Father & Son

Sunday, April 24th, 2005
Easter 5
Jerusalem Baptist Church, Emmerton VA
John 14:1-14

1 "Don't let this throw you. You trust God, don't you? Trust me. 2 There is plenty of room for you in my Father's home. If that weren't so, would I have told you that I'm on my way to get a room ready for you? 3 And if I'm on my way to get your room ready, I'll come back and get you so you can live where I live. 4 And you already know the road I'm taking." 5 Thomas said, "Master, we have no idea where you're going. How do you expect us to know the road?" 6 Jesus said, "I am the Road, also the Truth, also the Life. No one gets to the Father apart from me. 7 If you really knew me, you would know my Father as well. From now on, you do know him. You've even seen him!" 8 Philip said, "Master, show us the Father; then we'll be content." 9 "You've been with me all this time, Philip, and you still don't understand? To see me is to see the Father. So how can you ask, 'Where is the Father?' 10 Don't you believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words that I speak to you aren't mere words. I don't just make them up on my own. The Father who resides in me crafts each word into a divine act. 11 "Believe me: I am in my Father and my Father is in me. If you can't believe that, believe what you see - these works. 12 The person who trusts me will not only do what I'm doing but even greater things, because I, on my way to the Father, am giving you the same work to do that I've been doing. You can count on it. 13 From now on, whatever you request along the lines of who I am and what I am doing, I'll do it. That's how the Father will be seen for who he is in the Son. I mean it. 14 Whatever you request in this way, I'll do.

The last few times I’ve heard this passage read has most likely been in the same context in which most of us in this room have heard it read: a funeral. The words certainly provide a measure of consolation in the midst of grieving the loss of a loved one. To have Christ himself say he is going ahead to prepare a place for us signals to us not only that we will be with him, but that there is in fact, something beyond the pall! Having said that, in order to begin at a place where the funerary connotation is avoided from the beginning, we need to sometimes hear the words in a different way, with a different cadence, as it were.

That is why I chose to read the passage out of ‘The Message’ this morning instead of the more familiar New Revised Standard version. As you may have heard me mention before, humans are nothing if not creatures of habit, and even to begin to hear a familiar passage in known and expected phrasing will sometimes cause us to shut down or shut out any new understanding that may result from a different reading.

So we are here, at the point in the Gospel of John where Jesus has just shared the last supper with the disciples. Judas has just left the room to meet with the high priest, and Peter has just sworn to never deny the Lord, to which Jesus has responded that before the night is out he’d do it three times. Though we are past Easter by almost a month, in the context of the reading, we are just heading into the passion and crucifixion.

THAT is the context with which we begin today’s reading. Jesus has just dropped a couple of bombs in the middle of the disciples’ lives, by telling them first that one of them will betray him, and second that another will deny him. They are scrambling to understand what he’s saying. And having heard him speak in parables before, their initial response seems to indicate that they are HOPING, anyway, that he may have been speaking to them in parables this time as well.

He’s not.

His words are of assurance and affirmation. “You trust God, don’t you?” The implication in the question is that “yes, of course we trust God.” His statements carry with them the weight of an empowerment … a blessing, if you will, at the same time calling out and bestowing what the disciples themselves did not realize they had … or would have, shortly.

It might be called a literary device used by John to emphasize the point: the fact that first Peter, then Thomas, and finally Phillip ask questions that serve only to allow Jesus to restate his answer three times, a number not lost on the early church or, I would hope, on us here today.

The point is taken, isn’t it? We have Jesus speaking of being in the Father, and referring to the comforter, that is, the Holy Spirit, who will follow his departure. John is making that necessary but difficult to understand point of Christian Doctrine: God and Jesus and the Holy Spirit are the three parts of the triune God; the three parts of the trinity.

The most significant difference between John and the other three gospels is …? Remember from last week? What phrase did Jesus use in referring to himself in the Gospel of John? “I AM.” In Greek, “Ego Emi” "the resurrection and the life" (11:25) — what we just read here: the "way, and the truth, and the life" (14:6)—and the "true vine" (15:1). Jesus is in many ways much more of a compelling figure in the Gospel of John, insofar as he speaks of himself. That may be why it has been common practice to have copies of the Gospel of John to hand out on evangelistic campaigns, or when visiting or canvassing an area … people get a glimpse of a Jesus who did not back away from the fact that he was God incarnate. Growing up, I never remember a time when we didn’t have at least one box of a couple of hundred copies of ‘El Evangelio Según San Juan’ (The Gospel according to St. John) sitting around. If beggars came to the door, we would regularly give them food, and more often than not we’d include a copy of the Gospel in the bag we gave them.

Back to the passage: Jesus is telling us that he is the way, and the truth and the life; no one comes to the father except by him. That is the one point of exclusivity of the Gospel. To some, it is a hard pill to swallow. We live in a world where the prevailing culture has presented a view of religion – not faith – and certainly not an ongoing relationship with the living God -- as universally adequate. “It doesn’t matter what you believe as long as you believe”. On some level, that is true. But only in the sense that it is better for our spiritual and emotional, and even physical health to hold some things as core values, as a centering point for our souls.

But what can make us uncomfortable in the face of that broadcasting of the net … is that Jesus didn’t say that. His contention was, at this point, exclusive. But his emphasis was on the ME part, not on the NO ONE, or on the EXCEPT. He’s in the middle of trying to explain the fact that he and God the Father are one, and by implication, the Holy Spirit as well.
So what do we do with that? What does that mean for Jerusalem Baptist Church in Emmerton?

This is, again, the basics of the Good News – the Gospel of Jesus Christ – that God was in Christ reconciling the world to God’s self. This is instruction for us. This is fundamental. It leads into what Paul later called “foolishness to man”.

So in a sense it is a sendoff. A commissioning snuck in before the great commission we find at the beginning of Acts. Jesus is telling US – yes, he was talking to men and women two thousand years ago, but his words apply to us as well – we are his disciples today.

Jesus tells Phillip and the others they will do “Greater things” than even HE, JESUS himself, had done.

So we shrink back from that, don’t we? Can we truly imagine ourselves doing greater things than Christ himself? Humanly speaking, it’s impossible. To be honest, I don’t know if Christ was including in that his acts of healing and miracles. Perhaps, if the need arises, we would find ourselves calming the storm or healing a paralytic. I don’t know. I suspect that where we find ourselves doing greater things is in the living out of our allegiance, our devotion, our surrender to Christ. In doing that, in allowing him to live through us, we become him.

On some level, it is simple math: there are more of us, so there is more of HIM.

We are getting ready to send one of our own out to do that this week. She’s flying out on Tuesday to be Christ’s presence to the women and families whose husbands and sons and brothers are here working.

Leslie, could you please come to the front?

(Prayer of commissioning)

May the Lord bless you and keep you
May the Lord make his face to shine upon you
And be gracious unto you.
May God give you grace never to sell yourself short,
Grace to risk something big for something good,
Grace to remember that the world is now too dangerous for anything but truth,
And too small for anything but love.
So may God take your mind and think through it,
May God take your lips and speak through them,
May God take your heart and set it on fire
Through Christ our Lord.

Amen.

Life Abundant


Sunday, April 17th, 2005
Easter 4 (Good Shepherd)
Jerusalem Baptist Church, Emmerton VA
John 10:1-10

1‘Very truly, I tell you, anyone who does not enter the sheepfold by the gate but climbs in by another way is a thief and a bandit. 2The one who enters by the gate is the shepherd of the sheep. 3The gatekeeper opens the gate for him, and the sheep hear his voice. He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. 4When he has brought out all his own, he goes ahead of them, and the sheep follow him because they know his voice. 5They will not follow a stranger, but they will run from him because they do not know the voice of strangers.’ 6Jesus used this figure of speech with them, but they did not understand what he was saying to them. 7So again Jesus said to them, ‘Very truly, I tell you, I am the gate for the sheep. 8All who came before me are thieves and bandits; but the sheep did not listen to them. 9I am the gate. Whoever enters by me will be saved, and will come in and go out and find pasture. 10The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly.

We’re getting into a rhythm of sorts in the Park household. School during the day, gymnastics or softball practice in the evenings, and game one, game two, and game three on the weekends. I think before it’s all over, there may be a few weekends where we’ll have more than one game per child. Granted, it’s only been two weekends now, but I can already sense the rhythm starting: a rush to get ready, arrival, getting the kids to their teams, and then sit and watch, and cheer the team, shout words of encouragement to your child or the children on each team, and make quiet conversation with other parents, or friends, or meet and befriend people who you recognize, but can’t quite name. Then wander over to the concession stand for a hot dog or some chicken wings and a coke. And the whole day is bathed in sunlight, and a brisk wind that keeps your hands in your pockets more often than not pulling out a tissue to blow your nose with. Before long, the sun will overpower the wind, and we’ll be dealing with the HEAT much more than with the cold. There truly is something idyllic in the scene. It reminds me of something out of a Norman Rockwell painting. I’ve had several moments like that since we’ve been living here. It’s not a bad thing, not at all. In fact, if I had to characterize it, it would be easy to say we were living the abundant life. When friends and family have asked how we’re doing here, I always answer that we’re doing good, we’re doing fine. And I can’t help but tell them that it sometimes gets to the point where it is scary how good things are.

But what is an abundant life? We’d surely find different definitions of that within the lives of those of us sitting right here. Is an abundant life one that is long-lived? Probably not. We heard just this past week of a young mother, the sister of a young lady who has visited here in the past, barely in her thirties, who was found by her six year old daughter lying on the floor when she got home from school. Can her life be DISqualified from having been abundant just because it was cut short at so young an age?

Is an abundant life one full of unforgettable experiences? If we were to ask our Hispanic friend, who lost her twins twenty-three weeks into her pregnancy last Sunday, certainly an unforgettable experience, but I’m not sure she’d say that her life is more abundant because of it.

Is it a life marked by significance, or impact, or one that is memorable to more than just one’s immediate family? Tuesday evening I met a man who was in the final stages of a terminal disease. Though he is barely ten years older than I am, his life would certainly make a much more interesting read than mine would. With a history of alcohol and drug abuse, poverty and homelessness, he somehow managed to find the strength to straighten himself out, and begin to live what might be called a normally productive life. In the process, he met and straightened out his wife, who was a crack addict and an alcoholic. Working together, he got her off drugs and sobered up. But then last September, he was diagnosed with prostate cancer, and she began drinking again. Tuesday he had asked to stay in the hospital for pain management, but she did not want him to stay there and die. Her beloved husband belonged at home with her, surrounded by his animals and the love of a devoted, though alcohol-dependent wife. He definitely made an impact on HER life, insofar as he was the reason that she cleaned herself up from all the other drugs save the alcohol. Talking to their friend who’d driven the wife the 45 miles to the hospital, and hearing HER story about losing her sister, her husband, AND her mother within the last year, there was definitely more than just friendship that prompted her to stand by this couple in the midst of what is not only devastating to THEM, but which must surely reopen painful wounds left by her own losses. I came away with the impression that this man had a way about him that drew people, not just those two women, to him. When he rallied enough to speak clearly and directly, in a strong voice, to his tearfully combative wife, she quieted along with everyone in the room. It was certainly an example of a life that had an impact on everyone else in the room, but whether or not it has been an abundant life was not for us to say at that point.

The scene in the Gospel passage this morning is … pastoral in the fullest sense of the word, parts of it might be referred to as something out of a Norman Rockwell painting, what with a shepherd leading the flock of sheep around the pasture, the sheep somehow … tuned into the shepherd’s voice, or a sound, a whistle, a call, or a specific, identifying noise made whenever he wants their attention.

We have the image of Christ as the Good Shepherd, and he himself is portraying himself as that. A man who lies down across the gate to the sheepfold and guards against wolves and marauders, whose sheep follow the sound of his voice, rather than push from behind, he leads. The sheep follow because they recognize HIM, not because he forces them in the direction he wants them to go.

What is it that we seek if we set out on what Robert Frost called ‘the road less traveled”? Christ promised life abundant in this passage, but in others he admonished us to take up our cross and follow him. And yet in another, he warned that if any man loses his life for his sake he would gain it. He wasn’t speaking of a life of ease. He wasn’t promising freedom from pain and suffering … in fact, he did the opposite. He promised a life fraught with peril, with rejection, even with bitter disappointment, but he still calls it an abundant life.

So we have to look elsewhere, perhaps even elsewhen. We have to look for another reason why he would say our lives would be “abundant”.

What are we left with?

We’re left with him. We’re left with Christ. We’re left with the Son of God, calling us to himself, and loving us and cradling us like a Shepherd calls his sheep when they are lost and holds them when they are found. To live in the full knowledge that what we do and who we are is defined not by what we accomplish or accumulate, but by whose we are, and who loves us, and who we love, THAT opens us to an abundance of life the likes of which we cannot wrap our brains around in a lifetime.

Jesus calls himself both the gate and the gatekeeper, the gospel of John is known for Jesus’ “I am” sayings. In this Gospel, Jesus will use "I am" to identify himself as "the resurrection and the life" (11:25)—the "way, and the truth, and the life" (14:6)—and the "true vine" (15:1). It is John’s way of highlighting, of echoing for us that much earlier “I Am” that we hear from the burning bush in the desert. There is no missing the point for John’s listeners and reader: Jesus and God are one.

Life, colored, molded, and formed around the presence of the living God in our hearts is the most abundant life we can hope to experience. It is for us to take that abundance and share it, spread it, release it into the world and into the lives of those who so desperately long for it.

Tonight we begin a four-night Revival campaign. We will share in worship with Farnham, our mother church, Cobham Park, Mulberry and Ebenezer, our daughter churches, a family gathering in the broadest sense of the word.

I’ve seen abundance of life. I’ve seen it reflected in my parent’s faces when all of their children and their families have otten together for a special holiday. I’ve seen it in the faces of my father and mother-in-law, when THEIR three children and THEIR families have been able to manage to be together with them for a special occasion. I saw it in Leslie’s face, last night, after a long and harrowing week, topped off by a day spent at the ball fields watching our kids play, and sitting down to the dinner table groggy after having fallen asleep on the couch, and we were all grumpy and tired, but for a minute, just a second, the children mercifully bounced back from a totally inappropriate tongue lashing from me, and Caleb was sitting in her lap, and Judson and Hannah were chomping on Oreos, and we looked at each other over their heads and that look that says ‘This is what he was talking about. THIS is life abundant’ crossed between us.

May these next four nights with family be so marked.

Let’s pray.

Hearts on Fire

Sunday, April 10th, 2005
Easter 3 (Communion Sunday)
Jerusalem Baptist Church, Emmerton VA
Luke 24:13-35
With deep gratitude to Dr. Brett Younger, pastor, Broadway Baptist Church, Ft. Worth, TX

13 Now on that same day two of them were going to a village called Emmaus, about seven miles from Jerusalem, 14and talking with each other about all these things that had happened. 15While they were talking and discussing, Jesus himself came near and went with them, 16but their eyes were kept from recognizing him. 17And he said to them, ‘What are you discussing with each other while you walk along?’ They stood still, looking sad. 18Then one of them, whose name was Cleopas, answered him, ‘Are you the only stranger in Jerusalem who does not know the things that have taken place there in these days?’ 19He asked them, ‘What things?’ They replied, ‘The things about Jesus of Nazareth, who was a prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people, 20and how our chief priests and leaders handed him over to be condemned to death and crucified him. 21But we had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel. Yes, and besides all this, it is now the third day since these things took place. 22Moreover, some women of our group astounded us. They were at the tomb early this morning, 23and when they did not find his body there, they came back and told us that they had indeed seen a vision of angels who said that he was alive. 24Some of those who were with us went to the tomb and found it just as the women had said; but they did not see him.’ 25Then he said to them, ‘Oh, how foolish you are, and how slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have declared! 26Was it not necessary that the Messiah should suffer these things and then enter into his glory?’ 27Then beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them the things about himself in all the scriptures. 28As they came near the village to which they were going, he walked ahead as if he were going on. 29But they urged him strongly, saying, ‘Stay with us, because it is almost evening and the day is now nearly over.’ So he went in to stay with them. 30When he was at the table with them, he took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them. 31Then their eyes were opened, and they recognized him; and he vanished from their sight. 32They said to each other, ‘Were not our hearts burning within us while he was talking to us on the road, while he was opening the scriptures to us?’ 33That same hour they got up and returned to Jerusalem; and they found the eleven and their companions gathered together. 34They were saying, ‘The Lord has risen indeed, and he has appeared to Simon!’ 35Then they told what had happened on the road, and how he had been made known to them in the breaking of the bread.

Last Sunday was a pretty stark contrast to Easter, wasn’t it? As you might know, historically, the highest attendance Sunday of the year is Easter. Would you care to venture a guess as to which is the lowest attended Sunday of the year? (The Sunday after Easter)

All the special music, the children singing, the sunrise service, the banners and pageantry can make you forget that at Easter, all we’re really hoping for is a moment when we believe, when we feel, when we know deep down that it’s true. If all goes well, we catch a glimpse, just a glimpse.

We’re here again, hoping for a moment, a hint of hope, a glimpse of grace, a sign of life, but we have to pay attention.

The first Easter began without anyone even imagining they would catch a glimpse. On Sunday afternoon, which was like Monday afternoon for the Jews, two dejected disciples are walking the dusty road home to Emmaus. They want life to go back to what it was before. But they know it will never be the same. They would like to believe that Jesus’ life and death are going to make some difference. But their chins are on their chests, their eyes are blank, and their faces are empty.

They don’t even hear his footsteps. Jesus joins them incognito and asks what they’ve been talking about. They can hardly believe it. ‘Where have you been? How can you NOT know what’s been going on?” They explain to the uninformed stranger that a prophet has been executed. They tell him about the hope that they had for Jesus, how they had followed, and how their hope had been crushed when Jesus was arrested and crucified. They had never known such a wonderful person. Jesus was gracious in everything that he did. He spoke as no one had ever spoken. He loved as no one had ever loved.

Some women are spreading rumors about an empty tomb and angels, but they know hopelessness when they feel it.

Then it’s Jesus’ turn to marvel at how they can be so completely uninformed. Now you wonder how long it takes to explain the scriptures, but the stranger lays it all out for them … and they don’t get it. Jesus himself leads a Bible study and nothing happens. This story is a source of great comfort for anyone who has ever led a Bible study for people whose eyes are glazed over.

When they arrive at the couple’s house, the risen Christ seems to have things to do and places to go, but they ask him to stay for supper. They can’t let him go, whoever he is. They ask him to say grace, and the stranger is suddenly in charge. The house may not belong to Jesus, but the supper does. He breaks bread, blesses it, gives it to them, and they open their eyes. They see that Jesus is with them … and then he’s GONE. Just a glimpse and he vanishes.

Then - and this part is worth noting - they walk the seven miles back to Jerusalem. By this time it must’ve been dark, except, in a way, it was during the day as they walked TOWARD Emmaus, that they walked in the dark. Now, at night, they’re walking in the light. That moment at the table has changed them, turned them around.

Now it’s easy not to notice, but there’s a worship service going on here. The preacher interprets the Bible; he takes the bread, blesses, breaks it, and gives it to them.

Scholars suggest that Luke has given us the order of worship for the early church. The scriptures are read and discussed, and then they share the Lord’s Supper. Justin Martyr wrote the oldest surviving account of a Christian worship service about sixty five years after the Gospel of Luke. Justin describes their Sunday service:

“And on the day called Sunday an assembly is held and the records of the apostles – we call them the Gospels and Epistles – or the writings of the prophets – the Old Testament – are read for as long as time allows. (For some of you, twelve O’clock is as long as time allows) Then, when the reading has finished, the one presiding, in a discourse, admonishes and encourages us to imitate these good things. Then we all stand up together and offer prayers, then bread and wine are brought forward, and the one presiding offers thanksgivings. And the wealthy who so desire, give what they wish as each chooses, and what is collected helps orphans and widows, and those who through sickness or any other cause are in need, and those in prison, and strangers sojourning among us. In a word, it takes care of all those who are in need.”

Now, they didn’t chime the hour, or have an organ on one side and a baby grand on the other, but the order of worship two thousand years ago is a lot like ours. We worship as they worshipped in the belief that we will meet God here. When the scriptures are preached, and the bread is broken, Luke says that Jesus is present.

We come each Sunday to this sanctuary, but it’s easy to miss Christ in worship, in part because we forget that Christ comes not because we make it so, but because this is Christ’s church. Sometimes we act as if WE make worship happen. If the preacher says something profound for a change, if the choir enunciates perfectly, if we get a seat right in front of a speaker, if the children in the row in front of us will sit still … if the deacons are sufficiently somber during communion, then we’ll have worship “right”.

We ARE here to give our best to God, but we do so understanding that we will not coerce Christ into our presence. Christ comes as a gift; he comes suddenly out of nowhere. We don’t even hear his footsteps. We’ll miss the sacred moments if we don’t look with more than our eyes, and listen with more than our ears. But if we seek God with our hearts and souls, we may catch a glimpse.

God comes in a phrase in a hymn, a word from the scripture, a hope during a prayer, a moment when we feel God with us, a moment when we are truly alive. And we shouldn’t expect much more than a moment. God is with us for the whole journey, but we feel it only in partial, obscure, muffled experiences of the sacred.

What we hope for is a fleeting glimpse that takes our breath away, makes our hearts burn within us. For, if we catch a glimpse, it can turn us around; if we look with all of our being and imagination, what we may see is God. What we may hear is the faint sound of a voice; somewhere deep within us, saying that there IS a purpose in this life, in OUR lives, whether we understand it completely or not.

Christ comes to explain our lives and our world in the light of the sacred stories; Christ joins us at this table, and gives us his life, so that we might share life together in his name. It’s all a gift.

Worship is a gift.

Christ’s presence among us is a gift.

And if we pay attention, and feel God with us, when God sets our hearts on fire, it’s a gift.

(Communion)

Life in His Name

Sunday, April 3rd, 2005
Easter 2
Jerusalem Baptist Church, Emmerton, VA
John 20:19-31

19 When it was evening on that day, the first day of the week, and the doors of the house where the disciples had met were locked for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said, ‘Peace be with you.’ 20After he said this, he showed them his hands and his side. Then the disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord. 21Jesus said to them again, ‘Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.’ 22When he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit. 23If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.’ 24But Thomas (who was called the Twin), one of the twelve, was not with them when Jesus came. 25So the other disciples told him, ‘We have seen the Lord.’ But he said to them, ‘Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands, and put my finger in the mark of the nails and my hand in his side, I will not believe.’ 26 A week later his disciples were again in the house, and Thomas was with them. Although the doors were shut, Jesus came and stood among them and said, ‘Peace be with you.’ 27Then he said to Thomas, ‘Put your finger here and see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it in my side. Do not doubt but believe.’ 28Thomas answered him, ‘My Lord and my God!’ 29Jesus said to him, ‘Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.’ 30Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book. 31But these are written so that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name.

I’ve often wondered what Thomas’ voice sounded like when he uttered that ultimatum.

More often than not, the words have been spoken in a sarcastic ‘yeah, RIGHT - I wasn’t born yesterday’ jaded tone.

But as I read over the passage again in preparation for this morning, I thought that perhaps his was in an altogether different tone.

Imagine yourself hoping against hope for a reality that cannot objectively become fact, a hope on which you have built your life, a hope born out of three years of living, and eating, walking and talking with and learning from the most amazing man you’ve ever known; Jesus of Nazareth. And not just a man, but you’ve almost come to believe him to be the Messiah, the Son of God.

You’ve seen him heal the sick, silence the storm, cast out demons, cast out the money changers and call the priests and rulers to task for making the desecration of the temple possible, and you’ve seen him raise the four-days dead Lazarus.

But you have also seen him arrested, beaten beyond recognition, and finally crucified. And you’ve gotten the report that he had died.

You’ve only gotten the report because, in that darkest hour of your life, you ran and hid. You didn’t want to end up on the cross like him, with him. You’d heard Peter vow that he would die first, before he would betray the Lord, and just a few hours later you heard the betrayal from that same mouth.

And now, on the third day from that hellish event, everyone is telling you that they’ve seen him – in PERSON, and you dare not believe it.

You don’t dare because if you do and it is NOT true, you have only set yourself up to plunge again into the pit of despair from which you so desperately want to climb, but in the face of unending hate and violence, and callousness, you find yourself completely overwhelmed.

In the last 72 hours, your world has become a place devoid of truth, devoid of grace, and devoid of hope. You’ve been confronted with a world that rolls over dreams and visions and faith as indifferently as a wave crashes over a grain of sand on the beach.

You are angry. How can they play with that which has become so sacred to you??!! How can they so blithely prattle on about having seen him when everyone who was there saw him die? And though he may have been able to raise someone else from the dead, how could he act to raise himself from the dead when there was no breath left in his body?

What he did, what he said, what he taught, none of it belonged in the world after all, even though he tried. YOU tried. You really did. After he sent you out, along with the other disciples, to cast out demons and heal the sick in his name, you watched it happen with your own eyes. You couldn’t believe it at first, but it kept on happening. And when you came back together, you compared notes with the others, and they told of the same thing happening to them.

And so, hope was born.

Against all odds, against what your logic told you, you began to believe. It was tiny at first. No bigger than that mustard seed he’d mentioned. If you hadn’t known what you were looking for, you would have missed it.

And the seed grew, just like he said it would, into that huge bush.

And it started taking root in you, and reaching its branches all through you.

Into that place where you were thinking “It’ll never work HERE,”

And there, where you couldn’t help but wonder “what world is he living in?”

And over there, in that far corner, where that hissing, slithery whisper was telling you “perhapsss, but YOU could never measure up to THAT.”

And the roots and the branches were pushing those voices out. You found yourself smiling a little more often, believing a little more deeply, questioning a little less frequently. And the world started to seem like a different place. It seemed like there was something new happening in the world, something magnificent, and magnificently different.

Then, in a night and a day, the hope was dashed to pieces. It was beaten and crucified and died just as surely as Jesus was. And you heard that slithery voice inside say “see, I TOLD you so.” And as much as you hated it, you found yourself agreeing, realizing that a part of you always held back, always reserved judgment, always sat back and just watched.

And now, your hearing that he’s back, “We have seen the Lord!”

And your heart starts beating faster and faster, and you can’t catch your breathe and your mind is trying to wrap itself around the news and then you can almost HEAR the fist slam down in your head.

“NO!” It can’t be true. It’s too good, too good to be true. And like they say, if something is too good to be true, then it most likely ISN’T. And you’re thinking,

“DON’T MESS WITH MY HOPE. I ALREADY LAID IT TO REST, AND IT IS TOO PAINFUL TO TRY TO RESURRECT IT ONLY TO HAVE IT DIE AGAIN. I CAN’T KEEP MOVING THAT STONE BACK AND FORTH”

And the words spill out of you in a furious torrent:

‘"UNLESS I SEE THE MARK OF THE NAILS IN HIS HANDS, AND PUT MY FINGER IN TH E MARK OF THE NAILS AND MY HAND IN HIS SIDE, I WILL NOT BELIEVE!!"

You see, the voice that is crying out of you is the voice that did not want to give up hope, but is finding it so hard to FIND, it is setting itself an impossible barrier to cross – the barrier of the tomb, the one that was sealed with that stone, the one that is separating you from Jesus.

And then it’s a week later, but it feels like an instant, and just like that, he’s there, in front of you, plain as day, but different. The door was closed, but he is THERE. And his first words are: “Peace be with you. Shalom.”

Then, “Okay, here’s what you asked for. Here’re my hands. Here’s my side. Go for it. TRY ME.”

And your heart slows, and you breathe deeply, and the air seems purer, and the light seems brighter.

“My Lord and my God.”

And like he always did, he snaps it into perspective. “Do you believe because you see me? Was your hope born of what you see, or was it born from what you now understand to be the endless possibilities for life in my name, what you know can happen but which you CAN’T see?

Let’s pray.