1 Second Sunday of Easter

April 15, 2012

John 20: 19-31 Jesus Comes Repeatedly Simon Peter has seen the arrest of Jesus in Gethsemane on Thursday evening. He has seen his fellow apostle, Judas, whispering to the Sargent leading the Temple Guard, and Peter then sees, with his own eyes, in Peter’s own presence, this same Judas approach Jesus to kiss Him; and Peter hears Jesus ask, “Judas, is it with a kiss that you are betraying the Son of Man?” (Luke 22:47-48). And Peter sucks in his breath as the Guard seizes Jesus, arrests Him, and leads Him to the house of the High Priest. Peter follows at a discrete distance (Luke 22:54); they might be soon coming after me, he thinks. Still, they have not hinted at that, and Judas did not come after me. This night chill makes me shiver; I’ll shuffle up to the courtyard fire. Rubbing his hands, Peter soaks up the warmth and wards away the darkness. Peter feels that serving girl staring at him. She is trying to fix me, he thinks, trying to tie me to the arrested Jesus. Then she hunches her shoulder toward me; she whispers to her girlfriend, “This man also was with him.” Quick on self-defense in this dangerous courtyard, on the instant I hear myself lie: “Woman, I do not know [Jesus].” That quick retort will settle that girl! But now someone else is eyeing me and speaking more loudly so that his group can hear: “You also are one of them.” “Man,” I am shooting back, “I do not even know [Jesus].” But when the third man says that I talk with a Galilean twang, I feel my face burning in the frosty night and I shout: “Man, I do not know what you are talking about!” So then I hustle away from the fire, away from the courtyard, and my falseness to my dearest friend churns my stomach until my eyes water. I am shaking at my own perjury (Luke 22:54-62). 2 I did not sleep that Thursday night. Friday was a terrible night; I paced every minute in the dark of that upper room. On Saturday night, I was so worn out that I did slump in my chair. And now this Sunday morning, after hearing Mary Magdalene, I run with John to the tomb, and I see its emptiness. It’s Sunday, and Jesus comes to me this morning (Luke 24:34). It is a wonder, because on Thursday evening, when we were eating with you eleven, I heard Jesus say to us, “One of you will betray me.” And then Jesus, in an undertone, tells John that ‘“it is the one to whom I give this piece of bread when I have dipped it in the dish.” So when [Jesus] dips the piece of bread, he gives it to Judas…. So, after receiving the piece of bread, he immediately goes out. And it is night” (John 13:21-30). Besides that, Jesus foresaw that I, too, that I would deny knowing Him (John 13:36-38). I admit this to you, hard as the admission is. But the real wonder is, that after Judas and after my own denial, after even coming from the burial tomb, Jesus comes to see me. Well, we have the doors bolted shut, and none of us eleven are leaving. That Sanhedrin can stir up a crowd, so let’s be careful about going out from here. “Peace be with you!” It’s you, Lord. You have come again this evening. You show us your hands and even push aside your cloak to show us where the spear went into your side. But this is not the same as when you were dying on the cross. How is it that you can stand to be with us? We did not stick with you when we could be counted. 3 But Jesus has come and He asks for Thomas. Risen from the dead! Such has never before happened, not in our holy books, not in Jerusalem, not with our prophets or Abraham. Not even with Moses. I hear Jesus deny being a ghost; he invites Thomas to put his finger into the place of the spear wound and into the nail’s hole in his hands (John 20:26-28; Luke 24:36-42). Jesus says that a ghost does not have flesh and bones as does he; look, see for yourself, touch me. I am real. Shakespeare’s play, Hamlet, involves a ghost that several times appears. This ghost is seen, and this ghost is heard, for it exhorts the young prince Hamlet to dispatch the uncle who has poisonously murdered his brother, the King, and has thus snatched away the crown and queen (I, v). Shakespeare’s ghost, however poetically imposing, is only an author’s creation. Jesus is not a resuscitated body. For Jesus comes through locked doors, not once but on several moments. Jesus is visible to the eleven apostles, and to other disciples, and finally to five hundred disciples. The risen Jesus speaks to the eleven, even asking for something to eat. He takes a piece of fish, and Jesus eats that piece of fish in their presence (Luke 24:41-43) Jesus in appearing to the apostles “opens their minds to understand the scriptures” (Luke 24:45), and Jesus celebrates the Eucharist with at least two disciples (Luke 24:13-31). And Jesus confers on these Apostles the Holy Spirit: “He breathed on them and said to them, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained’”(John 20:22-23). 4 Jesus repeatedly comes to the apostles, repeatedly over forty days dwells with them, and shows Himself with them. Whatever the doubt and the denial, Jesus chooses only to dwell with those who have believed in Him. Amen.