Becoming His 31: The Eve of Easter

So often in today's society it's difficult to find things that celebrate the true meaning of Christian Holidays. Easter isn't any different. This week at work, as I was looking forward to Easter, I would ask my patients and co-workers if their family did anything special to celebrate Easter. Many would respond that they have family get togethers and dinners but very few included that they would be celebrating at a church. I was shocked at how many celebrate Easter with no real understanding of the holiday. Maybe shocked is too strong of a word, after all, many celebrate Christmas without celebrating the birth of Christ, so why would Easter be any different? But I guess I assumed Easter was different. Isn't so obviously a religious holiday, a time celebrating the resurrection of our Savior?

Unfortunately it gets buried underneath the commercialized Easter bunny, Easter Eggs, Pretty baskets and Easter Egg hunts. I suppose if you didn't come from a Judeo-Christian background you could justify setting aside a day to go a long with those Easter festivities. But as I consider what this young Poindexter family's holiday traditions will be, I am torn between wanting to avoid any secular aspect of Easter and allowing some fun popular traditions. I struggle with this same concept during Christmas. I find myself severely irritated with Santa Clause during Christmas and even MORE irritated with the Easter bunny during the Easter holiday.

As a Christian is it okay to allow some popular Easter traditions such as the Easter basket and Easter egg hunts into your Easter celebration? I mean, my parents always filled Easter baskets for myself and my siblings, we always had Easter egg hunts and usually dyed Easter eggs for fun on Sunday afternoon. I know doing those things never took away from the true meaning of the holiday in my family, and we never for one second believed that the Easter bunny (or Santa Clause for that matter) were even remotely real. But I am so afraid that I will do a poor job of getting that across to my future children. I want so very badly to raise children that will truly give their hearts to Christ and I know it will be Mark and I's responsibility to lead them in that direction. On the other end of the spectrum, I don't want to be legalistic and make my children bitter towards Christian holidays because they don't get to enjoy many of the same things their friends might be enjoying. How do you give them the true joy of the holiday, allowing it to be fun with family memories, but never taking away from the meaning of the celebration???

Am I crazy for even thinking about this right now? We don't even have a baby on the way and I'm already concerned about this. Is it too early to even worry about it???

Well, worry about I do. Concerned about it, I am. (Some how Yoda is making an appearance all of a sudden...???) Anyways! Mark and I decided that for now we will plan to allow our kids to have Easter baskets and most likely engage in some Easter egg hunting/dyeing activities, but incorporate the true meaning of the season even more than we allow the secular aspects. And to ensure that our children know the difference between truth and fictional characters.

Here are some cute and fun activities I found that could be a good idea to refer back to when it does come time to celebrate Easter with some young ones one day.