By Dr. John E. Morgan

Pastor–Collinsville Baptist Church

One Easter when I was young my sister and I really stretched the holiday out.  It was raining.  We decided to have our own Easter egg hunt inside.  There were no plastic eggs back then (or at least not many).  We had decorated our boiled eggs with the same type dyes most people use now.  Different colors in each cup.  Metal egg picker upper.  Do I remember smelling vinegar?   I think the dyes were even Paas.  They came with a wax crayon that could be used to make designs or put your name on your eggs. Mine were the best.  As I remember it.

We gathered the decorated eggs that we had left and put them in a basket.  Since Easter was winding down, our mother had already started having us eat them. I was great at decorating and hunting.  Not wild about eating them.

Our house had a living room that ran through the width of the house with a kitchen and dining room parallel to it.  The dining room had a table to eat and a couch for when we set the television in there.  Add an ironing board and some other things and all the furniture in the living room, and there were lots of hiding places.

We took times about hiding and hunting.  After a while, we had to work a little harder to find new places to hide.  Did we dare to put any in the corner cabinet that had mother’s collectible glass ware?  How about in the fireplace in the living room?  We decided it was about time to quit and just watch television.

We gathered the eggs back into the basket and put them back into the refrigerator.  We would be eating them over the next few days.  One last time counting them.  Did we have them all?  Mother would know.  We closed the door and officially said good bye to Easter.

Time passed.  About two months.  We were playing in the dining room.  As I jumped away from my sister and onto the couch, I heard a crack.  Uh oh.  What had I broken?  I pulled the cushion out.  And there was the Easter egg I hid two months earlier between the cushion and the arm.  It had worked its way out from under the arm.  And it was now completely crushed. Little blue pieces of shell mixed in with the rotten egg.

And, yes, it really did stink.  I tried to clean up before we were caught.  But the smell gave us away.  Gag.  I should have counted more carefully.  Two month old Easter eggs?  Not so good.

Hope you had a really meaningful Easter.  It was special for our family.  Our grandson, Isaiah, was baptized Easter morning.  How great is that?  And our building was full.  Lots of Easter excitement.

Some of you probably went to church Sunday for the first time in a long time.  Excellent.  Good for you.  Just don’t hide your faith now.  Easter faith is meant to be lived all year long.  The Church calls every Sunday a “little Easter”.  Another chance to celebrate Jesus being alive.  Another chance to renew our Christian walk.

One day soon you will need your Easter faith.  Don’t hide it now.  You may forget where it is.  And it may begin to smell. Or, as I hope you learned as a child, “Hide it under a bushel? NO.  I’m gonna let it shine.”