3 Easter B April 19, 2015
Luther Memorial Church Seattle, WA
The Rev. Julie G. Hutson
Acts 3: 12-19 + Psalm 4 + 1 John 3: 1-7 + Luke 24: 36b-48
Alleluia! Christ is risen! Christ is risen, indeed! Alleluia!
Peter’s father was a mechanic – he had a shop in the town he’d grown up in and he worked on everyone’s cars. Peter grew up in and around that shop, after school and on weekends and almost every day in the summer, Peter was there, helping his father out in whatever way worked for his age. At the end of every work day, Peter joined his dad at the big, deep sink, to wash his hands with a boar bristle brush, just like his dad, even though most of the time Peter’s hands bore none of the same grease and oil that his father’s did.
After high school, Peter was able to attend college halfway across the country, at a fine university. His father and mother had saved carefully over the years. Peter was in his second year of law school when the call came. His father had died of a massive heart attack, in the very shop where he’d spent his days. His death was entirely unexpected.
Peter was on the first plane back home; by the time his mother picked him up at the airport, it was time to go to the funeral home for visitation. Peter was still in shock. He had just been home over Christmas break. He had sat with his dad in the shop, just like the old days, and caught up on all of the news. He’d waited there with his father, until the work was finished for the day and he had washed his hands with the boar bristle brush before they went back home.
And now here they were, at the funeral home, standing in front of his father’s body, at rest in the casket. Ever so gently, Peter picked up one of his father’s hands and looked at the places where the brush had been unsuccessful in wiping away the stains of the grease and oil. These were the hands he knew. This was, in fact, his father – and having seen his hands and touched them, he could accept at last this unthinkable news.
In Luke’s Gospel reading this morning Jesus has appeared again to the disciples, after his resurrection. They are startled and terrified because they couldn’t imagine that he was really there. They thought he was a ghost. And then he says to them: “Look at my hands and my feet; see that it is I myself. Touch me and see;”
Last week we heard a similar story from John’s Gospel. Thomas had missed Jesus’ post resurrection appearance to the rest of the disciples and he wasn’t going to take their word for it. “We have seen the Lord!” they cried, and Thomas said “Unless I see him and touch his wounded hands and feet, I will not believe.”
Although Jesus had come back to the disciples and to the people who had loved and followed him, the marks of his crucifixion were still there. The wounds in his hands and feet and side remained. Resurrection had not undone them. And they were necessary for belief by the disciples.
At Trinity Seminary the processional cross is a massive, black cross. On one side there is the corpus, the body, of Christ. Some people cringe at the sight of a crucifix, a cross with the body of Christ. But it is there as reminder to us that the cross is not just a random symbol of our faith. If we needed that, we could use the fish used by the early Christians or a dove for the Holy Spirit. Jesus on the cross is a sign to us that his death was real. He was executed. It was capital punishment. He was dead.
The disciples knew this. And so their confusion was understandable. How could someone who was dead now be alive? Eventually, the text says that Jesus explained it all to them. Basically, from verse 44 on, my paraphrase of Jesus’ words would be: “ This was what I was trying to tell you before I was crucified! Everything written about me in our Scriptures – in the Torah and the prophets and the psalms – this had to happen.” Then he helped them understand everything.
But before he did any of that. They saw for themselves his hands and his feet – wounded proof of a risen Savior.
The other side of that processional cross at Trinity Seminary is solid black, except for four gold squares – one where each of Jesus’ hands would have been nailed; one where his feet would have been nailed, and one where his head would have hung. It is the Easter side of the cross – the one where we remember his wounds, but we see that his body is no longer there.
And here’s the thing about that processional cross, one side of it cannot exist without the other. There is no resurrection without the crucified Christ.
In that locked room, the disciples could not believe in a resurrected Christ without the crucified, wounded Jesus.
When we speak of what it means to be a follower of Jesus, we must never lose sight of his wounds. There are some very well known preachers who preach to thousands of worshipers in converted stadiums on Sunday mornings and the word they preach is what we call the prosperity Gospel. Basically, it says, if you follow Jesus and maybe keep some rules, you will prosper! You will be rich and you will not have any worries. But this isn’t what Jesus said….at all. Jesus said “If anyone wants to be my disciple they must lay aside their life, take up their cross, and follow me.” To follow Jesus means to be able to walk in our own woundedness. It means being able to carry heavy burdens and, when they become too heavy, to allow our sisters and brothers to carry them for us for a time, just as Simon of Cyrene carried the cross for Jesus.
At baptism, we are marked with the sign of the cross. Here we dip our fingers in the water and make the sign of the cross on our foreheads as reminders of this claim on our lives. That no matter how deeply we are wounded in this life, Jesus carries our wounded selves in the resurrection.
Sisters and brothers, Jesus was crucified because he preached and taught and lived a message of wide love and encompassing inclusivity. His every action: eating with tax collectors, prostitutes, and sinners….going to Zaccheus’ house for dinner; talking to the woman at the well….the very stories he told….the story of the Good Samaritan and the Prodigal Son….the point of all that Jesus did and all that Jesus said was to spread a message of love for all people. And he was killed for it. But his message stayed the same, post resurrection. He didn’t say: “Hey, maybe we should dial it back a little bit, maybe we should preach a message of power to Rome. No. He said “repentance and forgiveness of sins is to be proclaimed in the name of Jesus to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem.” The message remained for all people. And the disciples had a job to do. They were going to be witnesses to these things. And witnesses, by their very definition, tell what they have seen and heard. The disciples had more to do. And so do we.
But first they could touch the wounds in his hands and side. And then share a meal – some broiled fish. They weren’t at all sure, the text says “While in their joy they were disbelieving and still wondering.” Disbelief. Joy. Doubt.
It’s a part of who we are, as followers of One who died because of a message he trusts us to carry into the world. It’s a part of who we are as wounded disciples of a wounded and risen Savior.
And today we bring our own woundedness….our own disbelief….our own joy….and our doubts…..and we come to this meal, to this table, where Jesus invites us to touch him and taste him and know that he is risen indeed. Alleluia. Amen.