Incarnation and the Body of Christ

Incarnation and the Body of Christ We usually think of the incarnation as being the focus of the seasons of Advent and Christmas, but I ve been drawn to think of this theme in reading the Gospel text for this Sunday, found in the last half of John, chapter 20. What is incarnation? In our Christian context, it means that God became human in Jesus in-carnus. Carne in Spanish means meat, God as meat just to make the point rather crudely. We are familiar with Biblical texts that give expression to this concept: In the beginning was the word and the word was with God and the word was God and the word became flesh and lived among us (Jn.1:1&14) God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself (2Cor.5:15) Christ Jesus, though he was in the form of God emptied himself being found in human form (Phil.2:5-7) The Son is the image of the invisible God For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell and through him God was pleased to reconcile to himself all things. (Col.1:15&19). One can, of course, seek to prove, or clarify, or challenge this understanding logically, theologically, anthropologically, whatever. But for my part I simply want to start with this basic conviction of the earliest followers of Jesus, that in the life of this particular human being God was visible, audible, touchable experienceable, let s say in a mysterious and unprecedented way. Starting with that conviction, I want to try to say, and perhaps illustrate, how God s incarnation in Jesus is surprisingly, wonderfully, and still mysteriously, ongoing. One way this point is made comes from Clarence Jordan, a founder of Koinonia Farm and scribe of the Cotton Patch Gospel: The resurrection of Jesus, he says, was simply God s unwillingness to take our no for an answer. He raised Jesus, not as an invitation to us to come to heaven when we die, but as a declaration that he himself has now established permanent, eternal residence here on earth.the good news of the resurrection of Jesus is not that we shall die and go home (to heaven) to be with him, but that he has risen and comes home with us, bringing all his hungry, naked, thirsty, sick prisoner brothers (and sisters) with him. So, God is among us, like it or not, and the incarnation continues, at least metaphorically, in the poor, sick, needy, addicted, captive persons whom we meet, and indeed, whom we are! One of my current teachers, Ronald Rolheiser, is a Catholic priest who writes with unusual strength and plainness. He maintains that when the NT scriptures use the expression Body of Christ, it means both Jesus, the historical man who walked the earth for 33 years, and the body of believers, of whom we are a part. So, 1

writes Rolheiser, The incarnation is not a thirty-three-year experiment by God in history, a one-shot physical incursion into our lives. The incarnation began with Jesus and it has never stopped.god still has skin, human skin, and physically walks on this earth just as Jesus did. In a certain manner of speaking, it is true to say that, at the ascension, the physical body of Jesus left this earth, but the body of Christ did not.we are the Body of Christ. (Holy Longing,79) Paul wrote to the Corinthians: You are the body of Christ and individually members of it. (1Cor.12:27) And to the Colossians: All the fullness of deity lives in Christ s body. And you have been filled by him (Col.2:9) Suppose we look now at today s Gospel reading with this perspective in mind. Here are the disciples gathered a few days after the resurrection, fearful, reactive, disoriented. They had no doctrine of the incarnation to somehow interpret what was going on, but they did have their experience of Jesus. Puzzled yes, but surely they were increasingly feeling that Jesus embodied some momentous presence. And now this presence was impinging on them: in spite of locked doors, he shows up in their midst and addresses them. Peace be with you three times we hear this greeting in these verses. A conventional salutation to be sure, but also to be sure, a great solace to these so-called devoted disciples who had abandoned and betrayed their master. Jesus then insists on showing them the wounds of his ordeal. It s as if he is saying to them, You might have saved me from this, or is it rather, This is what might have happened to you too? In any case, nothing is being covered over here in this encounter, and it seems to bring relief because the troubled disciples are said to be full of joy. There seems to follow an extraordinary rite: As the Father sent me, so I am sending you, says Jesus, accompanied by some kind of ritual expression of being breathed upon. What was this a kiss, an embrace? And another utterance from the master: Receive the Holy Spirit. Was this a spontaneous rite of initiation, a rite of passage? A baptism of breath and Spirit? Something was being conferred on this sorry little huddle of men? or were there women there too? And finally a single instruction, or empowerment, about forgiving and retaining the sins of others, a power that normally was thought to belong only to the Divine. To use the language and imagery of incarnation, we might say that this very short scene in John s Gospel is a depiction of incarnational transference, from God through Jesus to his disciples: they now have undergone incarnation. As the Father sent Jesus, so he sends them; the Spirit that God breathed on Jesus at his baptism, Jesus now breathes on them. And God s power to forgive that Jesus had exercised in his ministry is transferred to them, his disciples. 2

The disciple Thomas is the foil in this story, the contrary one who keeps it grounded, keeps it from becoming too esoteric, too elevated, too spiritual. He keeps the carne in incarnation: I need to see meat, flesh, bloody wounds, touch them, smell them! And even when he capitulates, he gets no commendation. Do you believe just because you see me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe. But the role and words of Thomas are important. There is no incarnation if there is no skin, no flesh, no sensual touch, no insistence on earthy reality. And that s a reality that Jesus honors. In Mark s Gospel we read the story of a woman suffering internal bleeding for 12 years. Though all kinds of treatments have not healed her, she becomes convinced that if I but touch the hem of Jesus garment, I shall be healed. She does and she is. Jesus takes it another step by calling the woman into the light and making explicit the incarnational moment activated by faith, touch and word that has transpired between him and this long-suffering woman. How many other such stories fill the Gospels, stories of healing, stories of forgiveness of sins, and sometimes both. It s this incarnational dynamic that today s Gospel text seems to be showing in transfer from Jesus to his disciples, from the body of Jesus to the body of believers. That brings us to us. Simply put, we will find healing and wholeness by touching the Body of Christ and, as members of the Body of Christ, we are called upon to dispense God s healing and forgiveness by touch, by word, even by gaze, to others. Ronald Rolheiser recounts a particularly poignant example of just such a dispensation. In the movie, Dead Man Walking, Sister Helen Prejean, the Catholic nun who is helping a prisoner on death row prepare to die, tells him that when he is strapped to the chair, injected with the lethal solutions, waiting to die, he should watch her face. That way the last thing you will see before you die will be the face of someone who loves you. (We could add, someone with the authority, from Jesus, to forgive you.) The prisoner, Patrick Sonnier, does that and dies in love rather than in bitterness. This is the profound gift and power of the incarnation, as it touches us as members of the Body of Christ. We are both recipients and agents of healing, forgiveness, reconciliation, within the Body and with respect to those without. Another example (thanks to Rolheiser) that touches close to home, within a family, an extended family, or within a marriage: You are sitting at table one night with your family, your household, or just your spouse. You are overtired, irritated, underappreciated, and something happens to push you beyond your patience. You lose your temper and yell at the 3

others, calling them selfish and insensitive; you stamp out, slamming the door and go sit in your room, alienated. (Of course this is not Mennonite-style! That s much subtler, but the dynamics are the same.) Slowly contrition overcomes self-pity, but wounded pride keeps you from going to the others and apologizing. Eventually you fall asleep, spending the night in this unreconciled state. The next morning, now doubly contrite and sheepish, you come to the breakfast table to join the other(s), sit down and pour a cup of coffee without saying a word your contrition and wounded pride showing in your every move. Your family is not stupid and neither are you. Everyone knows what this means: you are touching the hem of the garment of the Incarnate One. Without words, you are saying, I want to be part of you again, and you are received. At that moment, the hemorrhaging stops. If you dropped dead on the spot, you would die reconciled to your family. The fundamental, essential dynamics of healing and forgiveness are exercised within the community, the Body of Christ, the gift and power of incarnation. Do we believe this? Do we live as if we believe it? Do we pray, for example, for our own children who seem distant from God, holding them in forgiveness, keeping them in touch with the hem of the garment of the Body of Christ? Do we reach out to sisters, brothers, of our own families, along with neighbors, aging, sick, dying, disillusioned young people as if our touch was the healing touch of Christ? Do you believe because you have seen me? Blessed are those who don t see and yet believe. I admit that I don t understand these words very well. As I said, I admire Thomas for insisting on seeing flesh and blood, because that seems to me to be an essential part of the incarnation, that is, our side of it, the human, earthy side. It s the other side, the God part that s hard to apprehend. Last Friday night Seth related, in story and song at a neighborhood gig, an experience of believing, not seeing, and I think incarnation, in an unexpected place and way. The story is his to tell, of course, not mine, but what I want to commend is his vulnerability that let him have the experience and his courage to tell it. My guess is that many of us have such stories to tell; that we don t see, maybe, because we don t believe or don t venture out in belief. We re waiting perhaps for the resurrected Christ to break through our locked doors and help us undergo incarnation. No doubt that will happen to us, sooner or later. But maybe it could be sooner than later. I conclude with a true story, sparsely told by Eduardo Galeano (Uruguayan journalist), of a group of people who gathered expressly to celebrate the 4

incarnation, in the Eucharist, who were required to believe without seeing. May it touch us, in this Resurrection season, to let ourselves be subjects of the incarnation. 1973, Montevideo, (under the Uruguayan dictatorship) Ninth Cavalry barracks: a terrifying night. Roaring trucks, blasts of shrapnel, the prisoners on the floor, face down, hands on the nape of the neck, a rifle stuck in each back, screaming, kicking, with rifle butts, threats... The next morning, one of the prisoners, who had not yet lost track of the calendar, recalled: Today is Easter Sunday. It was forbidden to gather together. But it happened. In the center of the bunkhouse it happened. Those who were not Christians helped. Some watched the grilled iron gates and followed the footsteps of soldiers on guard. Others formed a ring of people moving back and forth, walking nonchalantly around the celebrants. Miguel Brun (a Methodist pastor) whispered some words. He evoked the resurrection of Jesus, announcing the redemption of all captives. Jesus had been persecuted, imprisoned, tortured and killed, but a Sunday like this had made the walls creak, and then overturn, so that every prison was liberated and every loneliness embraced. The prisoners had nothing. Neither bread, nor wine, nor vessels even. It was a Communion of empty hands. Miguel offered what had been offered: Let us eat he whispered. This is his body. And the Christians raised their hands to their mouths and ate the invisible bread. Let us drink. This is his blood. They raised no Cup and drank the invisible wine. ( La comunión de las manos vacías by Eduardo Galeano) Clarence Jordan quote from Common Prayer, a Liturgy for Ordinary Radicals, 217 5