It’s been one week since Easter Sunday.  One week since the church was full of people smiling, laughing, embracing and singing.  One week since the pews overflowed and the balcony door was thrown open.  One week since the “hallelujahs” and “amens” filled the air and we celebrated God’s victory over the grave.  One week…a lot can change.  On Easter Sunday we celebrate our salvation, we commemorate our freedom from a life of sin and death.  On Easter Sunday we take hope in transformation, both of ourselves and the world through the love of Christ.   On Easter Sunday, we BELIEVE.  Yet, as my husband asked the congregation in his sermon this morning, “Where are you today?”  Where are you one week later?  Do you still believe?

One week after Jesus’ resurrection, the disciples were stuck. They were locked in a room, for fear, John says, of the Jewish leaders. As they were huddled behind closed doors, Jesus appeared. And he told them this: 

It was time to go! The power of the resurrection had been imparted to the disciples–they literally carried the breath of God inside of them!! What wondrous things could they do? Apparently, none, because John says in verse 26 that one week later, the disciples were again hiding in that locked room. Seriously? Again??

Do you know how many times I’ve said that as a parent? Just the other day, my son came home and told me he’s accidentally dinged another car in a parking lot. “Again!?” I asked. How can he not figure this out? Or last week, when my other son got miffed because he had no clean clothes for school. “Again!” I asked. Tell me before you run out!

Jesus must have been a little bit exasperated with the disciples. They had SEEN Jesus, they had TOUCHED Jesus, they had IMBIBED the Holy Spirit and they still didn’t believe enough to LEAVE!!  The disciples were stuck in the muck of their fear and despair.  The chains were broken but they couldn’t bring themselves to open the door and step outside.  A world was waiting, and they were hiding out.

Interestingly, John seems to insinuate that it was all Thomas’s fault, like they were just waiting for their friend who had someone been absent from the first lockdown experience to show up. Then they’d share the good news and head out. But when Thomas heard about Jesus’s appearance to the disciples, he got very Midwestern about it, proclaiming quite obstinately that until he’d touched Jesus’s scars himself, he would not believe. I don’t think he really wanted to touch Jesus’s wounds–in fact, I don’t think he expected Jesus to even show up. But something funny happens when we lower our expectations in regard to Jesus…he tends to blow them up and silence all doubt.

I appreciate that in this moment Jesus didn’t say: “Again?!” He had compassion on the disciples. They were his friends, his brothers. He had shared life with them, and he loved them too much to let them remain in their fear and despair. Jesus came back (he always comes back). He came back for his friends. He came back for Thomas. And instead of giving the disciples some big lecture, he simply said, “Believe!”

Sometimes, like the disciples, we find ourselves longing for the freedom Christ brings but are too afraid to step out of ourselves to claim it.  And though we might profess to believe in the transforming love of God, we often fail to take that open, compassionate, and generous love out to a world in need.  We leave the miracle of the resurrection behind us in the sanctuary until next Easter rolls around.  Yet when we do that, we miss the entire point of the story.  Christ didn’t live, he LIVES.  HE LIVES!!  It is now up to us, his disciples, to act like it. We need to unlock the doors, leave the room, and expect Jesus to show up. In short, we need to believe.

Blessings and Peace,
Sara