April 19, 2020: May God’s words be spoken, may God’s words be heard. Amen.
“Χριστός Ανέστη!” καὶ “Καλό Πάσχα!” Christ is Risen! and Happy Easter to all our Eastern Orthodox sisters and brothers in Christ, who today are celebrating Easter Sunday.
Yes, we celebrate Easter Sunday on different dates, but it is also true that for Christians of all stripes – Easter is not just a single day on the calendar. We are in Eastertide, celebrating Easter until the day of Pentecost, this year falling on Memorial Day weekend.
In truth, we are always in Easter because we are a resurrection people! But, the celebration of the life that grows out of death in the story of the resurrection, in the new flowers and budding trees, in the freshness of the Spring air – is so needed this year perhaps more than ever before in our lifetimes, given the disease, death, and isolation we have been facing. What is also needed – the story of Thomas, my favorite disciple after Mary Magdalene, which we heard in our gospel today.
Now, last week on the Jesus Channel, Mary Magdalene told the disciples “I have seen the Lord!” And she had. Jesus chose her to be the apostle to the apostles – the first to receive and preach the good news of his resurrection. She first had told them about the empty tomb, and two of them, Peter and some other unnamed disciple, ran over to check it out. It said they believed, but as we will see, it wasn’t about the resurrection, and they didn’t believe Mary about his being risen either.
So today, our story opens with the disciples gathered in a locked room in fear, when in comes the risen Lord himself – right through the locked door! Now, I think it would have been more fun if his first words to them had been “Surprise! I’m baaaaack!” But, no. He said to them “Peace be with you.” Seriously? I mean the last time the men saw him he was being led away to be crucified, and the women last saw him hanging on the cross. And the first thing he says is “Peace be with you?” Like, “hey…any news?” Now, as we will see, it was exactly what they needed to hear.
At any rate, they didn’t say “Wow! Mary said you’d be stopping by. Here’s a cup of coffee and some nosh – you must be starving after three days.” Yeah, no. They just stood there. Jesus had to step forward and show them his hands and feet – then it says they rejoiced. And, for good measure, now that they had come out of their “Oh my gosh a ghost just walked through our door” stupor, Jesus again said “Peace be with you.” So, just to summarize – they didn’t believe Mary when she said “I have seen the Lord,” and they didn’t believe Jesus until he showed them his hands and his side.
Now all this is great, except poor Thomas, one of the insider 12, was not there when all this happened. Where was he? Perhaps on a smoke break, using the little apostles room, or out trying to beat the crowd at COSTCO for some toilet paper, or maybe he got tired of the quarantine. But, when the disciples told him “We have seen the Lord,” he refuses to believe them unless he gets to see the wounds, and touch them. Now, where have we heard THAT before?
Yet through the centuries, we have turned this poor guy into a Christian whipping boy – this “Doubting Thomas.” I mean really? He only had the same doubts as everyone but Mary had, but do we do that to Peter who actually denied Jesus three times? No, we give him the keys to the church!
The thing is, there is nothing wrong with anything the disciples did – Thomas or the other ones – except for not believing Mary, and even that was understandable, even if it was likely due to the fact that her name was Mary and not Peter, or Paul. Still, those three will make a great singing group one day, but I digress as usual. No, where we go wrong is forgetting how vulnerable they all were – locked up and isolated – and in thinking there is something wrong with having doubts about what we believe.
Now, I have already said many times, so I won’t spend much time on it, but the opposite of faith isn’t doubt. The opposite of faith is certainty. When we stop doubting, our faith becomes cemented, grounded in fear. The very essence of faith is uncertainty. If we have no questions then it’s not faith, but fact. Uncertainty, the kind that leads to questions, is the doubt that shadows faith, and is so very needed. Faith and doubt are intertwined like darkness and light. To have faith, you will have doubt.
Yet, while many people today have doubts about their religious beliefs, they are often afraid to voice them for fear that it will show a lack of faith, a weakness in their commitment to God. We become like the disciples, locked inside the safety of our church walls, our church doctrine. We stop asking questions, and so our faith never is given a chance to grow more fully and deeply.
So just to set the record straight – there is nothing wrong with Thomas expressing his need to see what all the others got to see, and if you have doubts too – that’s just part of being a person of faith, don’t let it trouble you. Ask your questions, and keep seeking the answers you need. If our faith can’t handle that, we have serious issues.
So that aside, let’s get back to something else, something we often miss in this story – they were in a locked room in fear.
If ever we needed to hear this gospel, it is now, don’t you think? How many of us are behind closed doors too, isolated and afraid? We try to be strong, yet many of us struggle to keep up with managing the chaos swirling around us. It is exhausting, isn’t it? And, I saw an article the other day that said that even though we may be sleeping longer, many of us seem even more tired than ever before.
Given that I too am staying home more, I was watching the recent movies about Mr. Rogers, and something struck me – well, a lot of things really, but there was something that brought this gospel reading to mind. Now I am sure you all know by now that Fred Rogers was an ordained Presbyterian minister who had a renowned children’s TV show called “Mr. Roger’s Neighborhood.” Anyway, there was a scene in the documentary, not the Tom Hanks one, the one titled “Won’t you be my neighbor?,” when we hear something from, and about, the puppet Daniel Striped Tiger that resonated deeply with what we are hearing in today’s gospel.
Now Daniel was a sock puppet voiced, as most of them were on the show, by Fred Rogers himself, but Daniel was a special character. He was in many ways an extension of Rogers himself. And Daniel one day was telling another character on the show, Lady Aberlin, that he wondered if there was something wrong with him. He said to her “Sometimes I wonder if I’m a mistake. I’m not like anyone else I know. When I’m asleep or even awake, sometimes I get to dreaming that I’m just a fake…I’m not supposed to be scared, am I? Sometimes I cry and sometimes I shake, wondering isn’t it true that the strong never break. I’m not like anyone else I know. I’m not like anyone else. (To see the clip of this moment in the show, click this link: See A Video Of Daniel Singing This)
I thought it was one of the saddest and most truthful things I had ever seen. Yes, it was just a sock puppet, but we all know that the feelings that little tiger was singing about are not unique to TV puppets, don’t we? I think many folks feel a bit like that now – like we are supposed to be strong and brave, when we really feel a lot more tired and afraid, like we might break if this nightmare isn’t over soon. Like we have to be something, or someone, we are not, and if we can’t be, that we are a mistake, a fraud.
Fred Rogers allowed people who interacted with him to be who they were – even when they themselves didn’t quite know what that looked like yet. He would listen to them in such a way as to hear them into speaking, and thereby breathe courage into their hearts to trust in their own feelings and love themselves as God loved them.
I think that is what Jesus was doing with Thomas, or for that matter, Peter and the rest of them. Yes, all of them. Think about it. The gospel says they were hiding from the authorities, or in the text – Jews – but we all know that is a ridiculous thing to say – they were all Jews – Jesus and all the disciples, so let’s put that anti-Semitism aside. They all were scared, and they had every right to be afraid too. Their Rabbi had been given a criminal’s gruesome death by crucifixion, and they figured they were next. But I think there was more to it.
Peter had denied him three times, perhaps he was feeling like a fraud, shameful for what he had done. There were James and John (and Peter again) who could not even stay awake with him in the garden when he was in need of their company – they had failed him. And all of them fled, the men anyway, and did not stay with Jesus in his final hours as he hung on the cross. These were people who were not only afraid, but feeling like they had not lived up to what they needed to be for the one who loved them beyond measure. Perhaps they were feeling like they were a mistake – not the disciples Jesus thought they were.
So, Jesus came back for all of them, even making a special trip just for Thomas, because I think Jesus knew that if he did not return for them, that they might have ended up with this lingering Daniel Striped Tiger feeling of being not good enough. Jesus comes to the vulnerable like those disciples behind the locked door, to the grief stricken like Mary, and to the ones who are left out like Thomas. He comes most especially to these to bring his peace to their hearts. And he comes for us now too. When we are in our deepest Daniel Striped Tiger moments feeling fearful, broken, or not strong enough, Jesus comes to us too.
He will come to us to let us know that we are God’s beloved children – loved just as we are. That is essentially the message Lady Aberlin gave to Daniel Striped Tiger in her answer to him in that song, when she said: “Crying or shaking or dreaming or breaking, I think you are just fine as you are. You’re not a fake. You’re no mistake.” How many of us could use that right now – someone to remind us that we are all we need to be, we are enough, and we are loved.
Perhaps you too are feeling this way in this crazy time in which we find ourselves. And if you do, if you are singing a song in your heart of brokenness, of fear that you are not what you should be, or what others expect you to be, if you are crying, or shaking, or thinking that the strong never break. First and foremost know that you are enough – just as you are – and give all of that over to God in prayer, and share it also with those who love you. Know also that Jesus will always come for you too. It doesn’t mean you will have smooth sailing, not at all. It wasn’t true for those disciples either. It will just mean you will know that you are enough, and that you are deeply loved just as you are. It will mean that in the midst of the chaos, his peace will reside within you.
But let us be clear about something else too– this is no contemplative peace he is offering. Yes, it will give us strength. It will remind us that we are loved. But it will also fill our hearts with compassion, and our souls with a thirst for justice. As it did with those earliest disciples, it will help us to step beyond our own tombs of fear and vulnerability and call us to live as a resurrection people. It will help us also to be the ones other can turn to in their Daniel Striped Tiger moments.
So in this time of hiding behind the doors of our home in fear of the virus, when we may be crying or shaking or dreaming or breaking, the gift that Jesus gives us, gives each one of you, is knowing that you are not fake, you are not a mistake, you are loved just for being who we are, and you are enough to meet the days ahead. The gift he gives you is his peace. And what you do with that gift is entirely between you and God.
I want to leave you with a quote of Teresa of Avila. I have a framed copy, a gift from the bishop at my installation as your Rector, and it hangs above the prie-dieu in my vesting room, where I pray before worship. It reads:
“May today there be peace within.
May you trust God that you are exactly where you are meant to be.
May you not forget the infinite possibilities that are born of faith.
May you use those gifts that you have received, and pass on the love that has been given to you.
May you be content knowing you are a child of God.
Let this presence settle into your bones, and allow your soul the freedom to sing, dance, praise and love.
It is there for each and every one of us.”
My dear people, “Christ’s peace be with you.”
Amen.
For the audio from the 10:30am service, click below, or subscribe to our iTunes Sermon Podcast by clicking here:
The Rev. Diana L. Wilcox
Christ Church in Bloomfield & Glen Ridge
April 19, 2020
Easter 2 – In A Time Of Separation
1st Reading – Acts 2:14a,22-32
Psalm 16
2nd Reading – 1 Peter 1:3-9
Gospel – John 20:19-31
