What do Dracula, Captain Cook and Easter have in common? gracenotworks.com ::: april 2001 Easter marks the time when Christians around the world celebrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ. But have we got Jesus' resurrection date all wrong? Come with us this month as we put Christianity's biggest date to the test, and discover lots of things along the way... including what Dracula, Captain Cook and Easter all have in common. [The Bishops' Easter] In the autumn of the year 663 a remarkable group of men and women gathered at Whitby Abbey on the Northumbrian coast . While society in what is now Britain and Ireland was taking its first steps towards its modern form, the church was already sharply divided. The Celtic church in what is now Scotland, Wales and the north of England had moved off in its own direction since the fall of the Roman Empire. The Celts had already developed some major differences from the Roman church, and perhaps the most significant of these was the fact that the Celts celebrated Easter on a different day to the Roman church. This was a visible challenge to the authority of Rome and could not be tolerated. So the Roman church sent a selection of Bishops and Abbots to impose their authority on this unacceptable rival tradition. This was to become known as the Synod of Whitby, where Rome intended to finally settle this division and impose Roman authority onto the Celtic church. To cut a long story short the Roman delegation won the day, and this is the reason why Easter falls this year on April 15th. The Celts were brought into the Roman church, and the British Isles remained under the authority of Rome for the next 800 years. An abbey still stands on the cliff-top of Whitby where this ancient gathering took place. It still overlooks the protected harbour where Captain Cook learnt how to sail, and the beach where Bram Stoker's Dracula was washed ashore. [The Biblical Easter] Of course, if you know your bible well you will know that the real date of Easter was set over 2000 years prior to the Bishop's gathering at Whitby. Another group of people were preparing for a long journey, but they certainly weren't heading for Yorkshire! God had seen the misery of his slave people and decided to act decisively to bring them out of Egypt into the land he had promised so many years before. He commissioned Moses: Then say to Pharaoh, 'This is what the LORD says: Israel is my firstborn son, and I told you, "Let my son go, so that he may worship me. But you refused to let him go; so I will kill your firstborn son.' :: Exodus 4:22-23 The divine rescue, bringing God's son, Israel, out of slavery, would cost the Egyptians their firstborn sons. However, redemption from slavery was not a spectator event for the Israelites. They had to do exactly what God told them, or they too would lose their firstborn sons. On a specific day, each Israelite household was to take a year old lamb without defect. Four days later, the lambs were to be slaughtered at twilight and their blood splashed on the door-frames. With their bags packed ready to go, they were to roast the meat and eat it all. As the LORD came to kill the firstborn sons, he would see the blood and pass over the Israelites' houses (see Exodus 12:1-13). In remembrance of this night, every future year the Israelites were to celebrate the Passover recalling how God rescued them from slavery and brought them to the Promised Land. [Our Lord's Easter] Many years later as the Jews were making preparations to celebrate the Passover festival, a controversial teacher was making his way into Jerusalem. Jesus was conscious that his time had now come. Now was the right time to come up to Jerusalem. This Passover was to be unique, a fulfilment of the original shadow that had been played out in Egypt so long ago. Jesus had said before that "I lay down my life - only to take it up again. No-one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord." (John 10:17-18). He had chosen this time to die because it was the Passover, the remembrance of God's great rescue operation. As he focused his mind on the rescue he was about to put into action, he knew what it would cost him. He was to be the lamb, dying as a substitute in the place of God's people. On his knees in the Garden of Gethsemane he focused with terror on what he would endure the next day. As the substitute he would bear all the wrath and anger of his Father against all the sin and rebellion of humanity. As Jesus was being nailed to the cross, the Passover lambs were being slain in the temple. Jesus was the sacrifice without blemish. His bones had not been broken. His death was the death which saved God's people from slavery to sin and brought them into the Promised Land. Jesus set the date of Easter because he knew what his death would achieve. He knew that death would not hold him down. That this was the true Passover, ensuring that all those who are 'in Christ' would be passed over when the Lord comes on the last day of judgment. This Easter we remember that we will be passed over if Jesus is our Passover lamb. "For Christ our Passover has been sacrificed" (1 Corinthians 5:7) Gavin Perkins spent the last two years ministering in the UK with his wife Amy. After a year in London, he headed North to Hull in East Yorkshire. His only disappointment with the beautiful coast of Yorkshire was the cold water and the lack of good surf. He is presently engaged in theological training in Sydney, where warm water and point breaks abound. Email your feedback on this article Printable version