Friends, welcome to Pines with Jack and happy and blessed Easter.

I hope today has just been an incredible celebration of the resurrection of our Lord.

And more importantly, I just pray that this entire season, this Lenton season leading up to this period,

has been just such a fruitful season of prayer, fasting, almsgiving, the chance to prepare our hearts

for this incredible moment. This is my favorite time of the liturgical calendar. I have been very

blessed to have had some of the most incredible

experiences in San Diego and my church community there. That between the Thursday Mass,

the Good Friday Mass, the Easter Vigual, just doing the Tritium has brought just so much

fruit to my life, no matter how bad the year has been, no matter how much I've

stumbled during the Lenton season, it just always fills me up and edifies me. And I really

just pray that that's been the case for all of you guys. And even if it hasn't, if it's been a

really tough year and even a tough

lent because going from a pandemic where a lot of our disciplines and practices went away

and we then have to somehow go from zero to 60 and commit ourselves to these practices in

preparation for Easter to prepare our hearts. We might not have done as

successfully as we like. And I'm right that it with you guys. But don't let that take away from

the power and the magnitude of what Easter is, the resurrection. I want to read, of course,

in this is a Lewis podcast, some quotes from his that I believe just apply to this, this season, this time, this day.

This is from Miracles, chapter 16. The New Testament writers speak as if Christ's achievement in rising from the dead was the first event of its kind in the whole history of the universe.

He is the first fruits, the pioneer of life. He has forced open a door that has been locked since the death

of the first man. He has met, fought, and beaten the king of death. Everything is different

because he has done so. And then the cross, I love to watch the passion of Christ at this period, just remind myself

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