Year after year, Easter Sunday celebrates the reality of Jesus’ resurrection as the foundation of our Christian identity. As St. Paul says, “If Christ has not been raised, then empty is our preaching, and empty is your faith.” And yet, in the resurrection appearances of Jesus to his disciples, failure to recognize Jesus is a hallmark of his resurrection appearances. So rather than Jesus they see a ghost, and rather than joy they experience fear. The meaning of resurrection faith was that Jesus was going to change the disciples “slowness of heart” and fearful misunderstanding into “opened minds” and joyful recognition. The question for us is how will Jesus appear to us in this day and age? Will we be any better able to recognize him than those first disciples? As we reflect on the Gospel, I would highlight three components of the Gospel story that are also three movements In our spiritual journey. The disciples were a community of people. We are a Eucharistic people. The first disciples were to be a missionary people. Jesus commissioned them “to be witnesses of these things.” The first disciples were committed to the mission of Jesus. We are grateful for your generosity and may the Risen Lord bless you many times over for all the ways you give to make our Church a Community of Disciples who celebrate the presence of the Risen Lord in our midst,
John 20:19-31. It's ironic - that many of the religious people of Christ's time were unable to recognize Jesus as the Messiah. Their hearts were far from God, and as a result, they had no relationship with him. within each of us belief and unbelief are interwoven. Our journey of faith is, and will always be, a work in progress. We all need to draw near to Jesus and consequently we all need to be attentive to the demons that prevent us from doing so. Our journey is a no--holds barred endeavor where we must first wipe away any line -- that we may have drawn in the sand – which is intended to indicate just how far we are willing to go. Thomas immediately realized that it wasn’t the signs that Jesus performed that stirred his faith. Rather his faith was fanned into a flame once he recognized that Jesus is the true son of God. Jesus desires that each of us recognize his true identity so that we can also exclaim “My Lord and My God.”
A message for me and hopefully for all of us is that Easter joy is experienced in many, many life experiences. Easter is about Jesus. Easter is about real life. Easter is about how we experience the risen Jesus in our lives. The real Easter mystery is when experience the presence of the Risen Lord in the beauty of a sunrise, in simple sharing with people you love, in the ways you wash the feet of God’s poor, in this mystery of the Eucharist as are fed and nourished at the Table of the Lord. An important truth of our lives is that we discover important things about ourselves at the tomb. Just as the first disciples experienced the empty tomb before they came to a resurrection faith, we too need to empty ourselves at our own graves, leave behind our own burial cloths, and live in the light of the Risen Christ. Our empty tomb experiences are the moments of darkness and confusion in life. As we peer into the empty tombs of the ups and downs of our everyday lives, we are challenged to see and believe as the apostle John did as he stared into the empty tomb. Yes, it’s at the tomb that we can make sense of the questions that have followed us on our Lenten journey. The life issue we all face at at the empty tomb is that without trusting in the grace of God, we will never move away the empty tombs of our life that can too easily enslave us. A basic issue for us is whether we intend to live life newly now or just go on doing more the same-old, same-old and call it “following Jesus.” Lent has confronted us with the proposition that we are called beyond spiritual disciplines to a spiritual life. Will we ourselves, touched by Jesus, now rise and live life differently? We cannot celebrate Easter in one day; we cannot come to faith on one mass. Together, as a community of faith, a God’s Easter people, we make the journey together over the course of a lifetime.