowing doesn’t just change our life….it changes our days.  Our minutes. 

It brings the all the exclamation points back, even inside of the deepest pain. 

So let’s not worry about having to be all Easter-y today.  We just can’t forget to KNOW.   

Meeting adjourned. 

Happy Easter.  I love you. 

We win.

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!