Easter
2 Homily By The Rev. Marcia McRae
St.
John’s Episcopal Church, Bainbridge, GA, 12 April 2015
Acts
4:32-35; Psalm 133; 1 John 1:1-2:2; John 20:19-31
In
the beginning of a meal, we ask God's blessing on our food. Today's
scriptures offer us a banquet.
Let us pray. Holy God, bless us as we
feast on your words, may they
nourish us for our work of ministry in
Jesus' name. Amen.
John's
Gospel gives us food for thought today as he does when he opens [Ch.
1:1-5] his Gospel, saying “In
the beginning was the Word, & the Word was with God, & the
Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. What has come into
being in him was life, & the life was the light of all people.
The light shines in the darkness, & the darkness did not overcome
it.” This echoes the beginning in Genesis chapter 1.
In
today's Gospel, Jesus marks a new beginning, the beginning of the
Church, activated on earth to spread the Good News of God's Love that
we know through Jesus' life, death, resurrection & ascension.
Jesus entrusts us to carry on his healing work here, to shine his
Light of Love.
The
beginning in John's Gospel echoes Genesis: God creates Light; a bit
later [Gen. 2:7]
God breathes breath into the 1st
human, as several sources note.
In our Gospel [John 20:22],
Jesus breathes on the disciples & says: “Receive the Holy
Spirit.” Jesus breathes new life into us. We receive the Holy
Spirit to guide us in the work Jesus gives us to do to continue his
work of sharing God's Love & drawing more people into God's Love.
Our
lessons from Acts & from the 1st Letter of John give us details
about what sharing God's Love looks like: It looks like unity. As our
Psalm says: “Oh, how good & pleasant it is when brethren live
together in unity!” This doesn't mean we mindlessly agree &
think alike. It means we are honest about our successes & our
failures. It means, when we sin, we turn to God for
help & rely on God to lead us into better ways to live. It means
we live in Holy Community. God makes us for community.
Look
what a difference community makes in our Gospel. When Jesus comes to
the disciples, they are afraid, hiding behind locked doors. The
disciples are together except for Thomas. I wonder if Thomas is so
grief stricken over Jesus' death that he has to be alone1.
Look what he misses being away from the community, trying to handle
life's harsh reality on his own: He misses being there when Jesus
says: "Peace be with you" & then shows the disciples
his hands & his side, the very proof Thomas insists he must see
to believe.
When
Jesus shows his hands & side, the disciples get it. They rejoice.
Alone, Thomas struggles with the fact that Jesus has died. Then he
struggles with what his fellow disciples joyfully tell him.
Thomas
is a realist, honest about what he knows. You remember in John
14[:1-7 which we read in
today's Morning Prayer]
Jesus says: “Do not let your hearts be troubled. Believe in God,
believe also in me....you know the way to the place where I am
going.” Thomas says: “Lord, we do not know where you are going.
How can we know the way?” Jesus says: “I am the way, & the
truth, & the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”
Thomas
is honest. When he doesn't know something, he doesn't pretend to, as
Pope Benedict 16th
has noted, speaking
about Thomas to people gathered in St. Peter's Square Sept. 27,
2006.2
Thomas
shows us to ask Jesus our questions: “We often do not understand
(Jesus). Let's be brave…(like Thomas &) say: 'I don't
understand you, Lord;…help me...(When)…we express our meager
capacity to understand…(we) place ourselves in the trusting
attitude of someone who expects light & strength from (Jesus who
is) able to provide them.”3
Not
only is Thomas a realist, he is
courageous. You recall earlier in John’s Gospel [11:16,
as several commentators note]
when Jesus is going to Bethany to raise Lazarus, a
trip that will put Jesus in harm's way,
Thomas says: “Let's also go so we can die with Jesus.”
Notice
what Thomas does when he is
with the community & Jesus appears: Jesus offers for Thomas to
touch his wounds. Our Gospel does not say Thomas takes Jesus up on
the offer. It says Thomas immediately responds: “My Lord & My
God.”
“His
willingness to believe without touching Jesus is genuine
faith...Thomas...first embodied disbelief...now he witnesses the
(Gospels') highest... confession of Jesus (as the Christ).”4
Thomas
connects the dots between what he knows of Jesus as his leader/his
Lord & his new insight that Jesus is
God, integral in the Unity of the Holy Trinity, Father, Son &
Holy Spirit.
Thomas'
encounter with Jesus transforms him. His
brain has been busy trying to grasp what has happened; suddenly, his
heart grasps the joyful, awesome truth.5
His
heart beats with life-giving truth.
Our
hearts are designed to pump life-giving blood
throughout our bodies, as
you know.
Illustrations show 2 halves of the heart & science
describes 2 phases of the heart's work, contracting & relaxing.6
Our
hearts are like twins.
Our
Gospel calls Thomas the Twin.
My
research shows no solid explanation why;
not even the Pope knows7,
as Pope
Benedict 16th
said at the morning General Audience Sept. 27, 2006, when he spoke
about Thomas to the people gathered in St. Peter's Square. Maybe
more important than why Thomas is called the Twin is that in him we
can see
how
we may doubt & still take heart. We do not have to fear our
doubt. Like our Brother Thomas, we can honestly express doubt.
Our
Brother Thomas, who shows us (as
the Pope says)
“every
doubt can lead to an outcome brighter than any
uncertainty...[What]...Jesus says to Thomas assures us that true
faith encourages us to persevere no matter how difficult may be our
faith journey [our
journey] to Jesus.8
Bibliography
Barclay,
William. The Acts of
the Apostles.
Edinburgh: The Saint Andrew Press. 1962.
Barclay,
William. The Gospel of
John. Vol. 2. Revised
Edition. Philadelphia: The Westminster Press. 1975.
Brown,
Raymond E. An
Introduction to the New Testament.
New York: Doubleday. 1997.
The
Four Translation New Testament.
Minneapolis: World Wide Publications. 1966.
Handy
Dictionary of the Bible.
Ed.: Merrill C. Tenney. Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishing House.
1965.
Harper’s
Bible Commentary.
General Ed.: James. L. Mays. San Francisco: Harper & Row
Publishers. 1988.
Harper’s
Bible Dictionary.
General Ed.: Paul J. Achtemeier. San Francisco: Harper & Row
Publishers, 1971.
Holy
Bible. New Revised
Standard Version. New York: Oxford University Press. 1989.
Holy
Bible with the Apocrypha.
New Revised Standard Version. New York: Oxford University Press.
1989.
http://biology.about.com/od/anatomy/a/aa060404a.htm.
Accessed: 11 April 2015.
http://biology.about.com/od/anatomy/ss/cardiac_cycle.htm.
Accessed: 11 April 2015.
http://www.ewtn.com/library/PAPALDOC/b16ChrstChrch19.htm.
Accessed: 11 April 2015. From: L'Osservatore Romano. Weekly Edition
in English. 4 October 2006, page 10. L'Osservatore Romano is the
newspaper of the Holy See. The Weekly Edition in English is published
for the US by: The Cathedral Foundation, L'Osservatore Romano English
Edition. 320 Cathedral St., Baltimore, MD 21201. Provided Courtesy
of: Eternal Word Television Network. 5817 Old Leeds Road. Irondale,
AL 35210. www.ewtn.com.
http://www.proclaimsermons.com/viewSermon.asp?title=What%20Jesus%20Really%20Said.
Accessed: 11 April 2015.
Jewish
Study Bible: Jewish Publication Society TANAKH Translation.
New York: Oxford University Press. 2004.
The
New American Bible for Catholics.
South Bend: Greenlawn Press. 1986.
New
Oxford Annotated Bible with the Apocrypha.
Eds.: Herbert G. May, Bruce M. Metzger. New York: Oxford University
Press, Incorporated, 1977.
5
Note: Insight from Barclay. Ibid. P. 267.
6
http://biology.about.com/od/anatomy/a/aa060404a.htm.
http://biology.about.com/od/anatomy/ss/cardiac_cycle.htm.
Accessed: 11 April 2015.
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