April 2026 – Bruno Loyiso | Have you ever felt like you’re never quite good enough? Or like something in your life is broken, and no matter how hard you try, you can’t fix it?
Most of us know that feeling. We try harder, promise to do better, and adjust our behaviour, hoping things will change. Yet we often find ourselves back in the same place, repeating the same patterns, reacting in ways we wish we wouldn’t. It is as if something deeper in us is not right.
Paul describes this struggle with surprising honesty: “I don’t really understand myself, for I want to do what is right, but I don’t do it. Instead, I do what I hate” (Romans 7:15, NLT). This is not just an ancient problem. It is deeply human. We know what is right, and yet something in us keeps pulling us back.
Easter begins exactly here. Not with people who have it all together, but with people who know they don’t.
The message of Easter is not that we must fix ourselves to reach God. It is that God came to us. In Jesus, God stepped into our broken world and into our struggle. “God showed his great love for us by sending Christ to die for us while we were still sinners” (Romans 5:8, NLT). As John Stott explains, the problem is not only the things we do wrong, but something deeper within us that we cannot fix on our own, and the cross is God’s answer to that condition (Stott 1986).
On the cross, Jesus took our sin, our guilt, and even that deep sense of not being enough. “He was pierced for our rebellion, crushed for our sins… and by his wounds we are healed” (Isaiah 53:5, NLT). This is the great exchange. Jesus takes what we deserve, so we can receive what we could never earn: forgiveness, acceptance, and restored relationship with God.
But Easter does not end with the cross. Jesus rose again. This means we are not stuck. “Anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone; a new life has begun!” (2 Corinthians 5:17, NLT). As Tim Keller puts it, we are more broken than we realise, yet more loved than we ever dared hope (Keller 2008). Easter is not only about forgiveness, but about transformation.
I have seen how deeply this matters in my own life. For a long time, I kept running into the same conflicts in my relationships. I would often slip into sarcasm, subtle comments with an edge, trying to stay in control so I would not be hurt first. It was a form of protection, but it slowly damaged trust. No matter how hard I tried, I found myself repeating the same patterns. At some point, I had to face that I could not fix this on my own. I needed Jesus. Paul expresses the same cry: “Who will free me from this life that is dominated by sin and death?” and then answers, “Thank God! The answer is in Jesus Christ our Lord” (Romans 7:24–25, NLT).
But how does this change actually happen? Scripture gives us a simple but profound picture: “As we behold the Lord’s glory, we are being transformed into his image” (2 Corinthians 3:18, NLT). Transformation does not come from trying harder, but from drawing closer. As we spend time with Christ, in His presence, in His Word, in quietness and prayer, His life begins to reshape ours.
Easter invites us not just to believe something, but to respond. To stop trying to fix ourselves and instead come honestly before God. To receive His grace. To begin walking with Him. And to allow Him, over time, to transform us from the inside out.
Here is a question to carry with you this week:
Where in your life are you still trying to fix yourself? And what might it look like for you to slow down, turn toward Jesus, and allow Him to begin that work in you?
May the hope of Easter meet you right where you are and lead you into new life.
References
Stott, John. 1986. The Cross of Christ. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press.
Keller, Timothy. 2008. The Reason for God: Belief in an Age of Skepticism. New York: Dutton.
The Holy Bible. New Living Translation. 1996, 2004, 2007, 2013, 2015. Tyndale House Foundation. https://www.biblegateway.com/versions/New-Living-Translation-NLT-Bible/. Accessed 23 March 2026.