History of Easter

These are things Jesus promises us today. In Old Testament days a lamb had to be killed as an offering to God to make up for people's sins. When Jesus was crucified he took the role of a sacrificial lamb, and the Bible says he was the last lamb that would need to be sacrificed. Christians believe that when Jesus died, he died for all our sins, and when he came back to life he showed he had conquered sin once and for all.


And that's what we celebrate on Easter Sunday!


Back in the fourth century AD the church devised a whole Easter calendar to remember all the different events in the lead up to the crucifixion and resurrection, things like Pancake Day to eat up all your good food before fasting during the weeks of Lent.



richmondparkchurch.org.uk an evangelical pentecostal church in Boscombe, Bournemouth, Dorset, UK

History of Easter

Later, about 350 years after the crucifixion of Jesus, an important meeting of church leaders met to decide whether Easter should be celebrated the day after Passover, even if it fell on a week day, or whether Easter Day should always be on a Sunday. They didn't set a definite fixed yearly date for Easter, or stick to the old Jewish calendar. Instead they made-up their own formula to calculate the date to complicate matters further. Are you ready for this? Pay attention!

Easter Sunday is always the first Sunday after the full moon that directly follows the Spring Equinox.

Despite it's name, Christian "Easter" has much more to do with the Jewish Passover than pagan spring-time festivals. God instructed Jewish people to celebrate Passover to remember their escape from slavery in Egypt about 1200 years before Jesus. At that time God promised: I will get you out of the mess you've made; I will lead you to a freer life; I will treat you as my own children; and I will save you spiritually.


richmondparkchurch.org.uk an evangelical pentecostal church in Boscombe, Bournemouth, Dorset, UK

The History of Easter

The pagans celebrated the arrival of spring, encouraging their gods to bless the re-birth of plants and animals at this time of year.

We know that Jesus was killed at this time of year because the Bible and other historical records tell us he was crucified just before the Jewish festival called Passover.

The exact date of Passover shifts about a bit as it is calculated on the old Jewish calendar which was based on what the moon was doing, and this doesn't tie-in exactly with the modern calendar.


richmondparkchurch.org.uk an evangelical pentecostal church in Boscombe, Bournemouth, Dorset, UK

Easter

This is also the origin of the Easter Bunny, and strangely, Easter Eggs (what? no chickens?!) - all life was thought to have originally come from an egg, and eggs were another favoured symbol of fertility. The "spirit" Easter Bunny/Hare was supposed to lay its eggs in the grass, and people would go searching for them - the fore-runner of modern day Easter egg hunts.


richmondparkchurch.org.uk an evangelical pentecostal church in Boscombe, Bournemouth, Dorset, UK

Easter

Easter is the spring-time holiday associated with chocolate eggs and bunny rabbits. For Christians it is also the anniversary and celebration of the resurrection of Jesus.
Easter gets it's name from the Saxon goddess of spring called "Eostre". This goddess had a hare's head, or a hare companion, which makes sense when you remember that pagan worship centred on nature and fertility, and hares and rabbits breed like....well, rabbits!


richmondparkchurch.org.uk an evangelical pentecostal church in Boscombe, Bournemouth, Dorset, UK

Pancake Day to Pentecost

The holy days of the seven weeks of Easter observances that the traditional churches still follow were made up during the fourth century AD. Some independent evangelical churches, like Richmond Park Church, choose not to stringently follow traditions that were made up by the fourth century church, but which are not spelled out in the Bible. There is nothing inherently wrong with these traditions, if they are designed to point people in the direction of the example and life of Jesus, but neither is it compulsory to observe these created "holy days" to be a faithful Christian. However, after several decades of making a conscious effort to separate themselves from things which are merely "tradition", and not specifically Biblical, many evangelical churches are coming round to the idea that these traditional ceremonies are not without merit. Some are being re-introduced into independent churches and traditional churches, in a slightly revised fashion focusing on doing something pro-active to help others during Lent as a constructive way of not focusing on our selfs, eg the "Buy Less" "credit card".



richmondparkchurch.org.uk an evangelical pentecostal church in Boscombe, Bournemouth, Dorset, UK

Pancake Day

Shrove Tuesday / Mardi Gras (French for "Fat Tuesday") / "Pancake Day" - 47 days before Easter Sunday



This is the last day before Lent. "Shrove" means to 'have heard confession, assigned penance and absolved'. From the Middle Ages until the late Renaissance, eating all animal products except fish (which were considered bloodless) was forbidden during Lent. In more modern times the Lenten fast was confined to Ash Wednesday and all Fridays during Lent, and abstinence from meat did not include other animal products (eggs, milk and cheese, for example). Therefore on Shrove Tuesday people made pancakes to use up their supplies of eggs, milk, butter and other fats. These cakes were made in flat pans (hence pancakes) and were seen as a sign of self-indulgence before the fast!




richmondparkchurch.org.uk an evangelical pentecostal church in Boscombe, Bournemouth, Dorset, UK