The word Easter can start an argument among Christians very quickly. One family uses it for a day devoted to Christ’s resurrection, another prefers Resurrection Sunday, and another avoids the annual observance altogether. I believe we need to begin with what Scripture actually commands before deciding that one of these choices proves someone’s faithfulness or lack of it. We also need to tell the truth about the history we use to defend our position.
The Resurrection Is the Center
Jesus Christ died for our sins, was buried, and rose bodily on the third day according to the Scriptures. Paul places those facts at the beginning of his summary of the gospel in 1 Corinthians 15. Whatever we decide about the name of a holiday, the resurrection itself is something every Christian must believe and proclaim.
The Gospels describe people encountering the risen Jesus, not merely deciding that His influence would live on. The women found the tomb empty, and Peter and John examined the burial cloths. The study on the resurrection grave clothes considers the evidence they found there.
Jesus appeared to Mary Magdalene and stood among His disciples. He showed them His wounds and invited Thomas to examine them. Two disciples traveling to Emmaus spoke with Him before recognizing Him when He broke bread. He also ate with His disciples and taught them before sending them to proclaim repentance and forgiveness in His name. A Complete Bible Study on Post Resurrection Jesus and His Ascension follows His appearances and instructions.
Paul named witnesses too, reminding the Corinthians that most of the more than five hundred believers who had seen Jesus on one occasion were still alive when he wrote. He was proclaiming an event supported by living witnesses: the same Jesus who had been crucified was alive in a body people could see and touch. When some at Corinth denied the resurrection of the dead, Paul explained that their position would also rule out Christ’s resurrection. He made clear how much their faith depended on the truth they were denying.
And if Christ is not risen, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins!
We cannot reconcile Paul’s teaching with a Christianity that speaks about resurrection while denying that Jesus actually rose. Because Christ is risen, His people have a living Savior and a sure hope of being raised themselves.
I do not want disputes about names or customs to obscure the resurrection itself. Avoiding the word Easter does not make someone a believer in the risen Christ, and attending a crowded resurrection service does not mean someone has personally trusted Him. Before arguing about how the day should be observed, we need to understand and believe the gospel we are discussing.
What Scripture Commands Christians to Hold
The Lord gave His church definite responsibilities. We are to confess Him, preach His death and resurrection, baptize disciples, and teach them to obey His commands. In the Lord’s Supper, believers remember His body and blood and proclaim His death until He comes. Those responsibilities continue throughout the year, whether a congregation holds a special spring service or not.
The apostles did not reserve the resurrection for an annual occasion. Peter preached in Acts 2 that God had raised Jesus because death could not hold Him, and Paul proclaimed the risen Christ in synagogues and before Gentiles. Since the resurrection belongs within the gospel itself, a church needs to teach it plainly whether or not it holds an annual observance. A special service can give that truth particular attention, but the teaching must continue after the service is over.
An annual Easter feast does not have the same standing as the Lord’s Supper or baptism. The New Testament does not command Christians to keep it, and we are not under the covenant God made with Israel at Sinai. We should not introduce a new religious obligation and then accuse believers of disobeying Christ because they do not keep it.
A congregation may still choose a Sunday on which to give particular attention to the resurrection. The gospel is lawful to proclaim on that Sunday as on every other one. Choosing a date does not make the occasion a new sacrament or give the church authority to require something the Lord has not commanded. We need to explain that difference so people can receive the teaching without being pressured to treat the annual observance as an obligation to God.
Passover, Pascha, and the English Name
The biblical setting for Christ’s death and resurrection is Passover. Israel remembered how the lamb’s blood marked the houses and how God spared His people from death and brought them out of bondage. Paul explicitly connected Christ’s sacrifice with Passover in 1 Corinthians 5:7. That biblical connection explains the setting without borrowing a theory about spring fertility worship.
Jesus, the eternal Son of God, is the sinless Lamb who willingly shed His blood and died for our sins. Wicked men inflicted His bodily suffering and death as He gave Himself to be slain as the perfect sacrifice. The Father did not punish, curse, abandon, strike, bruise, or pour wrath on Him. His saving sacrifice through His blood and death was complete before His burial. On the third day He rose bodily from the grave, so the One who was killed and buried truly lives. A Complete Bible Study on the Passover follows that biblical connection in more detail.
Passover also explains the wording of Acts 12:4, where the King James Version uses the word Easter. The Greek word is pascha, the ordinary New Testament word for Passover or its festival period. The NKJV translates it “Passover,” and the preceding verse has already identified the Days of Unleavened Bread. Herod intended to wait until after that period before bringing Peter before the people. Luke was describing Herod’s plans, not instituting an annual Christian holiday or approving pagan worship.
Older English usage could apply Easter to the Paschal, or Passover, season. We can therefore explain the KJV’s wording without accusing its translators of deliberately inserting pagan worship into the Bible. The Greek word and its context explain what Luke meant. The presence of this English word does not, by itself, give us grounds to accuse the translators of unfaithfulness.
The English name nevertheless has a history worth acknowledging. In the eighth century, Bede described an Old English month called Eosturmonath and connected its name with a goddess called Eostre, in whose honor feasts had been held. He said that Christians continued using the old month name for the Paschal season. His account concerns an English name and its earlier religious association. It does not describe eggs, hares, baskets, or a worldwide equinox religion. Bede’s explanation appears in chapter 15 of The Reckoning of Time.
Much of the Christian world uses names derived from Pascha instead. A family or church may prefer Resurrection Sunday because it says plainly what they intend to remember, or because they want to avoid the older associations of the English name. I respect that choice. But the history of a regional name cannot establish that Christ’s resurrection originated in pagan worship or that every Christian who uses the word is honoring Eostre.
History, Customs, and Honest Warnings
Christians were observing an annual Paschal occasion long before Bede discussed the English name. Eusebius preserved evidence of a second-century dispute about when to end the Paschal fast and hold the observance. Some followed the fourteenth day of the month associated with Passover, regardless of the weekday; others insisted on the Lord’s Day, Sunday, in connection with the resurrection. Book 5, chapters 23–24, of his Church History records that disagreement. The record establishes that Christians observed the occasion and disputed its timing. It does not give the observance the authority of a biblical command.
Christians were therefore disputing the timing of a Paschal observance centuries before Bede wrote about Eosturmonath. That sequence does not support the claim that the entire observance began as an English fertility festival. The resurrection recorded in Scripture, the development of an annual Christian observance, and the English name later applied to it each need to be considered on their own evidence. Giving them all one origin misrepresents the history.
Later customs need their own examination. Eggs have been associated with life in different cultures, while Christian egg customs also developed around fasting, gifts, and celebration. In medieval Christian practice, eggs could be prohibited during Lent, the season of fasting before Easter, and then eaten when the fast ended. Such practices help explain some customs, but they do not tell us whether a particular use of an egg involves worship at all. English Heritage’s account of Easter eggs describes the medieval fasting and gift customs.
The custom of a hare hiding eggs is documented much later. A 1682 account describes it in German-speaking regions, and the American tradition developed among German-speaking immigrants. The Library of Congress discussion of the Easter bunny examines that evidence and the much later conjectures connecting the hare with a goddess. The evidence does not establish a continuous line from an ancient Eostre cult to every modern egg hunt.
None of that turns rabbits, candy, baskets, or pastel decorations into biblical symbols of the resurrection. They do not explain the empty tomb, forgiveness of sins, or the promise of bodily resurrection. If the church’s message becomes a backdrop for entertainment, children and visitors may remember the treats while scarcely hearing why Christ died and rose. A custom does not have to be traced to a pagan temple before we can decide that it distracts from what we are trying to teach.
Actual idolatry calls for more than a judgment about which decorations are useful. Deuteronomy 12 forbids Israel to imitate the nations’ worship and offer that imitation to the LORD. In 2 Corinthians 6, Paul rejects fellowship between God’s people and idolatry. We should refuse false worship and occult practices, including superstitious claims that an egg or another created object provides spiritual protection. Calling those things Christian does not make them acceptable.
I also need to be honest when warning someone. If all I know is that a child has been given a chocolate egg, I do not yet know that the family has participated in a fertility rite. We need to ask what people are doing, what they are being taught, and whether the practice involves worship or superstition. Suspicion alone is insufficient grounds for accusing a fellow believer of idolatry. A parent can decline a custom because it distracts the family without inventing a historical claim to make that decision sound more forceful.
Days, Conscience, and Christian Love
Romans 14:5–6 addresses believers who differ about days. One esteems a day above another, while another regards every day alike. Each is to be convinced in his own mind and act toward the Lord. Paul tells both groups to honor the Lord without despising or condemning one another. Their responsibility to Christ governs both observance and abstention.
I understand that principle to apply here because God has neither commanded an annual Easter observance nor forbidden us to remember the resurrection on that date. Romans 14 cannot be used to permit idolatry, excuse superstition, or authorize a church to manufacture divine commands. Where the choice is lawful, however, we should neither pressure a believer to act against his conscience nor condemn him for choosing differently.
Colossians 2:16–17 likewise warns against judgment over festivals, new moons, or sabbaths and directs believers to Christ, to whom those shadows point. Paul was protecting believers from religious demands that displaced their sufficiency in Him. We should not use a preferred date, or a refusal to keep that date, as a measure of whether another believer belongs to Christ.
In 1 Corinthians 8–10, Paul distinguishes ordinary things from participation in idolatry. He says an idol is nothing, yet forbids fellowship with demons at an idolatrous table. Food can be received with thanksgiving, but involvement in false worship must be refused. Even where a choice is lawful, we must consider another person’s conscience and spiritual good before insisting on our freedom. Those instructions require us to examine what is actually happening in each situation.
For example, a family may avoid eggs and bunnies because those customs distract them or because they cannot participate with a clear conscience before God. They should explain their decision to their children without teaching contempt for Christian neighbors who choose differently. Another family may use ordinary games or gifts without assigning religious meaning to them. They still need to distinguish play from worship and avoid presenting make-believe as truth. Parents should not let the fictional gift-giver become the main figure in what they present as a remembrance of Christ.
Neither family should treat conscience as permission to ignore Scripture. Refusing an annual observance does not remove our responsibility to rejoice in and proclaim the resurrection. Keeping it does not excuse superstition, indulgence, or letting purchases and entertainment crowd Christ out of the day. The same believer who can explain why an egg hunt is not necessarily idolatry should be willing to give it up if it is hindering his own household’s understanding of the gospel.
Listening also helps us understand what another believer means by Easter. One may be speaking only of Christ’s resurrection, while another hears an old religious association he wants to avoid. Clearer language may help them understand each other. If someone tells me he means the risen Jesus, I cannot fairly dismiss that explanation and decide what he worships from the word alone. Nor should he dismiss a sincere objection as foolish without hearing its reasons.
A special service may bring visitors who are particularly willing to hear about Jesus. The church should use that opportunity to open Scripture and explain His death and resurrection. If a performance displaces preaching, the people who came to hear will have been poorly served. They need a clear call to repentance and faith, just as believers need encouragement in the hope of their own bodily resurrection. Those needs should guide the gathering more than the desire to put on an impressive event.
The Resurrection Gives Life and Hope
The resurrection also concerns the life a believer lives after the service. Romans 6 connects our identification with Christ’s death and resurrection to walking in newness of life. Water baptism follows salvation and publicly pictures that identification; the water does not cause someone to be born again. The believer belongs to the crucified and risen Lord and therefore has reason to refuse the sin from which Christ has delivered him.
Our hope reaches beyond the present life too. Romans 8:11 promises that the Spirit who raised Jesus will give life to believers’ mortal bodies. In 1 Corinthians 15, Paul calls the risen Christ the firstfruits. Just as the first part of a harvest anticipates what is still to be gathered, Christ’s resurrection guarantees the resurrection of His people. Jesus did not merely live on in the disciples’ memories, and we look forward to an actual bodily resurrection rather than a vague continuation of life.
That hope does not require us to pretend grief is painless or death is harmless. Death is an enemy, but Christ has defeated it, and His people will not remain in the grave forever. His risen life also gives us reason to persevere in obedience now. Paul ends 1 Corinthians 15 by urging believers to remain steadfast in the Lord’s work because their labor is not in vain. The service God sees, including work that attracts no attention from anyone else, is worth continuing.
My Final Thoughts
I do not believe Scripture requires every Christian either to observe Easter or to reject it. We are required to believe and proclaim that Jesus died for our sins, was buried, and rose bodily on the third day. One believer may abstain from the annual observance to keep a clear conscience, while another gathers on Resurrection Sunday to honor the Lord. Both need to speak truthfully, reject idolatry, and treat Christ’s people with love. Our decision about the day should help us honor the risen Lord, with care for what our families learn and what our churches proclaim. It should never become an excuse to neglect His commands or accuse one another without cause.