It’s not about Easter eggs, or bunnies laying eggs.  For crying out loud, parents please don’t confuse your kids any further.  Rabbits are mammals, they don’t lay eggs, only birds and reptiles do.  Tell your children the truth, not only will it set them free, but they will also not flunk in Biology class.  But jokes aside, Christianity and its values are not about Santa Claus who rides on a sleigh at Christmas and Easter Bunnies who make their entrance during Easter-time.  Both of which are the works of imagination, and neither exist except in fairy tales.  Let’s get real. Neither is Easter about fasting for 40 days prior to the event.  Or giving up on your favorite TV shows, or swearing or drinking alcohol, or overeating, not indulging in gossip or slander, or being mean and nasty to your spouse, or watching inappropriate material, or temporarily give up on the lustful pleasures of the flesh.  For 325 days of the year we do all of the above, so why even bother to be hypocritical for 40 days?

God doesn’t impose the rules, He has given us free-will, it’s our guilt that does that. We think that we can appease God by making promises, going on fasts, and making sacrifices.  The god we construct, and deconstruct and pretty much align according to our human selves in our petty day-to-day lives is beyond that—He is true to His Word, Omnipresent, Immortal, the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End. He is above all things, and He looks at our hearts.  And it’s really very important to Him that we give up our old selves of disobedience, attachments to the world and it nothingness and become anew in Christ to gain life eternal.  After all He did pay a price for us: Death on a cross.  By doing this He set a new commandment: to love one another just like He loves us.

God so loved the world (you and I) that he sent His only begotten Son to die for our sins so that we might have life, and life everlasting.  Isn’t that unbelievable? In human terms we would have said “Has He lost it?” But God is beyond our pettiness, our earthly philosophies, psychology, so-called super intelligence and our debates that justify sin and its abominations, and glorify it in parades. He died the most humiliating death for us, the most lowly kind of death—that of a criminal, whipped and beaten, and then stripped of all his garments, and completely naked, he was nailed to a cross. Shedding every drop of His precious blood for our sake so that we would gain complete freedom and not be slaves to the prince of darkness, or the father of lies.

For a great many years I could not fathom the magnitude of God’s love for me.  I fell on the sidewalk like a drunk many, many, many times.  But each time I stumbled I went back to the Throne of Grace to ask for forgiveness, and then a great friend of mine introduced me to the Word of God-The Bible.  Initially it was such a pain to go through words I could hardly understand.  But God does work in mysterious ways, and His Word is coded and as I opened the closed door of my heart to God, He was able to enter.  You see He was knocking all this while but because I was so accustomed to the roadside attractions and the cacophony of the world, I refused to hear His call.  But now that I have, He is Wisdom Incarnate.  And the only true love of my life. Every morning as I sit in prayer, and worship, God and the Saviour of my soul leads me into an area of peace and joy that is completely unreasonable in the present scheme of things.  It’s impossible to describe, but here goes; in the pandemonium of global terror I remain unaffected.  In the unjustifiable scheme of things I am unperturbed.  Even when I have nothing (wealth, belongings, possessions) I have all.  I may be wearing rags but it seems like the priciest clothing.  I still don’t understand the magnitude of His death on a cross; it’s far beyond my comprehension, and still remains an enigma.  That’s because I still cannot fathom God’s unfathomable love.  It’s truly priceless.

But here’s a story: During a discussion with friends of different faiths, the discussion veered towards favorite hero, or heroine.  My answer was out-of-the-box, and a complete surprise to them.  I wasn’t trying to be different, evangelize or contribute to any kind of shock-value in our conversation but in the university campus where we were seated there was a crucifix in our midst, and I pointed out to the figure of Jesus on the cross and said “Now that’s my Hero!”

Jude Paul Fernandes is the author of ‘Frost Bites’ and the upcoming novel ‘Lonely in Mumbai’. He can be followed @judepaulferns