I love Easter for lots of reasons. But, one of the big ones is the chance to work with all our fine musicians that call Cedar Hills home. Between the special choir that gathers to sing at the 8:30 and 9:45 services and the large ‘worship jam’ group that leads at the 11am, we may have 70+ musicians involved on Easter Sunday. This is huge! And it’s so much fun!

Why all the effort? Why all the special rehearsals? Why all the people?

On Easter, we celebrate that our Lord and Savior has conquered the grave! We celebrate that the sting of death, the chains of death no longer have a grip on us. For those who love and follow Jesus, death is not the final say. Our bodies may perish, but they will rise again with Jesus.

As a kid, I used to ponder this moment. I knew we died and went to heaven, but the concept of our
renewed bodies at the second coming always gave me spooky daydreams of bodies coming out of the ground all creepy-like, like a zombie movie.

This is not Easter.

On Easter, Jesus shows us what it looks like to rise. He is not a zombie. He is fully alive in a glorified body that looks and is like a real body, only better! And we, too, will rise and get our cool glorified bodies. Real and better. Jesus is coming to restore all things. To make things new—the promise of a new heaven and a new earth. We, as the saints, will rule in glory with Jesus. The separation between heaven and earth will no longer exist. We won’t need sunshine —Jesus’ light will light up everything we need to
see. And our bodies are perfected and new. We will rise with Jesus and it will be glorious! THIS is why we celebrate!

Leah
Director of Worship & Media