Out of Fear. Second Sunday of Easter. 
Text: John 20:19-31

Preached by Rev. James Murray at Dominion-Chalmers United Church, April 19 2009.

When Jesus died, the scriptures record a very odd detail. It says at that moment, the curtain in the temple was torn in two. As a matter of history, this is an insignificant coincidence. As a matter of symbolism, it is of huge dramatic importance. The curtain in the temple separated the Holy of Holies from the congregation. For that curtain to be torn in two, means the barrier between God and the people has been removed. There is no more separation. We are all now able to have direct access to God. God is with the people.

The removing of this barrier is just the next logical step in the incarnation. With Jesus’ birth, God became incarnate, in human flesh, and dwelt among us. God is saying this incarnational relationship does not end simply because Jesus has died. The relationship will continue in a new way, which later comes to described as the resurrection.

In the history of God’s mission to bless and redeem this world, God has a habit of choosing the most unlikely of people and places to reveal this plan. God seems to like being present where there is little or no expectation of hope. If we have no hope in our own ability to save us, then the only hope we have must be coming from God.

Many years before, God chose a bunch of slaves to be his instrument of hope. They were pathetic brick makers for a brutal empire. The empire was killing off their first born sons in a program of ethnic cleansing.  When their cries came to God’s ear, God sent Moses to set his people free.  Centuries later this same group of people established a tiny kingdom on the shores of the Mediterranean. Time and time again they were conquered by foreign  powers. Finally they were taken as slaves once more, and forced to work for over 70 years in exile. Yet God did not forget them, and God did not let them forget who they were. This time God sends Ezra and Nehemiah to lead the people home.  Over and over again God meets the people where they are, as they are, in the most hopeless places and the most forsaken of times, in order to bless and redeem them.

The Canadian pastor and teacher Alan Roxburgh describes how God works in this way:

“In these biblical narratives God is constantly present in places where no one would logically expect God’s future to emerge, and yet it does, over and over.” God doesn’t go out and pick the brightest and the best to get the job done. In many cases God will deliberately seek out the weakest and the smallest to do these dirty and important jobs.

When the prophet Samuel is sent to anoint a new king, God sends him to the tribe of Benjamin, which was the smallest of the twelve tribes. Samuel is sent to Bethlehem, which was the smallest of villages. He picks the youngest of Jesse’s sons to be the new king. And this is how David is chosen to lead the people.  

Time and time again God affirms how God’s future is amongst God’s people. God doesn’t give up hope, even when we have. The disciples had given up hope, even though Mary Magdalene had spoken words of hope earlier on that first Easter day. They have now gathered back in the upper room. This time the door is locked, out of fear. They are terrified. They fear they will be rounded up and executed just as Jesus was. This cast of nobodies- fishermen, tax collectors, women, are all without hope.

Then Jesus appears before them. They are stunned and confused. They didn’t think anything could penetrate their fearful hearts or their locked doors. When Thomas meets the risen Christ, his old ways of seeing are no longer adequate. His old understandings of how the world works won’t allow him to accept the possibility of Jesus still being a part of his life. To paraphrase Albert Einstein, the resurrection changes everything, including our way of thinking.  Like Thomas, we are often too comfortable with our naive way of looking at the world. When we are confronted with something too complex, we turn into an ostrich who likes to stick his head in the sand, hoping the difficult challenge will go away. The risen Christ isn’t going away. He persistently invites Thomas to experience this new reality. He invites Thomas to change his way of thinking about life and death. He invites Thomas to experience the resurrection for himself. In the same way, the risen Christ invites us to experience the resurrection for ourselves here today.

Jesus offers the disciples this new possibility, by offering them the gift of peace. Peace is much more than just peace of mind. Here in Canada we expect our government to provide us with peace and order. The Romans had the same objectives. Yet here is Jesus saying he is the one who offers real peace.  Then he breathes on his disciples. He offers them his Spirit.

Roxburgh says “This act of breathing coupled with the announcement of peace takes the disciples back in their imagination, to another act of God. Jesus’ actions are a retelling of the creation story when God takes the mud of the earth, shapes the earth, and breathes life into it, and creates humanity.”  So here is Jesus, in the middle of a room of fearful, lifeless people, and Jesus is calling them to be the new humanity, the new creation, the kingdom of God come here on earth today.  God’s future is not to be carried by great leaders or politicians or professional religious personnel. God’s dreams are to be lived out by you, God’s people.

God’s future keeps bursting forth, to change the world. And God does this time and time again by turning up in the most forsaken and inauspicious of places. The people and places where the world says there is no hope, with the least potential, this is where God’s strange unlikely future will be found.

So here we are today. The doors to our church are locked right now, out of fear. The doors are locked out of fear for the people out there, who might come in here, to disturb us. Some of them are needy. Some of them are different from us.  While we may feel smug about being in here, we are still fearful of the world out there. And yet the Risen Christ appears even unto us. Even to us today he stands among us, for we are his people. And he speaks a word of peace to us. Peace which only he can give. And Jesus is inviting you to work with him, to help build God’s kingdom here on earth. To overcome our fears. To unlock our doors and embrace this world which God loves so much. Jesus is inviting us to leave our fears behind, so we might bless this world. So we can save the lost, free the captive, heal the sick, and make a difference.

Can you feel his presence? Can you hear what Christ is asking you to do?

source: Alan Roxburgh & Fred Romanuk “The Missional Leader” Jossey-Bass 2006.