Long time ago (about 40 years) in a country far, far away (ie. Canada) I woke up on the Sunday after Good Friday to an Easter Egg hunt. With the recent release of the latest Star Wars trailer I really couldn’t resist writing the previous sentence…..for me, as a child, Easter was all about chocolate eggs and rabbits.

While at a Good Friday church service yesterday I received a skype message from a client in another nation and I was reminded that not everyone celebrates Easter or even knows why it exists. Easter is a Christian celebration and it does not trace its roots back to Cadbury and Hershey but rather to a man named Jesus.

My father is a church minister and he explained to me how Christianity is summarised at Easter time. Rather than humanity reaching upwards to God by trying to be “good”, God reached down to man by sending us his only son, Jesus. Easter is about remembering how Jesus willing laid his life down for all of humanity and that he became the sacrificial bridge between a loving father in heaven and us all.

I thought this was a pretty good explanation (thanks Dad!) as at its heart Easter is about an incredible act of selfless love.

I’m always amazed at the courage of veterans in the armed forces who lay down their life for others, or police officers and emergency workers that run into harms way (and sometimes sadly die) to save a complete stranger. These individuals express the highest form of love that is the heart of Easter. In fact, the Bible says, “Greater love has no man when he lays his life down for another.” (Michael’s paraphrase).