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Sunday, May 1, 2011

May 1, 2011 Sermon: Easter 2

Alleluia! Christ is risen! The Lord is risen indeed! Alleluia! My that sounds good to my ears! Get used to it, since that is the shout of the Easter season!

I often get the feeling that for some, Easter is a major celebration and that demands our attention and presence. Yet, the Sundays afterward seem to trail off for some reason. The Easter season, my brothers and sisters, is 50 days long and in that time we will hear many stories of the significance of the resurrection.

Like today’s story about one of the disciples of Jesus. You remember Thomas? He is perhaps one of the more well known disciples since we have a phrase that we used that is tied directly to this story…. “Doubting Thomas.” Do we have any doubting Thomases in this community?

I don’t know about you, but it seems to me that doubting comes with human nature and it can get us into a whack of trouble. I’m away next week and I am still pinching myself to see if I am dreaming. I have been awarded a Doctor of Ministry degree after some six years of effort. Yet, there were many many times along that journey that I doubted. I doubted I had the confidence, the knowledge, the ability, the skill to get the job done. Many times I would stare at a blank computer screen and ask “What am I doing?” and “Why am I doing this?” or “How am I going to get this done?” It was debilitating at times.

Thankfully, I worked through my doubting and listened to the more sober voices of friends and family, the very voices of God nudging me onward despite my doubts. Had I simply given in to this process, I would have quit and the thesis would not have been written. My thesis deals with the national Sacred Circle in 2009 in Port Elgin, Ontario. I argued that the national sacred event led to substantial governance change in the Church.

Anyway, this story is a good one because it reflects our time. It is hard in this day and age some 2000 years past the original event to believe in a God we cannot see or touch or hear in the presence of an earthly Jesus. It is hard to believe in a world with so much hatred and violence and greed, where money and the love of it seem to top the agendas many times and where we continue to see poverty and illness and natural disasters and crises visit us. It is the hardest to believe when these things strike home and land on our doorstep.

And so, we revisit the Gospel passage. It is after the resurrection event. Jesus has made His first post-resurrection visit to the disciples in the Upper Room. These are the same disciples who were nowhere to be found when Jesus was being crucified. We are not told why, but one speculation is they were afraid. They were afraid they might be accused of having stolen the body of Jesus. They were afraid that perhaps they, too, would be crucified next. They were afraid that perhaps along with Jesus went all of their hopes and dreams. Scripture tell us it was not until after the resurrection event that the disciples fully understood what Jesus meant when He said He must die and rise again.

Fear is a crippler and it can lead to doubt. The disciples may have asked themselves, “Where are we now? Jesus said He would not leave us alone. Jesus said there were better days ahead. Jesus was the Messiah, wasn’t He? What if all of that was untrue? What if this were some elaborate hoax? What if we were duped?”

If we are afraid, we tend to retreat from life, to blindly follow where we might not otherwise go, in order to seek security. Fear can lead us to do things we might not otherwise do. There’s even such a thing as a ‘politics of fear’. Have you heard that expression? I’ve heard it said several times during our current election campaign. Some are kept in power by controlling others through fear. This can be said of dictators who we have heard of in our news lately.

Perfect love casts out fear and that is where Jesus comes in. In the midst of a climate of fear and uncertainty, Jesus appears to His disciples in the Upper Room. “Peace be with you,” Jesus then shows them His hands and side. Again, He says. “Peace be with you! As the Father has sent me I am sending you.” And with that statement Jesus commissions the disciples to become Apostles, which means ‘Ones who are sent’.

The Apostles are given their marching orders but not before Jesus breathes on them and says “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive anyone His sins they are forgiven; if you do not forgive them they are not forgiven.” The Apostles are now equipped with the mandate to carry on Jesus’ mission to the world.

Except there is one who is not present. Thomas. Why is that? Well, I am sure all of you, or most anyway, have experienced grief as a result of loss. Thomas was deeply committed to the Lord’s mission. Remember, he was the one who, when Jesus was ready to go to Bethany, courageously said he would go even if it meant he would die with Jesus. Thomas said to them, "Let us also go, that we may die with Him" (John 11:16). Thomas also asked Him one of the most famous questions. In John 14:5-6 Thomas says, “‘Lord, we don't know where you are going, so how can we know the way?’ Jesus answered, ‘I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me’"

He recalled that not long before, the authorities had tried to stone Jesus. And so, this courageous man would not have done that if he did not believe in the cause.

Thomas was likely in heavy grief, so much so that when the disciples caught up to him and told him they had seen the Lord, what was his reaction? He doubted, perhaps because of the many reasons stated earlier. So, he says, “Unless I see the nail marks in his hands and put my finger where the nails were, and put my hand into his side, I will not believe it.”

'I will not believe it’. Famous words of the doubter. Unless I have the proof in front of me I will not believe. Look around, I’m tempted to say. Feel the wind. You could say there is no such thing, but you can feel it when it blows and see the effects it has on the landscape. It is this evidence that leads us to believe there is wind even though we cannot see.

Like many who doubt, Thomas needed the proof and so a week later they were in the Upper Room again and Jesus again appears and says “Peace be with you!” This is the very heart of this passage as we note that the doubter may have wanted concrete proof. In the end, he didn’t need it. He saw and immediately cried out “My Lord and my God.” The scripture doesn’t actually say Thomas thrust his hand into Jesus side. He simply made an act of faith and believed.

Jesus then says. “Because you have seen me you have believed. Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.”

We, today, are ones who have not seen Jesus in the flesh. Yet, we, too, believe. This is faith, to believe in the fact the Lord kept His promise. He sent the Holy Spirit and we now have the power and ability and authority to continue God’s work in the world, to bring about healing, hope, reconciliation, to a world that so desperately needs it.

And so, when I was at my worst in doubting, I, like Thomas, had to work through that doubt and to listen to the voice of God. Where was His voice? It was found in you, in my family and friends and those who were confident I could get the job done. Brothers and sisters in Christ, there will be many moments of despair and uncertainty that will visit us. In these moments, let us not give in to fear and uncertainty. Instead, let us embrace the risen Lord in our lives and trust in His love and may that same love guide and direct us into deeper faith and deeper mission in His name! The Lord is risen indeed! Alleluia!

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