“Easter sure comes early this year!”  If I had a nickel for every time I heard that ….  We were all walking around, scratching our heads, and asking “Isn't it still cold out?  Didn't we just celebrate Christmas?”

We weren’t imagining it … Easter did come early this year.  Way back in the year 325 at the Council of Nicea the date for Easter was set.  The Council decreed that it would be the first Sunday after the first full moon in spring.  And since this year the first full moon of spring was on Friday, March 21, Easter Sunday was on March 23. The last time Easter came this early was in 1913 and the next time will be in 2228.  So there you have it.

And it was chill … downright cold for Easter Sunday.  But here is the good news … Easter isn’t over yet.  In fact, we are in the midst of the “Great Fifty Days!”

The “Great Fifty Days” or the Easter Season (through the Day of Pentecost) was the very first season of the Church Year.  In the early Church this was the only season of the Church Year.  No Christmas, no Advent, no Epiphany, even no Lent, and no Pentecost season.  All there was was the rest of the year and the “Great Fifty Days.”

It is still the central season of the Christian Year.  It is the season in which we remember the event that is at the very center of our faith (the death and resurrection of Jesus).

And so while Easter Day may have come early this year … and it might have been chilly … there is still time for us to have a warm, spring-like Easter.  Those “Great Fifty Days” of Easter aren’t over until June 11, The Day of Pentecost.  May these fifty days of the Easter Season be filled with signs of new life and resurrection.  As you breathe the warm spring air into your lungs, may you be filled with the spirit of God that brings us hope and life.