Easter Service "Joy!" by Rev. Teresa Stuefloten, M.Div., 4/5/2026

Good Morning and Happy Easter Sunday! This is Rev. Teresa. Today I am speaking about Joy!

Many of us grew up with the joyful tradition of the Easter Egg Hunt, where eggs, candy and small toys are hidden for children to find on Easter, and are said to be brought by the Easter Bunny. In my family this was an annual event, where my mother carefully hid these treasures for my brother and me to find in the morning, indoors if the weather was rainy and outdoors if it was sunny. I continued this tradition with my own children and my daughters continued it with my grandchildren. Coloring the eggs prior to Easter was always an enjoyable creative activity, too. Rev. Mark, ever the artist, made some very creative decorated eggs in his day as a Dad and as a Grandpa.

Easter is an ancient tradition predating Christianity, celebrating the return of the sun and fertility. Eostre was the goddess of spring. The egg and the rabbit are both symbols of fertility used since ancient times. Egg painting has a long tradition and the Druids were said to bury eggs painted red in their fields to encourage fertility.

In my family attending church was always a part of our Easter, as it was every Sunday. There were usually symbols of spring in the church, such as hand-made butterflies hanging on the walls. The welcome of spring and the resurrection is a joyful time!

Easter Sunday follows the sadness of Good Friday when Christ Jesus was crucified on a cross for the crime of being ‘King of the Jews.” He was condemned and killed because of the perception that he threatened the high priests and Caesar, though he said, “My kingdom is not of this world.” John 18:36 But so many people had seen his miracles, were listening to him, and  believed he had come to save the Jews, that he was seen to be dangerous because they did not understand his mission.

This was a sad time for those close to Christ Jesus. His mother, his mother’s sister, Mary of Cleopas and Mary of Magdala were all there at the cross, as was one of the disciples, ‘the one Jesus loved,” believed to be John, and they witnessed Christ Jesus’ pain and death. Imagine Mary’s pain at witnessing the death of her son, and the pain of all of those close to him.

But today, Easter Sunday, is the day we celebrate Christ Jesus’ resurrection of the body, out of death into Life Eternal. As Psalm 30:5 says, “Weeping may last for a night, but joy comes in the morning.” And indeed joy did come in the morning. The women had spices and oils to put on Christ Jesus’ body, but when they arrived they found an open tomb!

Matthew 28:1-10 relates, “In the evening of the sabbath, when the first day of the week began to dawn, there came Mary of Magdala and the other Mary to see the tomb.

   And behold, a great earthquake took place; for the angel of the Lord came down from heaven, and went up and rolled away the stone from the door, and sat on it.

   His appearance was like lightning, and his garments were white as snow.

   And for fear of him the guards who were watching trembled and became as if they were dead.

   But the angel answered, saying to the women, You need not be afraid; for I know that you are seeking Jesus who was crucified.

   He is not here, for he has risen, just as he had said. Come, see the place where our Lord was laid.

   And go quickly and tell his disciples that he has risen from the dead; and behold, he will go before you to Galilee; there you will see him; lo, I have told you.

   And they went away hurriedly from the tomb with fear and with great joy, running to tell his disciples.

   And behold, Jesus met them and said to them, Peace be to you. And they came up and laid hold of his feet and worshipped him.

   Then Jesus said to them, Do not be afraid; but go and tell my brethren to go to Galilee, and there they shall see me.”

They were both fearful and joyful. This was not what they had expected. Christ Jesus had said, “Tear down this temple and in three days I will raise it up.” John 2:19, but they did not understand that he meant the temple of his body. Christ Jesus had raised others from the dead, and now he raised his own physical body back to life, showing his mastery over life and death.

This was the first of Christ Jesus’ appearances to his followers after his death and resurrection. “When it was evening on that first day of the week, the doors were shut where the disciples were staying for fear… Jesus came, stood among them, and said to them, Peace be with you. He said this and then he showed them his hands and his side. The disciples rejoiced when they saw our Lord.” John 20:19-20 Thomas was not there and did not believe them.

“Eight days later, the disciples were again indoors, and Thomas with them. Jesus came when the doors were locked and stood in the midst, and said to them, Peace be with you. Then he said to Thomas, Put your finger here, and see my hands; reach out your hand and put it into my side; and be not faithless, but believing. Thomas answered, saying to him, O my Lord and my God!” John 20:26-28 There were many more appearances by Christ Jesus.

Easter Sunday is about joy, the joy of life eternal! Some call Easter Sunday Resurrection Sunday. We will all have a resurrection because there is no end to life. There is life and more life. We have life in a physical body in the Earth plane of existence for a relatively short time, and then we have more life on the other side in our astral and causal body. We are eternal Divine creations, made in the image and likeness of God. We never truly die, we just release the temporary physical body.

Christ Jesus had the ability to raise up his actual physical body after his earthly death. The dictionary defines Resurrection as: “the act or fact of bringing someone back to life, or bringing something back into use or existence” Cambridge Dictionary

In our own life we may have experiences that we can think of as a “crucifixion” and later a “resurrection.” With God’s help, through prayer and meditation, we can get through the trials and difficult times in our life. We are never alone. We always have Divine assistance.

Have you had a relationship end, or lost someone significant to you through death, and it was so painful it felt like a crucifixion? But you grew and found out you were much stronger than you realized and it felt like a resurrection into a new life. 

Have you ever lost a job and wondered how you were going to survive? Perhaps it was under conditions that felt unfair. You may have felt depressed and hopeless for a time. This may have felt like a crucifixion. And later you found the perfect job where you were so happy. Perhaps this felt like a resurrection.

Have you ever had a cancer diagnosis and had to undergo chemotherapy and other treatments? The cancer diagnosis and treatments might feel painful and devastating, like a crucifixion. But when the treatment is successful and the cancer is in remission, no more treatments, cancer free, that can feel like a resurrection. You feel like you have been brought back to life!

This can apply to so many health conditions that initially seem devastating, like a crucifixion, and then feel like a resurrection when the treatment is done and the person is deemed cured. What joy at the feeling that the suffering is done and life can go on without a constant focus on the physical body! 

The body can heal and it is our belief that allows it to do so. Our thoughts are so powerful that when we believe we will be healed without any doubt, we will. But Christ Jesus did not just have a belief that he would raise up his body, he had a knowing. There was no doubt in him at all. He knew his oneness with God, the Father, and he knew without a doubt that he could do all things.

New Thought pioneer Charles Fillmore says of resurrection, “The resurrection is the lifting up of the whole man (the whole woman) into the Christ consciousness. The whole man (the whole woman) is spirit, soul and body. The resurrection lifts up all the faculties of mind until they conform to the absolute ideas of Divine Mind, and this renewal of the mind makes a complete transformation of the body so that every function works in divine order and every cell becomes incorruptible and immortal. The resurrection is an organic change that takes place daily in all who are conforming their lives to the regenerating Truth of Christ Jesus. The resurrection takes place here and now in all who conform their lives to the spiritual law under which it works.” (Metaphysical Bible Dictionary)

So resurrection is part of our spiritual journey. As we study Truth teaching, meditate regularly, and are lifted higher and higher in consciousness to the consciousness that is in Christ Jesus.

Dr. Emmet Fox, prominent Divine Science minister of the 1930s and 40s, says of The Resurrection of the World -

   “Jesus Christ rose again because he had overcome the belief in separation from God. What theology calls the Fall of Man is the belief that we are separate from God. The Truth is that we are not separate - we are the expressions of God. It is as though God is singing a song and that song is man. We are the very self-livingness of God, not created in some past time, but re-created every moment. Because God lives, we live, for we are part of God’s self expression of Himself. Yet people have the belief that they are separate from God, and the Cosmic Law is that what we really believe we experience.”

   “It is this basic feeling of being separate from God that fills man with fear, and under the domination of fear, he does strange things. He begins to choose the lower instead of the higher. He believes he can get some supposed gain by lying or cheating or stealing. He believes he is "on his own" and must fight his way in the jungle of human experience. This belief in separation from God is the major tragedy of human existence, giving rise to many negative things that are faults of belief and not of fact. As soon as we begin to realize our oneness with God, everything changes and everything regenerates.”

   “In the course of human experience progress for man sometimes seems impossibly difficult, but this is because we are in the thought of limitation, dependent upon material things, and thus subject to "the law of the flesh." However, when we catch the vision of the Cosmic Christ and identify ourselves with that, we no longer come under the law of outer things, but, as Paul said, under grace. No human being ever lived who was more under bondage of law than Paul. He was so steeped in it from his earliest days that he almost lost his faith in God. Then he realized the Truth one day, and hundreds of years later, Luther, reading those wonderful words that Paul wrote, was also set free in the same way: "The just shall live by faith." This means that when you see the vision of the divine possibility within you and stretch forth your hands toward it, you are no longer under the law of sin and bondage. The limitations and weaknesses of your own character, the mistakes of the past, no longer have the slightest power to keep you back. You are under the law of grace.”

   “Calvary is past and Easter morning is dawning. It is the dawn of Easter and never again will you have the Thursday or Friday to go through. You are under grace. This is the real law of scientific prayer. It is withdrawing yourself from the limited condition into the spiritual realm where there is freedom and dominion.”

   “How do you withdraw yourself? By some physical act? No. It is a matter of attention. When your attention is centered on limitation, on your weaknesses or other people's weaknesses, on your difficulties, your sickness, your fears, you are in bondage to these things, As Paul says, "His servants ye are to whom you obey." But when you lift your attention - your I AM - out of the limited things into the spiritual, then you are in a state of consciousness where the limiting things no longer have any power.”

   “This is why scientific prayer performs miracles right and left. This is why it turns people's lives upside down, takes them out of beds of pain and sickness, and brings them out of lives of sin and self-contempt. Scientific prayer does this-not now and again, not occasionally, but every day in the week in every quarter of the world. It does it whenever and wherever one raises his consciousness to the presence of God.”

   “Easter is the crowning diagram of our personal destiny. Easter is there to impress upon us, to drive home to us, to brand into our hearts, that the resurrection is an activity that God calls for in all humanity, not just in Jesus. Jesus showed the way. The resurrection is a practical step for you and me to take today. It is not just a theological belief. It is a fact of nature. It is the Truth of Being. It means a perfect body. It means peace of mind. It means a perfect and integrated soul. It means reunion with God in thought, understanding, and realization. It means the overcoming of every limitation. We can do it; we have to do it; and in the name of Jesus Christ, we shall do it.” (End of quote)

Yes, we can, must and will do it! Are you ready to resurrect?

Nona Brooks, one of the founders of Divine Science, said: “Resurrection is the culmination of life process in the one who lives in the resurrection consciousness; it is the end of one process and the beginning of another.  Since the process of resurrection is taking place in every one of us, the event which we speak of as the Resurrection is especially significant to each individual.” 

“We all feel the Law of Life working within us; it is urging us upward and onward.  As we are led by the spirit of light into more and more truth, our vision broadens, and we come into a clearer realization of what it means to live truth as Jesus did.  There is great comfort and joy in knowing that we, too, share in the process of resurrection, and are capable of attaining to the glory of even a resurrection morn, as Jesus did.”

“The resurrection consciousness is the consciousness that raises the body from a belief in mortality to a certainty of Life Eternal.  The world today needs resurrection.  Just as there was a first century resurrection, so let there be a twentieth century resurrection. (And, I will add, a 21st century resurrection.) This resurrection time will be brought about by the spirit of consecration in your heart and in mind which says with Jesus, ‘Thy will be done in us.’  Resurrection will be brought about by our own thought process.  It is that consciousness which loves without wavering.”

“The resurrection consciousness is the complete consciousness; it includes the whole man (the whole woman)-soul and body.  I hope that as you read this, you find that today is a day of resurrection - a day in which our lives are being lived closer to Divine Consciousness.  God is working through us; let us give Him an opportunity to speak and act through us to his highest purpose.  We are God’s opportunities.  If we meet all demands of the day with love we shall rise out of limitations for Love is Resurrection.” (End of quote)

What brings you joy? It is important to have experiences of joy in our life regularly. A walk in nature, a conversation with a friend where you laugh together, spending time with people you love, giving and receiving love, spending time in the garden, the wag of the tail of a beloved pet, the sun on your face outdoors on a beautiful day, creating artwork, making food you love or eating out at your favorite restaurant. We need joy in our lives. These are temporary joys, important, but not ultimately enough for the soul.

The practice of daily meditation brings the inner joy of the soul. Going within and spending time in the silence of Divine communion expands the heart with joy. You will feel it blooming like a flower. You go within, shutting out the outer world, getting quiet by focusing on your breath or a mantra, and letting go as the thoughts quiet. And then there is the click and joy bursts forth in God communion. Most of the time there are no words, just joy! And it feels so deeply nourishing.

Make time for your own resurrection in consciousness. Make time daily to go within in meditation. Christ Jesus will meet you there if you ask him. He will teach you about unconditional love. That was his message, love, love and more love. "Love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul and with all your might and with all your mind… And…Love your neighbor as yourself.” Matthew 22:37-39

Today commit yourself to loving everyone, seeing the God in everyone, and awakening to your own resurrection through the Christ Consciousness in you. “Christ in you, the hope of glory.” Colossians 1:27

And so it is!