Easter

Singapore is a very interesting country to live in, there are many different religions and races all living together in harmony. 

Good Friday is a public holiday in Singapore as is Christmas, Scott also gets off work several other days through out the year for various holidays that are important to various religious groups, we are trying to learn more about these holidays that we don't really know anything about while we are here.

It is really important to us to keep as much of our family tradition in our holidays as possible while living an ocean away from our family.

 Usually we would get together with Scott's family on the Saturday before Easter to have a pot luck dinner and spend the day outside playing games, there is always a BIG egg hunt, there have been as many as 18 dozen eggs hidden in the past.

Easter Sunday is spent at church in the morning then we go to Randi's parents house for a nice dinner and quality time together, there are egg hunts, go cart and dirt bike driving etc.. sometimes Randi's grandparents from Indiana have been able to join us in Wisconsin for the celebration.

This year however, it is just the four of us.  We went to church on Good Friday to barely find a seat available, it was a packed service and meaningful to us.

 Friday during the day we colored our eggs, a friend sent us a paas egg dye kit in the mail so we could keep that tradition alive.

As we started with clean eggs I was reflecting on how we try to make ourselves look clean, nice, and presentable before meeting up with people.  Natural eggs have a real calming quality to them.  They are fresh, delicious and nutritious.

We can change the appearance of that egg by what we apply, it is interesting when you are dealing with both brown eggs and white eggs, the dye of course looks different based on the base color. 

We as Christians can look one way on the outside but really we know that we are sinners, Romans 3:23 tells us that "all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God" So really the inside of us looks to me remarkably like this egg that we dyed.

We are clouded with sin, cracked vessels, imperfect, trying hard to blend into our environment.  Romans 6:23 reminds us that "the wages of sin is death but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord"


I loved how this "pink" egg dye turned out on our brown egg it was reflective of the blood of Jesus covering my sin and my shame.

The best part is that in Romans 5:8 it also says "God demonstrates his own love for us in that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us"  Jesus paid our price on that cross on Good Friday we do not need to walk around with shame and guilt from our sin, it has been forgiven.

Romans 10:9-10 assures us that "if you confess with your mouth Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised Jesus from the dead, you shall be saved: for with the heart man believes , resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, resulting in salvation"

The golden gates of heaven are open to all who confess Jesus as Lord.  We are all still sinners, trust me our sin does not go away but the power in the blood of Jesus frees us from the shame and bondage of sin.

So really one could say that we are all eggs of a different kind but we are all people and we are all sinners living together on one little island in peace and harmony.

May God touch your heart this Easter as He has touched ours and may you know the power of that blood that was indeed shed for you.

 As we hold to our family traditions this year and as we learn about and love the people around us we really are trying to stay focused on what is important in our lives.

HAPPY EASTER TO YOU ALL, we miss you!

~THE MILES FAMILY Easter, 2011