A friend of mine, Dr. Donald Reeves, wrote recently about the way Easter reminds people of Jesusʼ victory over death. That's all right, he said, but he likes to think about what Jesus taught us about dying, not just about living, and that dying, which so many of us fear, is actually the gateway to life eternal.
When he was a boy, Don remembers, he had an old basketball goal that was cut from a ten-gallon lard can and nailed to the side of the barn, and he used to go out there and toss a ball at that homemade hoop. One time he was headed there with his basketball in one arm and a bucket of something in the other—probably scraps for the pigs or chickens—and he complained to his dad, “Daddy, how am I going to get through the gate with both my hands full?”
His father said, “Son, how about if I go first and leave the gate open? Will that make it easier?”
That's what Jesus did for us, Don went on to say. He went through the gate first and left it open for us. |