The meaning of Easter

Rev Will Pickett

Uniting Aboriginal and Islander Christian Congress (Victoria) and Weeroona Uniting Church minister

Easter stands at the centre of Christian theology and remains foundational to my faith and vocation.

I have been a Christian since 1990, following a significant family loss that led me to reassess my life in light of the gospel.

In that context, the Easter narrative of Christ’s death and resurrection became not only a source of comfort but a theological anchor and reminder.

As the apostle Paul writes, “If Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile” (1 Corinthians 15:17).

The resurrection reminds me and affirms that the cross is not an end in itself, but God’s decisive act of reconciliation and victory over sin and death.

Since my ordination as a Minister of the Word in 2004, Easter has taken on an even deeper significance as I continue in ministry throughout the Uniting Church in Australia and the Uniting Aboriginal and Islander Christian Congress.

The resurrection shapes my Christian discipleship and ministry, grounding both proclamation and pastoral care in hope, renewal and transformation.

Christ’s declaration, “I am the resurrection and the life” (John 11:25), affirms that new life is not merely future-oriented but present and active within the community of faith.

From an Aboriginal theological perspective, Easter resonates with the understanding of creation as living and restorative.

Just as Country is renewed after fire or drought, the resurrection proclaims God’s ongoing work of restoration, reconciliation and healing for all creation.

Easter therefore calls the Church into faithful stewardship, justice and gratitude, grounded in the life-giving work of God the Creator revealed through the risen Christ.

Rev Fran Barber

Pilgrim Theological College Ministry Formation Coordinator

To say that Easter lies at the heart of the Christian faith is as obvious as it is unoriginal. Some might argue for Christmas, though in the life of the church it arrived much later as a major festival. In truth, the two cannot be separated. The cross and the cradle are cut from the same wood – to paraphrase Martin Luther.

Easter marks the events in which God, who “so loved the world” (John 3:16), entrusted Jesus to the world’s judgment — and we responded as we often do to truth and love.

On the cross, Jesus enters the depths of absence and despair that is so much part of being human. There, God is revealed as fully acquainted with human fragility and anguish — a shocking claim! The Easter Vigil on Easter Saturday speaks to this experience of waiting and hopelessness, one we often rush past on the way to Sunday.

Yet the good news of Easter is that God does not fail us and won’t let despair have the last word.  God weeps with us, loving us, and the whole groaning creation, into recreation, into healing and into new life.

In the cross and resurrection, God holds together our pain and our hope, our brokenness and our healing, our “no” and God’s enduring, louder “yes”. For me, Easter is an invitation to witness to the truth that resurrection life is at work among us revealed in acts of love, in reconciling community and our acts of mercy and service.

Naomi Buster

Children’s Ministry Lay Leader

We have been reading a delightful children’s book called ‘Goodbye to Goodbyes’ as a family. You may have read it – it is about Jesus and his friends Lazarus, Mary and Martha and about how Jesus brought Lazarus back to life.

To me, this is what Easter is all about. We face sadness, loss and death in this world, and that will continue. But at Easter all of that lost its power – at least in the eternal view. Sure, we still feel it, but we know that life and goodness and resurrection is more powerful than all the bad and sad things of the world.

In Jesus at Easter, good won out, and won forever. And because of Easter we can have peace and joy and certainty that good will overcome, even when everything looks dark around us.

Rev Joseph Lee

Minister, Wheelers Hill Uniting Church

Easter 2026 invites me to step back and reflect. My first year in a new ministry brought both hope and pressure. Looking back, I recognise moments when I placed myself at the centre rather than God.

In caring for people, leading worship, sharing Scripture, and building community relationships, a pastor’s heart is shown through their actions. Easter is therefore more than just a remembrance. It is a time to change our direction, to give our lives to the cross and welcome new life through the resurrection.

Many people today feel exhausted and unmotivated, yet the resurrection opens the way to a new beginning. It reminds us that God continues to make all things new beyond our failures and limitations.

This Easter, I seek to learn again the heart of Jesus and serve with love, praying that personal transformation will nurture healing and restoration in our community.

Rev Duncan Macleod

equipping Leadership for Mission Executive Officer

Easter for me is experienced as a dramatic communal reflection on the death and resurrection of Jesus.

Here I see deep challenges of life and death, with its gritty reflection on suffering, time to wait on an emerging future, and the mystery-laden hints of resurrection that surprise us time and time again.

I’m reminded of the deep significance of the Christian gospel for people, individuals, communities and whole societies. In the middle of conflict, suffering and transition, I discover again God’s offer to join in on new beginnings, belonging, solidarity in suffering, courageous advocacy, healing, liberation, forgiveness, transformation, hope for a future and God’s loving creation.

On another note, I feel that our Southern Hemisphere celebration of Easter in autumn means that the theme of eggs and bunnies are disconnected with the spring season of new life and fertility. I’d love to revisit this spring theme in an Easter 2.0 experience, like Christmas in July.