1 Peter 1:1-9
John 20:19-31
The main interest in the story from John 20 is Thomas, or “doubting Thomas” as he has come to be known. Thomas is the patron saint of all Missourians: the first to say, “Show me,” and others who just aren’t sure about Jesus and the claims about him.
There are lots of themes we can develop with this Thomas story, but I’m not going to deal with any of them. The reason I’m not is because another statement of Jesus caught my eye instead. It is just as powerful--maybe more so--than the Thomas story. But we (I) have been guilty of racing right over it in order to get to the ever popular doubting Thomas.
Three times Jesus says to the disciples, “Peace to you.” Two of the times are right at the start of the story before we ever get into the doubting Thomas part of it. It’s the second of the “peace” statements that caught my attention, verse 21 and 22. Jesus says, “Peace to you,” but then adds, “Just as the Father sent me, I send you.” Then he breathed on them and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit.”
We need to get clear in our heads what the situation was. It was the day of the Resurrection. Later on that day, in the afternoon, all the disciples got together in one place. You’d think they’d be excited, hearing the news of the empty tomb. But evidently not. Instead they are brooding and fearful. They’re fearful of the Jews. Three days have come and gone from Jesus’ arrest, trial, beating, being bloodily paraded through Jerusalem carrying his cross, finally to be nailed to and hoisted up on that cross. It would have been absolutely gruesome to see. And frightening. The disciples fear would have come by way of “guilt by association.” Fear that they were next. Fear that the Jews were after them. Fear that what happened to Jesus was possibly going to be their same fate, simply because they followed him around.
The world certainly is a dangerous place. Especially for Christ’s followers. In one of my favorite books, Pilgrim’s Progress, the main character, Christian, is traveling from the City of Destruction to the City of the King. There are all kinds of dangers for the pilgrims who decide to make the journey to the Celestial City.
At one point on his journey he’s traveling with two others: one’s name is Timorous; the other is Mistrust. Suddenly they are terrified to hear the roar of two ferocious and hungry looking lions, one on each side of the road up ahead of them. It looks hopeless with no way past the two beasts. Timorous and Mistrust decide it’s too much--too scary, too dangerous. So they give up their journey; they turn around and head back toward the City of Destruction where they had started out. But Christian decided to keep going forward. The lions certainly represent all that’s terrifying about the world for those who would be Christ’s followers.
For the disciples, fear and paranoia mixed together to mess with their heads. They had to be filled with thoughts about the people who had killed Jesus, like, “they” were out there, that “they” were watching, that “they” were just waiting to pounce. Fear had become the two lions on the other side of those locked doors. Happiness, joy or any sense of peace were no where to be found in that gathering of disciples. So they locked the doors in an attempt to keep the lions out, and to keep themselves in, thinking there was safety in numbers. Security for them were the locks on the closed doors, and being together with other fearful people.
In the Gardner Museum in Boston, there hangs Rembrandt’s painting of “The Storm On The Sea Of Galilee.” It’s a powerful scene. The small boat is being lifted by the crest of a giant wave, sail and lines are torn loose from their riggings, flailing wildly in the wind. Five disciples are struggling, trying to hold desperately to the mast. The rest of the disciples are in the stern of the boat, frightened almost to death, one miserably seasick, hanging over the side. Others are frantically trying to wake Jesus from his sleep. What’s interesting about the painting is that Rembrandt put himself in the picture of panic. He’s standing, clutching one of the stays with one hand, holding his head in terror with his other hand. It’s as if Rembrandt was saying, by painting himself inside the boat, that’s where most of us find ourselves, caught up in the furious storms of life, threatening to sweep us overboard from a place we once thought was safe--or, should be safe. That’s certainly how the disciples were feeling: totally caught up in fear, wondering if there was any safe place.
But I like what Helen Keller once said about security:
“Security is mostly a superstition. It does not exist in nature, nor do the children of men as a whole experience it. Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than outright exposure (to it). Life is either a daring adventure or nothing.” (Helen Keller)
The disciples were trying to avoid danger behind their locked doors. But Jesus shattered their trust in their own locks by getting past the lions, past the locks, and past the doors, suddenly showing up.
I believe Jesus knew what it was like to be really afraid. Long before his agonizing prayer in the Garden of Gethsemene, I believe he may have been afraid to enter the world, to do what God asked him to do. Think of what it meant for Jesus to move from his place with the Father and into the world.
It would be a move from security to anxiety.
A move from stability into the unknown.
A move from the heavenly to the human.
A move from the everlasting to death.
A move from the infinite to the finite.
A move from God’s presence to Godlessness.
A move from perfection to sin.
“Peace to you. Just as the Father sent me, I send you.” That’s what the risen Lord said to the fearful disciples, quivering together in that room with locked doors. It’s interesting that Jesus uses two different words here for “sent.” When Jesus says the Father sent him, he uses the Greek word, “apostello.” It’s a combination word: apo and stello. “Apo” means to be separated, one thing from another; to take a part away from the whole. Almost like a birth process. “Stello” means to set in place, or to outfit and prepare oneself. So for God to send Jesus, it meant that Jesus was separated from God, taken away from God, torn away from the wholeness that was God, and outfitted to be set down in another place: the world. That’s how Jesus was sent by the Father into the world.
But when Jesus talks about how he is sending the fearful disciples, he uses a different word for “send.” It is the Greek word “pempo.” Pempo is the word used for thrusting a thing or a person out of one place into another. It means to be propelled out. Add the fact that right after saying this, Jesus breathed on them so they would be surrounded and filled with the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit becomes a party to this thrusting out process.
Remember when Jesus was sent into the wilderness by the Holy Spirit to be tempted by the devil? Jesus is sent into the wilderness with the same word that is used here with the disciples: pempo. Jesus goes from the amazing event of his baptism and hearing the affirmation by the voice of God out of the clouds, and then is literally thrust, pushed out into the wilderness by the Holy Spirit to face the devil and his temptations.
Remember when the Holy Spirit came upon the believers and they all spoke the message of Jesus in different languages at Pentecost. Then they were sent out into the world, equipped with that amazing gift, by the Holy Spirit. Again the same word for sent is used. Those disciples, now equipped, were thrust and pushed out of their comfortable little room and out into the world by the Holy Spirit.
There are times when we disciples need to be pushed out of our comfortable places and out into the world where there are lions and storm tossed seas. There in the room where the disciples were gathered, on the day of Resurrection, afraid, behind locked doors, Jesus came to them and in effect said, “Look. Just as God separated me from my comfortable place in heaven in His presence; just as God outfitted me and prepared me to set me into the world as a human being, so I push you out into the scary world.” Then Jesus breathed on them, giving them the Holy Spirit, not just to empower them but also to impel them out, pushing them, giving them a swift kick in the pants to get out and past those locked doors.
Back to Pilgrim’s Progress and the journey of Christian with lions ahead on each side of the path. As Christian moved fearfully forward, closer and closer to the teeth and claws of the huge lions, he noticed something else. Both lions were chained. Their legs were chained, and even though they could get close to the path where Christian was walking, they couldn’t get close enough to do any harm to the pilgrims who dared move forward. The thing was, Christian would never have known that had he not kept going on the path and dared get close to the lions. From where he stood, back with Timorous and Mistrust, the chains weren’t visible. So Timorous and Mistrust gave up too soon. Christian walked forward with the terrible roaring in his ears, and the lions clawing at the air, trying to get to him, but out of reach because of their chains. So he got past them unharmed, and continued his journey to the City of the King. Some of the things that scare us, may not be so fearful if we dare get closer to them.
And yet, we must be honest. There are times when the lions are loose. In the opening lines of the first letter of Peter, Peter is addressing fearful Christians who are living in scary times. During that time, the lions had been freed from their chains and were quite literally clawing believers to death. Peter addresses his readers as “exiles...scattered to the four winds.” It is deadly persecution that was causing that scattering. Christians who were captured, simply for being Christians faced numerous deadly tortures.
That’s the world the disciples were pushed out into. That’s the world where the lions were truly loose. Thankfully, we don’t live in those kinds of times. But, there are lions loose, and in more subtle ways are seeking to shred our faith. Those are the conditions under which believers were living, whom Peter is addressing in his letter.
Peter remembers the day he and his companions were pushed out of the room by Jesus. How scared they were. Peter knows that the exiled and fearful believers are asking themselves the same kinds of questions he asked on that Resurrection afternoon: Is it really worth it to be a follower of Jesus? Why believe in something that, just by believing in it, puts your life in jeopardy? Having faith in something, in someone like Jesus, should have a positive effect on your life right now, in the present moment. But will it really be so? Christians were dying simply for being a disciple of Jesus. Peter knows that the people who read his letter will want to know, as he wanted to know on Resurrection Day, if there will be any relief to their anxiety and their crisis of faith, after being pushed out into the world?
So listen to some of the phrases Peter uses in the opening lines of his letter to terrified believers. He says, “Because Jesus was raised from the dead...
Not one is missing, no one forgotten.
God the Father has his eye on each of you.
We’ve been given a brand new life.
We have everything to live for.
God is keeping a careful watch over us and the future.
You’ll have it all--life healed and whole.
You can trust God with laughter and singing.
You’ll get what you’re looking forward to.
“Peace to you. Just as the Father sent me, I send you.” It’s as if these statements Peter shares with scared fellow believers came right from Jesus. Jesus knew them all to be true, because they were true for him as he was sent into the world by the Father. Jesus knew his shoving the disciples out into the world was a scary, and seemingly uncaring thing to do. But, there are certain assurances from God that Peter wanted others to know about, even though they were scared.
The great 17th century French General Vicomte de Turenne was known for marching into battle at the head of his troops. Asked about it one time, he replied, “I conduct myself like a brave man, but all the time I’m afraid. I don’t give in to the fear, but say to my body, ‘Tremble, old carcass, but walk!’ And my body walks.”
Jesus has been our general, who was sent by the Father ahead of us into the battle, into the terrifying world, to face what we, who follow him, may face. By pushing and prodding, Jesus takes us into the world with him, moving us beyond the doors we have kept locked to keep us from facing our fears. All he asks is that we say to ourselves, “Tremble old carcass; but WALK!” knowing we are walking with the Risen Lord.
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