The other day I was having lunch with a good friend of mine. At one point, the subject of Easter came up, and he shared with me how he doesn’t believe we should celebrate it as Christians. Partly because it has ‘iffy’ pagan beginnings and partly because it has become less about Jesus’ resurrection and more to do with commercialism. Is he right? And if he is, should we then all cease to celebrate this Christian holiday?

Certainly, for some people in our culture, Easter Sunday is more about the Easter bunny than it is about the resurrection of Jesus. But what’s the connection between the resurrection of Jesus and the common modern traditions related to Easter Sunday? Simply – there is none.

The truth is, in order to make Christianity more attractive to non-Christians, the ancient Catholic Church mixed the celebration of Jesus’ resurrection with celebrations that involved spring fertility rituals. These spring fertility rituals are the source of the egg and bunny traditions.

Fast forward to today, our consumeristic culture can’t seem to help itself in trying to cash in on the gullibility of people to be parted with their money for non-essential trinkets and sweets which focus on those eggs and bunnies. So, it seems that Easter might as well have pagan origins, since it has been almost completely commercialized – the world’s focus is on Easter eggs, Easter candy, and the Easter bunny and not on the resurrection. Does that mean we stop celebrating Easter? And what about the ‘iffy’ pagan origins?

Pagan origin theories
Some have made the claim that we get the name Easter from pagan sources, one being Ishtar an ancient Mesopotamian goddess of war, fertility, and sex. She is featured in the Epic of Gilgamesh, and the “Ishtar Gate” was a part of King Nebuchadnezzar’s Babylon. Her worship involved animal sacrifices; objects made of her sacred stone, lapis lazuli; and temple prostitution.

A popular meme has been circulating the internet with these words superimposed over an image of Ishtar: “This is Ishtar: pronounced ‘Easter.’ Easter was originally the celebration of Ishtar, the Assyrian and Babylonian goddess of fertility and sex. Her symbols (like the egg and the bunny) were and still are fertility and sex symbols (or did you actually think eggs and bunnies had anything to do with resurrection?). After Constantine decided to Christianize the Empire, Easter was changed to represent Jesus. But at its roots, Easter (which is how you pronounce Ishtar) is all about celebrating fertility and sex.”

Here’s the thing, there is absolutely no conclusive connection between the pagan goddess Ishtar and the Christian celebration of Easter. Any theory that Easter is named after Ishtar is pure speculation. Added to that, there is also no proof that Ishtar was ever associated with eggs or rabbits as symbols. Truth be known – Ishtar’s sacred animal was actually a lion. Both lions and bunnies are fluffy and furry, but certainly not the same.

Another theory makes the claim that the name Easter comes from a pagan figure called Eastre (or Eostre) who was celebrated as the goddess of spring by the Saxons of Northern Europe. According to this theory, Eastre was the “goddess of the east – from where the sun rises,” her symbol was the hare (a symbol of fertility), and a festival called Eastre was held during the spring equinox by the Saxons to honour her.

This theory on the origin of Easter is highly problematic however, because we have no hard evidence that such a goddess was ever worshiped by anyone, anywhere. In fact, the only mention of Eastre comes from a passing reference in the writings of the Venerable Bede, an eighth-century monk and historian.

Bede wrote, “Eosturmononath has a name which is now translated as ‘Paschal month,’ and which was once called after a goddess of theirs named Eostre, in whose honour feasts were celebrated in that month. Now they designate the Paschal season by her name, calling the joys of the new rite by the time-honoured name of the old observance” (source: De Temporum Ratione).

Other than this one source though, Eostre is not mentioned in any other ancient writing; no shrines have ever been found, no altars discovered, and nothing has ever been identified to document the worship of Eastre. So, it is quite possible that Bede simply extrapolated the name of the goddess from the name of the month.
Others contend that the word Easter ultimately derives from the Latin phrase in albis, related to alba (“dawn” or “daybreak” in Spanish and Italian). In Old High German, in albis became eostarum, which eventually became Ostern in modern German and Easter in English.

In the end, even if it could be proved that the word Easter is etymologically related to the name of a pagan goddess such as Ishtar or Eostre, it would not change what the Easter holiday itself means to us. For that matter, I don’t think that it should go unnoticed that the word Wednesday comes from Woden’s Day in honour of the Norse god Woden or Odin – but we don’t fret about ‘that’ word’s pagan origin.

In the end, while the word Easter most likely comes from an old word for “east” or the name of a springtime month, we don’t have much evidence that suggests anything more. Assertions that Easter is pagan or that Christians have appropriated a goddess-holiday are untenable.

What Does Scripture Have to Say?
Christians celebrate Easter as the resurrection of Christ on the third day after his crucifixion. It is the oldest Christian holiday and the most important day of the church year because of the significance of the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus. I get that because of the commercialization and possible pagan origins of Easter, many churches prefer to call it “Resurrection Sunday.”

The rationale is that, the more we focus on Christ and his work on our behalf, the better. Paul says in 1 Corinthians 15:17, that without the resurrection of Christ our faith is futile. What more wonderful reason could we have to celebrate!

But, whether we call it “Easter” or “Resurrection Sunday,” isn’t the important thing. What is important is the reason for our celebration, which is that Christ is alive, making it possible for us to have eternal life. “We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.” – Romans 6:4

So, should we celebrate Easter or allow our children to go on Easter egg hunts? This is a question both parents and church leaders struggle with. Ultimately, I believe that it comes down to a matter of conscience as Paul speaks to in Romans. “One person esteems one day as better than another, while another esteems all days alike. Each one should be fully convinced in his own mind.” – Romans 14:5

There is nothing essentially evil about painting and hiding eggs and having children search for them. What is important is our focus. If our focus is on Christ, our children can be taught to understand that the eggs are just a fun game. Parents and the church, however, do have a responsibility to teach the true meaning. In the end, participation in Easter egg hunts and other secular traditions must be left up to the discretion of parents.

Regardless of where the name Easter came from, or what the world has done to commercialize an ancient experience, Easter itself is the celebration of the resurrection of Jesus Christ, which is a critical doctrine of the Christian faith. When we celebrate, we are making a statement declaring definitively that Jesus conquered death and the grave, proving to be the world’s Saviour from sin and death. “Whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life” – John 3:16

11 “And now, O Lord God of Israel, who brought your people out of the land of Egypt with a mighty hand and with signs and wonders and with great power and outstretched arm and made yourself a name that continues to this day, 12 we have sinned, we have been ungodly, we have done wrong, O Lord our God, against all your ordinances. 13 Let your anger turn away from us, for we are left few in number among the nations where you have scattered us.”

Sounds like the Bible, right?  Yet if you try to find this passage in most Protestant Bibles, you won’t.  This passage is an excerpt from Baruch 2, a book included in the Catholic canon but excluded from ours.  

Many Protestants have been surprised to learn that Catholic Bibles have seven more books than Protestant Bibles.  How did it end up this way?  And which canon of Scripture has the correct number of books?  To answer these questions, we first need to consider some history behind the Old Testament.

Historical Overview
The Christian Old Testament comes from the Hebrew Bible.  Though their contents are the same, their books are arranged in a different order.  The Hebrew Bible was subdivided into three collections:  the Torah (Law), Nevi'im (Prophets), and Ketuvim (Writings).  In contrast, the Old Testament follows the book arrangement used in the Septuagint, which is the Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible.  

During the intertestamental period, the 400-year period between the Old and New Testaments, there was a need to translate the Hebrew Bible into Greek, the common language of the time.  It is important to note that the process of translating the Hebrew Bible into Greek was not instantaneous; the books were not translated all at once but were translated over a period of time when there was a flurry of literary activity.¹ These translations are collectively referred to as the Septuagint.

During this period, many Jewish writings began to emerge and circulate.  These writings were highly valued among the Jewish community and offer insight into Jewish culture and history to readers today.  

Of these writings, there are works that Catholics include in their canon of Scripture and Protestants exclude.  These works, known to Catholics as the Deuterocanon (second canon) and by Protestants as the Apocrypha, include Tobit, Judith, 1 & 2 Maccabees, Wisdom (of Solomon), Sirach (Ecclesiasticus), and Baruch, along with additions to Esther and Daniel.  There are some other works beyond these which Eastern Orthodox Christians include in their canon.  Additionally, there are other valuable writings that emerged, such as the Book of Jubilees, Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs, and Psalms of Solomon, which would have been revered but not considered Scripture by any tradition.  

By the fourth and fifth centuries, some Christians such as the early church father Augustine understood the Apocryphal writings to be sacred, equal to the Hebrew Scriptures.  Others, like Jerome, disagreed, believing that Christians should stick with the books in the Hebrew Bible.  

Around this time the codex (the earliest form of book) was gaining prominence.  The earliest codified Greek Bibles we have are from the fourth and fifth centuries:  Codex Vaticanus, Codex Sinaiticus, and Codex Alexandrinus.  What’s interesting is that these codices contain the Apocryphal books side-by-side with Scripture without distinction (though these codices are inconsistent in which Apocryphal books are included).²

Even more interesting, in Jerome’s translation of the Bible into Latin around 400 AD, he prefaced the Apocryphal books with an inscription stating they should not be read as Scripture but that they are useful for the edification of the church.  Having extensively studied Hebrew, Jerome was convinced that Christians should only view as authoritative the books in the Hebrew canon.  Ironically, Jerome’s Latin Vulgate would eventually lose these inscriptions and become the translation of the Bible endorsed by the Catholic Church at the Council of Trent—Apocryphal books included.

At this Council in 1546, the Catholic Church formally recognized the Apocryphal books in the Vulgate as canonical, with a warning that to reject them would mean anathema, or excommunication.  

Martin Luther disagreed, placing the Apocryphal books in their own section between the Old and New Testaments.  Like Jerome, Luther believed Christians should recover the Hebrew canon.  Protestants throughout history have followed Luther’s lead, and eventually the Apocrypha has been removed from the Bible altogether.  Naturally, the question that follows is, “Was Luther right to do this?”

Should Christians view the Apocrypha as Scripture?
To answer this question, it is vital that we understand how Jesus and his apostles used their Bible.  

By Jesus’ day, the common languages were Greek and Aramaic, and out of necessity, many Christians used the Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible.  It appears that Jesus and his apostles often used the Septuagint from verses such as Luke 4:18-19, in which Jesus reads Isaiah 61:1-2 from a scroll using the Greek translation of the text.³

Now, the question arises:  If Jesus and his apostles quoted from the Septuagint, did they consider the Apocryphal books authoritative?

Catholics argue yes, Jesus and his apostles quoted from the Septuagint, which contains the  Deuterocanonical books in its corpus.  There are even places in the New Testament that seem to be referencing or alluding to the Deuterocanonical books.  

Conversely, Protestants contend that while Jesus and his apostles used the Greek translation of the Hebrew Scriptures, it does not inherently mean that they understood the Apocryphal books to have the same authority as the Hebrew Scriptures.  

Before moving forward, it is important to keep in mind that in Jesus’ time, books of the Bible were written on scrolls.  Remember, they did not have a complete book with a table of contents like the 4th century Codex Vaticanus.  It is reasonable to argue that Jesus could read the Greek rendering of the Hebrew texts without endorsing the Apocryphal books as Scripture.  Even if a synagogue Jesus was teaching at had a scroll of 2 Maccabees, it does not inherently mean that Jesus or the other rabbis considered it Scripture.

That said, here are three reasons why Protestants do not consider the Apocryphal books Scripture:

Reason 1:  When Jesus talked about “the whole Bible”, he used the Hebrew canon.

As mentioned above, Jesus and his apostles quoted from the Septuagint as Scripture.  The primary spoken language was Greek, and Jesus quoted from the Greek Bible so that his hearers would understand.  However, when Jesus referred to the whole corpus, or complete body of Scripture, he would describe it in terms of the Hebrew canon.  

Why is this important?  If when Jesus describes the collection of Scriptures from beginning to end, he uses the Hebrew Bible, this necessarily excludes the Apocrypha from the canon of Scripture.  Here are two examples in which this occurs:

1. Luke 24:44 - Then he said to them, “These are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you, that everything written about me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled.”  

Note how Jesus follows the tripartite structure of the Hebrew canon, not the arrangement of the Septuagint.  When Jesus explains how the whole Bible is about him, he is referring to the books in the Hebrew Bible.  

2. Luke 11:49-51 - “49 Therefore also the Wisdom of God said, ‘I will send them prophets and apostles, some of whom they will kill and persecute,’ 50 so that the blood of all the prophets, shed from the foundation of the world, may be charged against this generation, 51 from the blood of Abel to the blood of Zechariah, who perished between the altar and the sanctuary.”

Here, John Piper makes a compelling argument in favour of Jesus’ use of the Hebrew canon.⁴  In this passage, Jesus is referring to all the Old Testament prophets.  He lists Abel, who is martyred in Genesis 4.  Then, Jesus mentions Zechariah, who is killed in 2 Chronicles.  

However, Zechariah is not the last prophet to be killed chronologically in the Bible. Chronologically speaking, Uriah is killed after Zechariah (Jer. 26:22–23).  Did Jesus make a mistake here?  No, the reason Jesus cites Zechariah as the last martyred prophet is that he’s working from the Hebrew canon, which ends with 2 Chronicles.  

So, even if Jesus and his apostles quoted from the Greek translation, it still seems that Jesus viewed the material in the Hebrew Bible to be the entirety of the Scriptures.  

Reason 2:  The Jews in Jesus’ day assumed the canon of the Hebrew Bible.  

Josephus, a non-Christian Jewish historian writing around 90 AD affirms that Jews limited their Scriptures to the books in the Hebrew Bible:  “For we have not an innumerable multitude of books among us, disagreeing from and contradicting one another, [as the Greeks have,] but only twenty-two books [emphasis added].”⁵  These twenty-two books account for the books in our Old Testament by combining Judges and Ruth, 1 and 2 Samuel, 1 and 2 Kings, 1 and 2 Chronicles, Jeremiah and Lamentations, Ezra and Nehemiah, and the Twelve Minor Prophets.  But no Apocrypha.  

It doesn’t seem that Jesus was in disagreement with the Jews about the contents of their Bibles.⁶  In fact, in many of Jesus’ debates with the Jewish religious leaders, there was never a question of who had the correct Bible.  If Jesus was diverging from the Jewish tradition by accepting the Apocryphal books as canon, there is no record of it in the New Testament.

Reason 3:  The New Testament never quotes the Apocrypha as Scripture. 

Consider how of the many, many references to the Old Testament in the New Testament, the Apocryphal books are never quoted as Scripture with phrases such as, “It is written in Scripture” or “The Scripture says…”  Though there may be some allusions to these works in the New Testament, it is apparent that they do not carry the same weight as do the Hebrew Scriptures because they are not referred to as Scripture.  

One seeming exception is a quotation of a prophecy in Jude 14-15 from 1 Enoch 1:9. However, Catholics also do not include 1 Enoch in their canon, and it is possible to quote this prophecy without endorsing the rest of the book as Scripture, in the same way Paul quoted from Greek poets without considering them Scripture (Acts 17:28).

There is no clear instance of the Apocryphal works being quoted as Scripture.  Though it is true that there are a few Old Testament books not referenced in the New Testament, most of them are, and the Apocryphal books are not among them.

Implications
Ensuring you’re using the right canon of Scripture is a weighty matter.  

Merrill puts it well:  “It then becomes an issue of virtual life-and-death dimensions; for to add to the completed revelation is to impose human judgment and opinion on the reader, and to eliminate portions from the revelation is to deny to the reader a Word from God.”⁷

Protestants have good reason to believe that the Apocryphal books are not Scripture.  Yet, as Jerome argued, these books can be edifying to the church when rightly handled. 

Let’s recover a healthy appreciation for these works.  But let us not add to Scripture beyond the completed revelation.

¹Greg Lanier, "Septuagint: Why the Greek Old Testament Still Matters," Desiring God, October 27, 2021, accessed
February 13, 2026, https://www.desiringgod.org/articles/septuagint
²BibleProject Scholarship Team, "Why the Deuterocanon / Apocrypha Is in Some Bibles and Not Others,"
BibleProject, June 2, 2025, accessed February 13, 2026,
https://bibleproject.com/articles/why-deuterocanon-apocrypha-some-bibles-and-not-others/
³Greg Lanier, “Septuagint: Why the Greek Old Testament Still Matters,” Desiring God, October 27, 2021, accessed February 13, 2026, https://www.desiringgod.org/articles/septuagint.
⁴John Piper, "Why We Believe the Bible, Session 2: The Inspiration, Inerrancy, and Authority of the Bible"
(sermon, Desiring God, February 15, 2008), video/audio, accessed February 13, 2026,
https://www.desiringgod.org/messages/why-we-believe-the-bible-ses sion-2
⁵Flavius Josephus, Against Apion, trans. William Whiston, in The Works of Flavius Josephus, vol. 3 (Peabody, MA:
Hendrickson, 1987, repr. of 1737 ed.), accessed February 13, 2026, Project Gutenberg,
https://www.gutenberg.org/files/2849/2849-h/2849-h.htm
⁶Piper, Why We Believe the Bible, Session 2.
⁷Eugene H. Merrill, Mark F. Rooker, and Michael A. Grisanti, The World and the Word: An Introduction to the Old
Testament (B&H Academic, 2011), 107.

I love travel documentaries and one of my favourites has been, “Parts Unknown” on CNN hosted by Anthony Bourdain. You can imagine my surprise when I first heard that Anthony was found dead by suicide Friday June 8th2018. According to his mother, Anthony had everything to live for. “He is absolutely the last person in the world I would have ever dreamed would do something like this,” Gladys Bourdain told the New York Times.

Another celebrity, Kate Spade, sounded happy the night before her body was found in her New York City apartment earlier the same week as Bourdain. “There was no indication and no warning she would do this,” her husband Andy Spade said in a heart-wrenching statement published in the Times.

For more than four decades Antoon Leenaars has tried to construct a theory to explain why people kill themselves. Among his findings is that those who die by suicide are often tragically gifted at concealing their true intentions, even from themselves. “We find it in the suicide notes and in the psychological autopsies,” said Leenaars, a Windsor psychologist whose archive of more than 2,000 suicide notes is believed the largest collection of its kind in the world. “There’s both a conscious and unconscious intent to be deceptive, to hide, to mask,” he said.

I think that’s why, for the most part, we are often surprised when someone takes their own life. I haven’t personally experienced a close friend or family member commit suicide, yet I have been around many others who have had close friends or family take their lives, and I can tell you that it can be terribly confusing and heartbreaking, sometimes to the point of questioning what they currently believed about God. In fact, just today I learned of someone who had been heavily involved in the local church recently abandon his faith because of the confusion and grief experienced when one of his children took their life.

For the friends and family of that person who has taken their own lives, grief can be like a wild animal inside, thrashing to get out. There are times It won’t be contained, spilling out in sobs and screams, while at other times it turns inward, causing those left behind to desperately examine every interaction over the weeks and days preceding their loved one’s death, wondering what they could have done differently. It’s a terrible place to be.

Does the bible say anything about committing suicide?
Is suicide the unforgivable sin? Does the person who self-kills go immediately to hell? Within the church community, this controversial topic has unfortunately often been addressed in emotional ways, not through biblical analysis. For example, for those who grew up Roman Catholic the prevailing view is that suicide is definitely a mortal sin, irretrievably sending people to hell. Influenced by the arguments of Augustine and Aquinas, this belief dominated through the Reformation. This of course causes much angst and problems for the survivor to process through. As a result, the approach is most often an emotional one. Besides this traditional position of the Catholic Church, we encounter three others:

1) A true Christian would never commit suicide since God wouldn’t allow it.

2) A Christian may commit suicide but would lose his salvation.

3) A Christian may commit suicide without losing his salvation.

As purposeful as those statements are, we still need to ask what the Bible, not tradition or opinion says. As much as we don’t have all the answers, let’s begin by talking about those truths we do know as revealed in God’s Word.

We know that humanity is totally depraved (Isaiah 64:6; Romans 3:10-18). Of course, we should understand that this doesn’t mean we’re as evil as we could be, but rather that every human capacity – intellect, heart, emotions, will – is tainted by sin. We also know that even after regeneration, a Christian is capable of committing any sin except the unforgiveable one. We see the unforgivable sin mentioned in Mark 3:25-32 and Matthew 12:32. A study of these passages leads us to the conclusion that they are referring to the continual rejection of the Holy Spirit in the work of conversion, ultimately referring to a committed unbeliever.

I think that it’s important to remember as well, that a believer is quite capable of taking the life of someone else, as David did in the case of Uriah, without this action invalidating his salvation. After all, Christ’s sacrifice on the cross has forgiven all of our sin – past, present, and future (Colossians 2:13-14; Hebrews 10:11-18). Still, suicide is a serious offense against God because it represents arrogant violation of the gift of life the Creator has given. However, if a genuine believer is theoretically capable of taking another’s life, why is it impossible to conceive he or she could ever take his or her own?

The truth is that the sin a Christian will commit tomorrow was forgiven at Calvary – where Jesus justified us, declaring us positionally righteous. He accomplished this work through one single offering that didn’t need to be repeated again. On the cross Jesus didn’t make us justifiable; he made us justified (Romans 3:23-26; 8:29-30).

Granted, some point out that Scripture contains no instance of a believer committing suicide, while it includes many cases of unbelievers doing so, thus coming to the conclusion that believers simply don’t (won’t) commit suicide. But this is an argument from silence. Scripture doesn’t explicitly mention many things in life. Moreover, some hold suicide robs a Christian of her salvation because it doesn’t provide an opportunity for repentance. But if you were to die right now, would there be any unconfessed sin in your life? I think that we could only say that yes, of course there would be.

The sacrifice that covers the unconfessed sins we have remaining until death is the same sacrifice that would cover a sin like suicide. Suicide is not what determines whether a person gains entrance into heaven anyways. If an unsaved person commits suicide, she has done nothing but “expedite” her journey to hell. However, that person who committed suicide will ultimately be in hell for rejecting salvation through Christ, not because she committed suicide. “Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God.” – John 3:18

We should also point out, however, that no one truly knows what was happening in a person’s heart the moment he died. Some people have “deathbed conversions” and accept Christ in the moments before death. It is possible that Anthony Bourdain could have had a last-second change of heart and cry out for God’s mercy, we don’t know, but if he did, we can know that God’s mercy would have reached him even there.

Back to our original question. Is suicide the unforgivable sin? If we’ve established that a Christian is capable of committing any sin, why can’t we conceive that someone could commit the sin of suicide? And if we believe Jesus’ blood is capable of forgiving any sin, wouldn’t his blood cover this sin too? The wonderful truth of the matter is that if Jesus’ sacrifice has made believers perfect forever (look up Hebrews 7:28-10:14), could any sin remove their salvation? Based on scripture, I’d have to say a resounding no – including suicide.

Further to this point, if someone like Moses (and Job, and Elijah, and Jeremiah) came to a point where he wished God would take his life, couldn’t a believer with schizophrenia or extreme depression, who lacks Moses’ strength of character, make this wish a reality? Martin Luther believed that a true believer could be oppressed by demonic powers and thus driven to the point of suicide. The suicide of a believer is evidence that anyone can struggle with despair and that our enemy, Satan, is “a murderer from the beginning” – John 8:44

Having said that, on the basis of Scripture, history, and the experience of God’s people – as well as the indwelling Spirit and the means of grace in the church – it’s most likely that suicides will be rare (though not impossible) for genuine believers.

How should we respond to a survivor?
Even still, when a suicide does occur, we should seek to comfort, not accuse. Instead of identifying the horrors we should seek to comfort the hurting. Our chief focus should be on that about which God has said much (salvation), not on that about which he’s said little (suicide).

Sometimes the best thing we can say to a survivor (friend or family member of someone who took their own life) is NOTHING! In fact, sometimes the best reaction is no words at all, but a hug. There is much comfort that comes with the caring presence of friends, and the assurance others are praying for them. Even still, if you do feel led to say anything, here are some examples you can use that I have found helpful as I have come along side those who are hurting.

“Tell me a favourite memory of…”

“I love you, and my prayers are with you.”

“How can I help you today?” (Following through with errands, grocery shopping, cleaning, going to church with them, etc.)

“I am so sorry for your loss. Words fail.”

“I’m here.”

The best advice to anyone who wants to comfort a suicide survivor is: “Show up, let them see you care, and respect the griever’s right to feel bad for a while (guilt, anger, sadness, etc.). Too many survivors reported “friends” who avoided them altogether after their loved ones’ suicides rather than to risk saying the wrong thing. Please don’t do that, because that hurts most of all.

If you’ve spent any time on social media lately, you’ve probably seen a phrase being used which simply says, ‘Love is Love’. The meaning behind the statement is that falling in love is not about the gender of the person, nor important if it’s monogamous or polyamorous. The sentiment is that you can be gay, bi or straight and pursue a monogamous or polyamorous relationship as long as you’re getting the love, affection and companionship that you need to be happy and fulfilled emotionally as well as satisfied sexually.

The understanding is that when someone makes the statement using the three words, ‘love is Love’, that should settle the matter. After all, how can you argue with someone else’s choice to love? For that matter, it might not even be a choice anyways if I have ‘fallen in love’ because that’s an uncontrolled physical and emotional response to chemistry between two people that just happens. Is it though?

There are a few issues that need to be addressed that come along with the blanket statement ‘Love is Love. For instance, where do we draw the line? Does it only include ‘love’ between two consenting adults, or could it include love between an adult and a child or a human and an animal?

To most of us, including those who promote the current idea of the phrase ‘love is love’, those suggestions would be unthinkable. However, only a few short years ago the majority would have been aghast at the idea of the love is love ideology as it is promoted today. Yet there are movements afoot to normalize both pedophilia and bestiality as we speak, who’s to say that one day they wouldn’t be ‘normalized’? It’s happened before in past cultures – Rome & Greece are just two examples of many.

Who set’s the boundary of this love is love ideology anyways? After all, ‘Love is love’ isn’t it? It comes down to the simple pursuit of happiness and that sense of being needed, wanted, and cared for – isn’t that what we all want? If the answer to those questions are in the affirmative then I’d say, ‘go for it!’.

But what if it is not an enlightened way to live but is instead a foolish lie? What if it leads to unhealthy places for one or both involved; emotionally, spiritually, and yes even physically?[1]

If that’s the case then we need to be extremely careful in making a case for what we might think should be normal and accepted in our culture.

Before we go on, let’s look at this falling in love idea…

IS FALLING IN LOVE A REAL THING?
I’ve heard the statement used, “Well you can’t help who you ‘fall in love’ with”. Falling in love is an expression describing someone’s emotional state when those puppy dog, googly eyed, happy feelings of what’s assumed to be love, start to grip the soul and make you feel like you just can’t breathe another moment without that person being in the same room with you. But I think we need to ask whether or not ‘falling in love’ is even a real thing.

The idea of “falling in love” relies on warm emotions and (more than likely) surging hormones. However, the idea that love is all about feelings is more of a western cultural, 20th century invention than anything else. The biblical view of love is that love can exist apart from feelings. Think about it, no hormones are needed to obey the command to “love your neighbour as yourself” – James 2:8. In other words, we choose to love; that is, we commit ourselves to act in the best interests of another person.

Of course, nice emotions often accompany love, and we naturally have warm feelings toward someone we’re attracted to. And of course, it’s good and proper to have positive feelings and surging hormones when in the company of your spouse. But if that’s all there is to “falling in love,” then we’re in trouble. What happens when the feelings fall away? What about when the hormones stop surging? Have we fallen “out” of love? Love should never be seen as dependent on feelings or expediency or romantic attraction. The “falling in love” concept places undue emphasis on the emotional condition of those involved. The wording of the phrase almost makes it sound as if love were an accident: “I can’t help falling in love with you” makes a nice song lyric, but, in real life, we are responsible to control our emotions. Many marriages have been ended (and many foolishly begun) because someone “fell in love” with the wrong person. Love isn’t a state that we stumble into; it’s a commitment that we grow into. It’s probably more accurate to say that those who “fall in love” actually “fall in lust” or “fall into infatuation” or “fall into co-dependency.”  – What does the bible say about falling in love?

So my answer to that question, ‘is falling in love a real thing?’ can only be no, but rather an invention of the Western world’s infatuation with a ‘fun’ emotional sensation.

LOVE IS LOVE STILL… ISN’T IT?
Even still, someone may not have experienced the emotional sensation of falling in love but have instead grown into a love commitment with someone other than their spouse, with more than one partner at a time or with someone of the same gender. If that’s the case then can we not say that for them at least, love is love? If loving is my choice that I make, that means I can choose to love anyone I choose, whether it’s someone of a different gender, the same gender, or more than one person… after all love is love – right?

Ephesians 5:31 is a quotation of Genesis 2:24, “For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one.” Paul adds in verse 32: “This is a great mystery, and I take it to mean Christ and the church.”

The union of one man and one woman in marriage is a mystery because it presents a narrative, a true story, a parable if you will of Christ and his bride the church. And hidden in this allegory of marriage is that God ordained a permanent union between his Son Jesus and the church. In other words, marriage Is not simply an ancient cultural definition that we haven’t ‘evolved’ away from yet, nor is it an accident that marriage between a man and woman provides the church with a language to explain Christ’s relation to the church.

God had purposefully designed human marriage to be an earthly reflection of his celestial plan. Do you see that picture? God willed it that Christ and the church become one body, and then willed it for marriage to reflect that pattern. That is why we see the blessing and encouragement of a husband and wife becoming one flesh as stated in Genesis 2:24.

Paul paints the picture for us even further about this being the image for the church when he says, “For I feel a divine jealousy for you, since I betrothed you to one husband, to present you as a pure virgin to Christ.” – 2 Corinthians 11:2

Now, understanding that – when people say that “love is Love” – we can’t help but see how it cheapens what true love is. It doesn’t allow for the full expression to be experienced as God intended, and we see it for what it is (or is not). It’s not an enlightened understanding of love at all but is in truth a bad copy at best.

Of all the ways we might think about love being expressed, biblical love gives us the best definition. In fact, it’s described as “the most excellent way” – 1 Corinthians 12:31. Paul says that “Love is patient, love is kind” – 1 Corinthians 13:4. I don’t think that it should be lost on us that we don’t find too many people, if any at all, “falling into” patience or kindness, do we?

“Falling in love” or saying that “love is Love” are nice phrases and make for great soundbites to use in the moment or in songs on a soundtrack. They appeal to the emotions and give us nice fuzzies, the goosebumps, the enjoyable feelings of having entered the ideal romance. Please understand that I think that those feelings are fine, in and of themselves, and it’s possible that those who are “falling in love” have actually found a perfect match.

But we need always remember that love is more than emotional involvement based on physical attraction. It’s more than finding a person or persons to ‘enjoy’ experiences with. Truth is that those who are falling in love are sometimes blinded to the reality of their situation and can easily mistake the intensity of their emotions for genuine love.

But there’s some good news…

REDEMPTION BRINGS RECOVERY
God created marriage between one man and one woman to be THE image of Jesus’ relationship to the church. But the problem has been that sin has so confused the image as to make it unrecognizable. If contemporary culture succeeds in redefining and reimaging the purpose of love relationships, the meaning of the image we are to reflect to the world of Christ & his bride, seen as love between a husband and wife will be obscured for many years to come.

That is why we, who are committed to God’s definition of marriage, must live out the true meaning of authentic, committed love relationships, with our spouses if we’re married, within the church in authentic ways, with our neighbours representing Jesus to them, and even more importantly with Jesus Christ himself, growing to know him intimately.

As we grow in these love relationships, we need to commit to living out our true love publicly and joyfully, so that the world sees it and begins to recognize the depth of love they are missing out on. We need to live it out in such a way that our love displays Christ in all his beauty. That’s the Gospel being put on display! And pray that those who see our love in action will be so attracted to Jesus that they soon become counted among the redeemed and recover the life they were created for – a love relationship with our Heavenly Father, through his son Jesus, accomplished through the power of the Holy Spirit.

True story – It’s only as our lives are redeemed that true recovery back to reflecting the image of Jesus can be realized just as those ‘some’ were redeemed and recovered who Paul wrote to in the Corinthian church so long ago.

“Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. And such were some of you. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.” – 1 Corinthians 6:9-11

[1]A telling statistic is that HPV infection is found in about 90% of people with anal cancer:  https://www.medicaldaily.com/does-anal-sex-lead-anal-cancer-3-facts-and-myths-400561

What comes to mind when you hear the word ‘worship’? Most people think music, usually done at a ‘praise & worship service’ or singing loudly along with a ‘worship’ cd playing in our car. Those aren’t necessarily wrong, and in fact can be quite wonderful if the worship is sincere. But I would propose that worship is much more than that and goes beyond music, by, like a lot. Worship is much more than a great song sung on a Sunday morning.

The English word “worship” comes from two Old English words: weorth, which means “worth,” and scipeor ship, which means something like shape or “quality.” We can see the Old English word ‘ship’ in modern words like friendship and sportsmanship – that’s the quality of being a friend, or the quality of being a good sport.

So worth-ship is the quality of having worth or of being worthy. When we worship, we are saying that God has worth, that he is worthy. Worship means to declare worth, to attribute worth. So, when we speak, declare, or sing, about how good and powerful and worthy God is – we are worshipping.

This is a purpose for which we are called: “You are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light” – 1 Peter 2:9.

We receive absolutely everything from God… but the one thing we get to give back to him as our gift is worship. That is one of the job descriptions of a Christian. We are called for the purpose of praising and worshiping God. We should declare that God is worthy, worth more than everything else put together.

God wants worship not only verbally, but also in our hearts. He wants our worship to be sincere – he wants to be the most important thing in our lives, that we are truly submissive to him. He wants our worship to affect our behaviour. In other words, our worship needs to result in a response.

The best thing that has ever happened to us is that we have God in our lives and the best thing that’s happened to us this week is that we have God in our lives. In short, we have reason to celebrate all the time and in every place. Even Paul and Silas sang praises while shackled in prison.

They did something that should be quite natural for a spirit filled believer especially when with another believer. It is natural that we praise God when we gather together, when we speak to one another about the best thing that’s ever happened to us – not the situation itself, but the fact that God is with us in the situation. In other words, we really should be worshipping all the time, and that means then that worship definitely needs to be a priority when we gather together as the church.

Having said that, we need to understand that corporate worship is not about a great sing along on Sunday mornings. So then if that’s not it, what does corporate worship look like? Is there a method to the madness? What is my role as a part of the ‘crowd’?
The following are five aspects of corporate worship to consider every time we meet together.

Gather
Simply by gathering, we are showing that God has worth. Where two or three are gathered in his name, he will be present in a special way. When we gather, we gather in the presence of God. As the Old Testament says, we appear before the Lord. It’s like an ancient throne room, and we are invited to be with him. In our worship services, we want God to be present.

We specifically ask him to be present. He promises to be present. And if we are sincere about this, we should expect him to be present. And when we sing in God’s presence, we are singing to him. It’s not just a song about God — it is a song to God. These are words spoken to him. Many of the psalms, hymns and other spiritual songs we sing are often prayers set to music. He is the audience; we are the participants. That’s so cool.

Music
Throughout the years our music has come from a rich & wide variety of styles. Some songs express positive emotions, such as adoration, praise, thanksgiving, confidence, faith, joy or excitement. We should always be happy that God is in our life. Even when we have trials, we are to rejoice. The psalms tell us to come before him and rejoice, to praise the Lord, to sing a new song unto the Lord.

That means then that our joy in him should spill over into praises. In fact, our worship should be dominated by praise. But joy is not the only legitimate emotion we can have with God. The psalms also have prayers of confession and supplication. Some of our songs are more meditative than celebrative. Some ask questions, some express sorrow, or anguish or fear. All of these are legitimate emotions we can sing about.

Prayer
Our times of worship need to comprise prayer. This includes praise, petitions and confession. We join in the prayer not as spectators, but as participants. When we say “amen,” we are saying, that’s my prayer, too. When we express our dependence on God, when we give all our requests to him, it shows his worth. When we want to be in his presence, it shows that he is good. When we confess our sins to him, it shows his greatness.

When we give him thanks and praise, it exalts him and glorifies him. We worship when we participate in prayer together. Worshiping God through prayer brings us closer to him. It changes us. It changes our lives. It changes our circumstances. It gives us peace. It gives us joy. It strengthens us. It builds our faith. “Come close to God, and God will come close to you.” – James 4:8 NLT

Preaching
Yes, you see it correctly, preaching is a part of worship. In fact, I’d go so far as to suggest that preaching alone can be used by God, just as a a worship service with music alone can be amazing, but together in their proper places, worship can be explosive. The sermon is a communication of God’s word to us. It explains to us what God’s will is for our life. We expect God to speak to us through his Word and we listen for what God is telling us. God’s truth affects our lives and our hearts. It affects real life, and it demands a heartfelt response.

The sermon should therefore appeal to our mind and to our emotions. In the sermon, we are not just an audience – we should also be participants. We should actively think about the Scriptures, think about the sermon, think about what it means in our lives. This isn’t just information about God — it is information about how God wants to change our lives.

This means then that a part of our worship, a part of our respectful response to God is listening for what he wants to teach us and how he wants to change us. We have to listen with the expectation that the sermon contains something God wants to tell us. It may be different for you than it is for me. The point is that we have to participate in the listening. Just as we participate in the music, and as we participate in prayer, we should participate in the sermon, too.

Response
Jesus said, “But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him. God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.” – John 4:23-24

Worship is much more than an emotional connection. We worship in spirit and truth – it’s a both/and. As we listen, we should be ready to respond to the message we hear in the preaching (truth), and the message we have discerned in our prayers (spirit), and the message we have experienced in the song (spirit & truth). The response can come in many different forms, depending on the message we have heard.

One way to respond is to do what God is telling us to do. Some people are doing this by serving in various capacities within the church. Others respond with service outside of the church, and some may respond by telling others how good and great God is – worshiping him by doing the priestly duty of sharing the good news of salvation – and hopefully all these responses will be common.

Mary Kills People’ was a Canadian TV series (January 2017 – June 2019) set around the life of Dr. Mary Harris, an overworked single mother and ER doctor who also moonlighted as an underground angel of death – working outside the law assisting patients who wanted to die on their own terms. The story followed Mary who managed to stay under the radar, but business began to boom, which caused her ‘double life’ complications. However she is willing to live this way since she believed that she was championing a basic human right.

Proponents of assisted suicide contend that this ‘right’ allows the patient to leave this earth with dignity, save their families from financial ruin, and relieve them of insufferable pain. They claim that giving competent, terminally ill adults this necessary right is to give them the autonomy to close the book on a life well-lived.

Those opposed come back with arguments that say that assisted suicide endangers the weak and vulnerable, gives societal approval to killing, pressures dying people to end their own lives, and potentially turns doctors into killers, as former US Surgeon General C. Everett Koop alluded to, when he warned that the practice of medicine “cannot be both our healer and our killer” – (KOOP, The Memoirs of America’s Family Doctor by C. Everett Koop, M.D., Random House, 1991).

The fact remains however that we are living in a day and an age which is sometimes referred to as a “culture of death.” Abortion on demand has been practised for decades and even some are seriously proposing infanticide. Now assisted suicide is being presented as a viable option to be embraced in society.

Understandably it is not easy to broach this subject with someone who is suffering and sees death as a release. The truth is that death is an unnatural ripping apart of body and spirit, so of course there will be strong emotions and opinions one way or the other and endless positions in between. But it is important to not solely choose our ‘position’ based on sympathy or empathy, we must also consider what the word of God says about life along with considering where assisted suicide will (potentially) lead as well as begin to grasp just how God’s sovereignty fits into all this.

1)  God’s Word must be considered
The word of God tells us clearly that life is a gift from God. Adam became a living being by the breath of God. “Then God said, ‘Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.’ So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.” – Genesis 1:26-27

Since life is a gift to mankind it is then clear that life belongs to God. In other words we mortals do not have absolute autonomy over our own lives but are stewards of the life given to us by God. That being the case it means then that the lives of all humans, both their own and others’, need to be valued and protected. Consequently, the person who takes the life of another will be held accountable. The sixth commandment, “You shall not murder.” – Exodus 20:13 is clear about this.

This focus on death as an answer to the world’s problems is a total reversal of the biblical model. Death is called an enemy that will be destroyed, “The last enemy to be destroyed is death.” – 1 Corinthians 15:26 and throughout scripture it is presented as a curse. On the other hand, it doesn’t take long to read in the scriptures (Genesis 2:7) that life is a sacred gift from God. It’s quite clear that assisted suicide spurns the gift while embracing the curse.

2) Societal consequences must be considered
Not only are there biblical considerations, but there are also societal considerations. In countries where assisted suicide has been made legal, euthanasia (different from assisted suicide in that a doctor directly acts – such as via lethal injection) has expanded in a way that was unpredicted when they began. The number of “mercy killings” in Belgium rose 27 percent in 2014, to five killings per day on average. Belgium also allows terminally ill children of any age to request to be euthanized.

In due course someone has to decide who can choose to die and many questions will need to be raised in the process. Who should be included; children, the mentally ill, those physically disabled? Only those who are terminal, what about those who aren’t terminal but aren’t enjoying a certain quality of life (& who deems what level of quality is acceptable)? Should the cost to our medical system of keeping someone alive become a factor in determining whether they should be allowed to die? When Britain was considering assisted-suicide legislation, Dutch ethicist Theo Boer reportedly told the House of Lords, “Don’t do it, Britain. . .  Some slopes are truly slippery.”

3) God’s sovereignty must be considered
If we believe that God is merely an uninterested force or deity in our day to day lives then there is no need to submit to his (or its) non-existent plan. However if we believe in a God who is active in the lives of mankind, is in control over the affairs of history, and is in fact is seeking our very best with a plan to renew a lost relationship with him, then we can trust what he says about life and death and about the circumstances we find ourselves in.

Death is inevitable for us mere mortals. Of course, allowing death to occur naturally in a terminally ill person is not necessarily wrong, but actively hastening death is. Beginning to understand God’s sovereignty is an opportunity to learn to trust him. In the end, God alone is sovereign over when and how a person’s death occurs. “I know you will bring me down to death, to the place appointed for all the living.”- Job 30:23. And, “No man has power over the wind to contain it; so, no one has power over the day of his death.” – Ecclesiastes 8:8.

It’s a tough assignment to speak up against society’s move toward assisted suicide. Those conversations we have with coworkers in the lunch room are often clouded by the emotion we share: sympathy for people facing terminal illnesses. We don’t want them to suffer and in fact want to help. But the truth remains, choosing suicide at any point is the same sin Adam and Eve committed in the garden: the pride of wanting to be (like) God.

Ultimately, assisted suicide is another way that man attempts to usurp authority from God, but if you are one of those (as I am) who believe in the sovereignty of God and in his word to direct our choices, then we can only conclude that God must be the one to have the final say over death.