Easter is celebrated around the world. It occurs on a Sunday between March 22nd and April 25th – dependent on the first full moon following the vernal equinox. Many Christians use the weekend to reflect on the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Some countries, including Canada, designate Easter as a national holiday. Many world leaders issue press releases about Easter, recognizing its significance to the Christian faith. However, few world leaders have been as specific in their public remarks about the Christian tradition as President Barack Obama — the 44th President of the United States.

Of course, we all know politicians have speech writers who carefully craft words and paragraphs considered appropriate for the occasion. The leader then has the option of deleting, editing or making additions to the prepared remarks to reflect what is important to them. That’s a standard process common to all. What gets said publicly is what leaders feel must be said in a way they are comfortable saying it. That’s the test. How much are they willing to say for the record?

I am not aware of a king or queen, prime minister or president of any country who has spoken more specifically about the true meaning of Easter than President Obama. Obviously, he was a political figure, so people are likely to either proudly embrace his words or dismiss them with disgust. That goes with the territory of being a politician in a deeply polarized era.

If other world leaders have made similar content-rich comments about Easter, please share the quotes with us so they can be published here.

Laying politics aside at this moment, please read President Obama’s remarks about Easter and ask yourself what the Easter tradition personally means to you. This post will conclude with verses from the Holy Bible telling us what happened on Easter Weekend, 33AD. What God’s Word says is infinitely more critical than any speech ever made by any world leader. Without exception, all of them and all of us are flawed. Romans 3:23

On April 19, 2011, at the Easter Prayer Breakfast hosted by the White House, President Obama said:

“…I wanted to host this breakfast for a simple reason -– because as busy as we are, as many tasks as pile up, during this season, we are reminded that there’s something about the resurrection — something about the resurrection of our Saviour, Jesus Christ, that puts everything else in perspective. 

We all live in the hustle and bustle of our work.  And everybody in this room has weighty responsibilities, from leading churches and denominations to helping to administer important government programs, to shaping our culture in various ways.  And I admit that my plate has been full as well… But then comes Holy Week.  The triumph of Palm Sunday.  The humility of Jesus washing the disciples’ feet.  His slow march up that hill, and the pain and the scorn and the shame of the cross.

And we’re reminded that in that moment, He took on the sins of the world — past, present and future — and He extended to us that unfathomable gift of grace and salvation through His death and resurrection.

In the words of the book Isaiah: 

“But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities:  the chastisement of our peace was upon Him; and with His stripes we are healed.” Isaiah 53:5

This magnificent grace, this expansive grace, this “Amazing Grace” calls me to reflect.  And it calls me to pray.  It calls me to ask God for forgiveness for the times that I’ve not shown grace to others, those times that I’ve fallen short.  It calls me to praise God for the gift of His Son and our Saviour.

And that’s why we have this breakfast.  Because in the middle of critical national debates, in the middle of our busy lives, we must always make sure that we are keeping things in perspective.  Children help do that. A strong spouse helps do that.  But nothing beats Scripture and the reminder of the eternal.

So I’m honoured that all of you have come here this Holy Week to join me in a spirit of prayer, and I pray that our time here this morning will strengthen us, both individually as believers and as Americans…”  (1)

On April 07, 2015, President Obama made these statements in his Easter message at the Prayer Breakfast.

“…I am no preacher.  I can’t tell anything to this crowd about Easter that you don’t already know.  I can offer just a couple of reflections very quickly before we begin the program.

For me, the celebration of Easter puts our earthly concerns into perspective.  With humility and with awe, we give thanks to the extraordinary sacrifice of Jesus Christ, our Saviour.  We reflect on the brutal pain that He suffered, the scorn that He absorbed, the sins that He bore, this extraordinary gift of salvation that He gave to us.  And we try, as best we can, to comprehend the darkness that He endured so that we might receive God’s light.

And yet, even as we grapple with the sheer enormity of Jesus’s sacrifice, on Easter we can’t lose sight of the fact that the story didn’t end on Friday.  The story keeps on going.  On Sunday comes the glorious Resurrection of our Saviour. …… Through God’s mercy, Peter the Apostle said, we are given

“an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you.”  1Peter 1:4

It’s an inheritance that calls on us to be better, to love more deeply, to serve “the least of these” as an expression of Christ’s love here on Earth. (2)

President Obama’s final Easter remarks, before his second term as President concluded, were made on March 30, 2016, when he said:

…. we think about all that Jesus suffered and sacrificed on our behalf — scorned, abandoned, shunned, nail-scarred hands bearing the injustice of His death and carrying the sins of the world. And it’s difficult to fathom the full meaning of that act.  Scripture tells us,

“For God so loved the world that He gave His only Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life.”  John 3:16

Because of God’s love, we can proclaim “Christ is risen!”  Because of God’s love, we have been given this gift of salvation.  Because of Him, our hope is not misplaced, and we don’t have to be afraid.

And as Christians have said through the years, “We are Easter people, and Alleluia is our song!”  We are Easter people, people of hope and not fear. (3)

More importantly, what does the Bible say?

In 33AD, the Apostle Peter spoke in Jerusalem some fifty years after the resurrection of Jesus Christ and said this:

“… Jesus of Nazareth, a man attested to you by God with mighty works and wonders and signs that God did through him in your midst, as you yourselves know— this Jesus, delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God, you crucified and killed by the hands of lawless men. God raised him up, loosing the pangs of death, because it was not possible for him to be held by it. Acts 2:22-24

A short while after, the Apostle Peter, standing in Solomon’s Temple portico in Jerusalem, addressed the people:

The God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, the God of our fathers, glorified his servant Jesus, whom you delivered over and denied in the presence of Pilate, when he had decided to release him. But you denied the Holy and Righteous One, and asked for a murderer to be granted to you, and you killed the Author of life, whom God raised from the dead. To this we are witnesses. Acts 3:13-15

Later, Peter told the religious people of his day that the Jesus who was crucified and buried and resurrected is the only Source of salvation.

And there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved. Acts 4:12

The Apostle Paul, once an absolute hater and rejector of Jesus, trusted Christ as his Saviour and Lord and later spoke of that Easter weekend. Speaking of Jesus, he said:

Though they found no proper ground for a death sentence, they asked Pilate to have him executed. When they had carried out all that was written about him, they took him down from the cross and laid him in a tomb. But God raised him from the dead, and for many days he was seen by those who had traveled with him from Galilee to Jerusalem. They are now his witnesses… Therefore, my friends, I want you to know that through Jesus the forgiveness of sins is proclaimed to you. Through him everyone who believes is set free from every sin, a justification you were not able to obtain under the law of Moses. Acts 13:28-39

Consider Easter by thinking about these Bible verses and embracing them personally.

Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that He was buried, that He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures. 1 Corinthians 15:3-4

He himself bore our sins in His body on the tree…1 Peter 2:24

For Christ also suffered for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, that He might bring you to God…1 Peter 3:18

Seven hundred and fifty years before Christ came down from Heaven to die on a cross, the Prophet Isaiah wrote about why Christ suffered.

But He was pierced for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on Him, and by His wounds we are healed. We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to our own way; and the LORD has laid on Him the iniquity of us all. Isaiah 53:5-6

Friend, if you have never discovered the depths of what happened that Easter weekend 33AD and embraced it personally for yourself, will you do it just now? There is no other way for you to be right with God. There is no other way to have your sins forgiven. There is no other way for you to get to Heaven. There is no other way for you to experience true peace and the full meaning of life here on Earth. There is no other way for you to have salvation and eternal life but through personal faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.

Check this out on our site: JESUS: The Easter Story

The Bible records a man asking how he could personally be saved.

“Sirs, what must I do to be saved?” They replied, “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved.” Acts 16:30-31

Notes and Sources:

Note: Changes made to Obama’s transcripts — pronouns referring to Jesus were capitalized, and words like ‘Saviour’ and ‘honoured’ reflect Canadian spelling. The three Bible verses quoted in the transcripts were separated and bold-lettered for emphasis.

1. https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/the-press-office/2011/04/19/remarks-president-easter-prayer-breakfast
2. https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/the-press-office/2015/04/07/remarks-president-and-vice-president-easter-prayer-breakfast
3. https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/the-press-office/2016/03/30/remarks-president-and-vice-president-easter-prayer-breakfast