When Eric and I were cleaning out his parents house a few years ago, we would find things that were broken or missing some pieces. We would place those in an area while we continued looking and most of the time find the part that was needed. One of the things that we found was an old nativity set from the 1960s that Eric could remember being set out for Christmas. It was made out of hard plastic, with a barn and animals. Mary and Joseph were near it, but we could not find baby Jesus. We put all of the items in a box and kept cleaning. As the attic became empty, we kept looking for Jesus. We searched between the wooden floor slats, in the insulation, anywhere that something could have fallen and not been seen. When everything was out of the attic, we made one last sweep to look for anything forgotten. We had a flashlight and looked thoroughly all over to make sure we had not overlooked anything.
As we were looking through the box holding the nativity set, we didn't know whether or not to throw it away. Being the nostalgic and sentimental person that I am, I wanted to keep it and display it at our house. But as Eric looked at each piece, he made the comment, "You can't have a manger scene without Jesus. It isn't Christmas if you don't have Jesus". The decision was made to throw it away.
During the Easter season when the flowers are blooming and Easter egg hunts are taking place, we should remember that it isn't Easter without Jesus. Christmas is about a baby, Easter is about a man. A man who loved us enough to die for us. A man that would rise again and would live forever. A man. Not chocolate bunnies, not new outfits, not a day off from work.
A man. A Savior.
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