2 Easter – April 7, 2024
John 20:19-31
“Do not doubt, but believe” Jesus tells us today. This story about Thomas is given to us every year on the Sunday after Easter. It is a resurrection story filled with the reality of human life. Thomas is asking to see the wounds of Jesus….the mark of the nails in his hands and the mark on his side. Thomas wanted to see Jesus’ wounds and put his fingers in them. And, Jesus invited him to do so. Jesus, in wearing his wounds—even in his resurrection— confronts us with our own and calls us to move through them into new life.
Thomas reassures us that the week after the resurrection has always been murky, messy, and complicated. We’re not the first human beings to struggle with it, and we won’t be the last. Struggle is intrinsic to post-Easter life.
But weakness is not what we see in Thomas. We see a man who desired a holy and beautiful thing — a living encounter with Jesus. A man who wouldn’t settle for someone else’s experience of resurrection, but stuck around in the hope of having his own. A man who dared to confess uncertainty in the midst of those who were certain. A man who recognized his Lord in scars, not in wonders.
“Do not doubt, but believe”. John’s gospel uses the word believe quite a bit….98 times….and often in the present tense. Apparently John wanted to stress an active, continuous, and vital trust in Jesus. In John’s gospel, believe has much to do with relationship.
Recall that earlier in John’s Gospel, Thomas is saying to Jesus: ‘Lord, we do not know where you are going. How can we know the way?’ Jesus said to him, ‘I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you know me, you will know my Father also. From now on you do know him and have seen him.’”
As Karoline Lewis shares, “It seems you found the way, Thomas, but really, you knew it all along.
You knew the way was not a roadmap.
You knew the way was not a claim meant to exclude others.
You knew the way was not that which you could use to reject others.
Instead you knew the way was being in the presence of your Lord and God — and that’s all you wanted. You wanted what Jesus said you know. You asked for what Jesus said you should. You needed what Jesus said is yours — always. And in that moment you saw Jesus as your Lord and as your God”.
To see the Resurrected Jesus is to see life itself. John forces us to ask ourselves a profoundly uncomfortable question: What is a human life? If Jesus is the manifestation of both “eternal life” and “true humanity,” what does it mean to truly live?
How many of us go our entire lives without ever yearning as boldly as Thomas did?
John’s desire for his readers was that they would come to believe. That they would consent to the process, the path. The implication is that belief is not instantaneous. I’ve hardly ever experienced sudden transformation; the changes that matter most have always come sideways and in fits and starts, often without my conscious understanding or effort. Anyone who has battled an addiction, or stuck it out in a challenging relationship, or lived with a chronic illness, will testify that genuine conversion is lifelong. Maybe this is why the earliest Christians referred to their new faith as “The Way.” A “way” is not a destination. It’s a road to walk. It’s an invitation to journey.
Jesus opened a way for Thomas through the marks of his own suffering and trauma, sharing his broken body so that Thomas could find his way to wholeness. You know, we can do what Thomas did when he extended his hands to touch Jesus. We’re be doing this very thing momentarily as we extend our hands to receive Jesus’ body in Holy Communion. It’s an experience of union with Christ; it is a communion with Christ – your body, your broken body, being filled with Jesus’ body, Jesus’ broken body. There is tremendous power in this communion. What is it you need from Jesus? What of his resurrection power do you need to take in today so that you can go on? Ask Jesus for this as you extend your hands and open your heart. Jesus is present here and now. Resurrection often doesn’t come as we expect. Resurrection comes amid tears in locked rooms, to people face-first with death. That’s how the first Easter was. Jesus will come to you as you are.
Jesus looks with love, seeing and knowing what we lack, how we doubt, what we fear. “Peace be with you,” he says. “Put your hand in my side.” Consolation, love and surprising touch: notice the echo of last week. Remember Jesus reassuring his frightened followers during that last great conversation on Maundy Thursday. Jesus washed each of their feet and then said: “Love one another as I have loved you.”
The story that comes after Easter is a story of scars and doubts. This is a tremendous gift; ponder it. “So that you may come to believe.”
“Peace be with you”. Amen.
0 Comments