Sermons from First Congregational Church of Southington

Transcription

1 Sermons from First Congregational Church of Southington The Risen Christ Has Scars John The Second Sunday of Easter April 3, 2016 John When it was evening on that day, the first day of the week, and the doors of the house where the disciples had met were locked for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said, Peace be with you. 20 After he said this, he showed them his hands and his side. Then the disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord. 21 Jesus said to them again, Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you. 22 When he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, Receive the Holy Spirit. 23 If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained. 24 But Thomas (who was called the Twin), one of the twelve, was not with them when Jesus came. 25 So the other disciples told him, We have seen the Lord. But he said to them, Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands, and put my finger in the mark of the nails and my hand in his side, I will not believe. 26 A week later his disciples were again in the house, and Thomas was with them. Although the doors were shut, Jesus came and stood among them and said, Peace be with you. 27 Then he said to Thomas, Put your finger here and see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it in my side. Do not doubt but believe. 28 Thomas answered him, My Lord and my God! 29 Jesus said to him, Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe. 30 Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book. 31 But these are written so that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name. I. It s really wonderful that you came to church today. I probably shouldn t say it, but I think the Sunday after Easter is probably the hardest Sunday of all to come to church. Think about it. How could we top last Sunday? Some of us started the day early at Camp Sloper with a glorious resurrection celebration at sunrise with a crackling fire and blooming daffodils. Then lots of people showed up here for one of the worships services. The Barnes Memorial Chapel was packed at 8:00 and we could feel the glory of resurrection. At 9:30 the Adult Choir s anthem was spectacular, so much so that a two-year-old in the back pew exclaimed Yay! as the last note faded into joy. And at the end we sang Handel s glorious Year C: Easter 2

2 The Risen Christ Has Scars April 3, 2016 Sermon Page 2 of 5 Hallelujah Chorus with passion. And after the 11:15 worship service I went home singing My Redeemer Lives the rest of the day. We celebrated God s victory. Death, evil, injustice God whipped them all. Nothing could hold Christ in the grave; nothing could defeat God s purpose. In the resurrection God got the final word. Seemingly powerless love overcomes loveless power. Alleluia! Christ is risen indeed! How could we top that? Yet you ve come back today, probably not expecting packed pews or the Hallelujah Chorus or My Redeemer Lives, but you re back. I don t know why you came back, but I m guessing you ve come to church today, as you come on any ordinary Sunday, to be part of this community that seeks to make a difference in the world, a community where you find life, however you define your search for life. Maybe you came back for the beautiful music, or the ancient words, or to be surrounded by friends who are more than friends they re family. Maybe you came back for more strength for the journey, more hope for the future, more courage in the struggle for justice and peace, or just to live life every day. Maybe you came to church today because it s just one of your better habits. Whatever the reason, you ve come back, and I m thrilled you did. II. It takes some courage to come to church the Sunday after Easter, and a lot of faith, because although we shouted, Christ is risen indeed! last Sunday, our actual experience with contemporary tombs may seem more stubborn. Examples of contemporary tombs are abundant: the powers of hatred and death seem so immutably strong. You have to look no further than civil war-torn Syria or AIDS-ravaged Africa or terrorstricken Nigeria to see the power of death. What is the impact of Easter in a Good Friday world, where injustice is commonplace and violence is viewed as a solution? Has Easter changed anything? Yes, I will argue in this sermon, it has, but perhaps not in the way we expected. Whether what they witnessed at the empty tomb actually changed anything has to be the question plaguing Jesus friends on Easter evening. Could resurrection be too magnificent for them to grasp? It might seem so, for after seeing the empty tomb and hearing the news that Christ is risen, the disciples didn t preach, they didn t join the choir, they went home 1, like we went home last Sunday after church. Now they are hiding in the house with the door locked. Like that would make a difference to Jesus. 1 John 20.10

3 The Risen Christ Has Scars April 3, 2016 Sermon Page 3 of 5 A locked door couldn t keep Jesus out. Right there in their midst Jesus appears. He stands among them. Yet there is a curious thing about this appearance of Jesus to his frightened disciples. They didn t know him. That theme is common to all the Easter stories in the Bible. Mary Magdalene thought Jesus was the gardener when she saw him on Easter morning. On Easter evening two disciples walked with Jesus all the way to Emmaus and they didn t recognize him until they sat down for dinner and he broke the bread. The resurrected Christ is a mystery. At first the disciples did not recognize him either. Jesus speaks to them. Peace be with you, he says. But still they look at him dumbfounded, not knowing who this mysterious person is. Then he showed them his scars, his wounds. Then and only then did they recognize him. Then they rejoiced. Somehow, it seems, the gospel makes a connection between belief in the risen Christ and the wounds of Christ. The risen Christ has scars. Being raised from the dead did not take away his scars. Someone claiming to be Jesus without the scars would be a fraud. The Christ of Easter bears the wounds of Good Friday. Jesus disciples, including Thomas, only understand that Jesus has risen when they see his scars. Easter, the stunning, miraculous triumph of God, God s great victory over death, does not make the scars go away. The risen Christ still has his scars. III. Thomas wasn t there. Who knows where he was when Jesus appeared. Mary told them that she had seen Jesus. Maybe Thomas was out looking for him. Whatever the reason, he missed Easter. The other disciples tell him about it, but he thinks they are off their rockers. Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands, and put my finger in the mark of the nails and my hand in his side, I will not believe. I sympathize with Thomas. I need to see too. It is human for us to want to see, to be certain about things. That s all Thomas is doing, and I sympathize with him. I want to be certain too. But surviving in a Good Friday world doesn t require certainty. In fact, I would argue that certainty is a liability in a Good Friday world. What is required is faith.

4 The Risen Christ Has Scars April 3, 2016 Sermon Page 4 of 5 Certainty is not faith, but neither is belief. Faith is how we come to believe. We can only have faith is something that we can t see yet. Jesus said it himself: Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe. To have faith means to believe in things that you cannot yet see. It is still required of us today. Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe that we can eradicate racism in our time. Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe we can be a community that celebrates diversity. Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe that love can cast out hate, that powerless love can defeat loveless power. But that kind of faith, that believing without having seen, leaves scars. The risen Christ has scars. Put your finger here and see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it in my side. Do not doubt but believe. IV. I have a scar, three actually, on my right arm, that I earned when I was four years old. I ll show them to you, if you want. I was racing my sister to the farm tractor my father had just started. The first one there might get to sit on his lap and drive. Close on my sister s heels, I thrust out my arm to block the glass storm door she had just thrown open from closing in my face. The closing glass door hit firmly at the base of my hand. The glass shattered and badly cut my arm. I will spare you the graphic details. My mother, who usually fainted at the sight of blood, sprang into action. She bound the arm in a towel and my father raced me to the hospital where the wounds were stitched up and the bleeding stopped. But I still bear the scars, three of them; I ll show them to you, if you want. They seem to grow more visible with the passing years. They are a reminder of the faith of my mother, a faith that could see beyond any crisis, a faith that could face with courage and love whatever the world put in her path. It was the courage and love that I would see in her eyes 14 years later as she valiantly battled cancer, a disease that scarred her body and eventually took her life, but never destroyed her faith, her ability to see something more. When I see my scars, I know her courage; I feel her love. The risen Christ, the Christ who appeared to Thomas a week after Easter, still has scars. There are some people in the world who think that Easter has overcome all our wounds. They think that because Jesus is risen from the dead on Easter, the cross is overcome, the pain is forgotten, the world is fixed, the scars are gone.

5 The Risen Christ Has Scars April 3, 2016 Sermon Page 5 of 5 No. The risen Christ has nail prints in his hands, a healed gash in his side. That s how they knew the mysterious one before them really was Jesus. American Sign Language has a particular sign for Jesus. The creators of sign language would never have come up with this sign were it not for Thomas. The left middle finger touches the right palm, and the right middle finger, in sequence, touches the left palm. No words are necessary. Jesus is the one with wounded hands. Everything isn t fixed, but everything is made new. The risen Christ has scars so do we. It is through our scars, our vulnerability, our faith in God in this world gone mad, that we can find our faith True life. our life. Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe. Blessed are those who have scars.