Thomas, My Twin

The Second Sunday of Easter
April 19, 2009

John 20:19-31


I’ve always felt a bit sorry for Thomas the disciple In the accounts of the ministry of Jesus, you don’t hear much about Thomas. We know he was a twin—in Greek they called him “Didymus”—the twin.

But we don’t learn much more. We don’t hear bad things about him or strange things or even good things. Which tells us that he was a good disciple, at the very least not doing less than expected. We would have heard about that. So not Peter, perhaps, but certainly not Judas.

So for someone who followed Jesus throughout his ministry, and who later, tradition tells us, went on to preach and witness to the saving word and works of our Savior Jesus Christ … well, we mostly remember him for one moment of doubt.

Doubting Thomas.

What if we were remembered for our one moment of doubt? Or for one moment of anger? Or, heaven forbid, in a well-preserved snapshot from one embarrassing moment? What a nightmare!

I can just imagine being remembered for … for perhaps that day in 7th grade English class when it was my turn to read aloud and everyone laughed because I thought the word debut should be pronounced as it’s spelled. I can just imagine how it would feel if today I were known as Michael De-But.

I’m not, thank goodness. But Thomas – he’ll always be Doubting Thomas. Because we see one moment frozen in time, that moment when he doubted.

The fact is, it would be unfair to freeze anyone’s life to one moment. Because that’s not how life works. One moment you’re headed in one direction, the next moment somewhere different.

I know that much of my life has been filled with incidents of the world turning around on me, handing me one thing when I expected another. Jobs, relationships, even homes.

A snapshot wouldn’t do justice to the richness or, to be honest, the confusion of that life.

I know that when old high school and college friends find me these days, they’re often surprised that I’m not a reporter or copy editor. That’s the snapshot they have of me in their minds.

And I’m often surprised to find out things about them – about how the lawyer now teaches fly-fishing, and how another has moved from the executive suite to the classroom.

I’m also saddened to hear about deaths, about accidents, about layoffs in so many fields.

And on they change – from happy to sad and back again, from career to career, from one thing to another. One change after another in my life and in the lives of those around me. We think we want one thing, but something else is handed us. We think we have one thing, but it turns out to be something else.

We aren’t handed a roadmap, especially one that guarantees no detours. Parts of life lead us down unimaginably wonderful roads. Other parts, for some, into places impossibly dark.

We don’t rest in one place forever, or even for very long. And that’s what makes it so hard to sort life out into good and bad, happy and sad, what’s desired and what’s not. Often, it’s all these things at once.

I look back on some of the most difficult times in my life and, to my great surprise, I consider them the good old days. In fact, how many times have you heard someone talk about the good old days and realize they were talking about the Great Depression? How many times in our lives do we find that rather than simply trying to make the best of a bad situation, we find that there are wonderful things to be had in these hard times?

When we are at our happiest, we don’t expect the difficulties that are sure to come. When evil comes round, we lose faith in ever again finding the good. We simply don’t believe it possible because it goes against all common sense. We don’t have faith in it because there’s no logical reason to have faith.

And there you find Thomas.

Like the other disciples, he fled as Jesus took his cross to Golgotha. Like the other disciples, he was hiding from the Romans and the Jewish officials. Like the others, he was in despair.

Jesus was gone. Why go on hoping? Why go on living?

And by a stroke of luck – good or bad – he was not in the room with the others on that Sunday night when Jesus came walking in. Thomas was not there to hear Jesus say, “Peace be with you.” Thomas was not there to see his hands and his side.

The other disciples did not have to go on blind faith now. They had seen, they had heard, they had proof for their faith. Thomas, poor Thomas, he had only the word of his fellow disciples.

Thomas had believed in the words of Christ, but why believe these men? These same men who had scattered, who had broken their promises, who had fainted when Jesus said stay awake. They probably were hysterical, conjuring up images in their fear, grasping at phantoms as the desperate so often do.

And that’s where we see Thomas, that’s where we remember him.
And that’s where we so often find ourselves – where we would always be remembered if life were a snapshot and not a journey. That’s where we so often are – being told the truth but refusing to believe. Knowing the truth but succumbing to doubt.

We experience great joy – birth, love, gentleness, the sweetest things life can offer. And then we are shocked when we experience the pains of life and so often convince ourselves that sorrow is the fullness of life and that joy … well, that joy is a phantom to be grasped at but never reached.

We experience the Resurrection moments of this life – healings and renewed friendships and gifts of a new day. And then … and then we forget these minor miracles. We forget their power and ask – nay, demand – that the Resurrection be proved all over again.

Here we are a week after Resurrection Sunday. A friend of mine said it’s too bad that we have to hear the Thomas story so quickly after Easter, that it’s a come-down.

I disagree. I think it’s a step up.

I think my friend was over-optimistic, assuming that we couldn’t have forgotten the joy of the Resurrection so quickly, that thinking about Doubting Thomas would be bringing us down from our Easter high.

But in this week, I know that I’ve forgotten. I know that after the moving liturgies of Holy Week and the joyous explosion of song and praise at the Vigil and Easter morning … that after all that, I descended rather quickly and predictably into the grumbling minutiae of everyday life.

The power outage and the limbs in my yard and trees fallen over in the yards of my friends. The bills and the overdue tax return and the conversations with friends and parishioners whose lives just aren’t hanging together in the way they wish.

Perhaps if I had a snapshot of Easter sitting on my desk. A snapshot hanging from my car visor. A snapshot slipped into my wallet. To remind me of the joy, to reassure me of that joyous time.

I was there with Thomas, already forgetting, already doubting. Hand me something to make me believe. Show me something to help my weakness.

And to Thomas, on that evening, surrounded by his friends, it was given. And Thomas said, “My Lord and my God!”

And to me, on this morning, surrounded by my friends, it is given – given to me by my Lord and my God.

A chance to remember in the body and the blood. A chance to see the proof in the hearts of the faithful. The promise of the peace that passes all understanding, a promise from the Risen Lord of peace, of joy, of resurrection. Today, like Thomas, I will not doubt, but believe.

Amen.

The Importance of Letting Go

Sunday of the Resurrection
April 12, 2009

John 20:1-18


This Sunday of the Resurrection is a glorious day, one that Christians look forward to the entire year. Popular culture has a Christmas fixation, suggesting that our faith centers on that day. But the teaching of our faith, the core of our faith, points to the Resurrection. Points toward this day, Easter. The day Christ arose.

And he is risen, alleluia.

I hesitate, though, in saying that this is the most important day of the year. I get nervous about pointing to any one thing as the most important.

A couple of years ago, I was interviewed for a newspaper story on the Easter Sermon, based on the idea that the Easter sermon is the most important one of the year. That’s an idea I don’t really agree with … and anyway, I sure don’t like that kind of pressure!

Back when I was teaching students how to be newspaper reporters, I’d tell them to avoid questions like, “What’s the one most important thing?” or “What’s your favorite something?” or “What’s the funniest or tastiest or most bestest ever.”

For one thing, our brains tend to shut down when he have to eliminate everything else …. for example, if I were ask you, “What’s the absolute best restaurant meal you’ve ever had?” That’s hard to answer. But if I ask you, “Tell me about one great meal you’ve had,” then you probably have something to say.

If I asked you to name some of the most important things in your life- not just one, but many- I'll be you could close your eyes and see many of them. I close my eyes and think of going fishing with my brothers, of trips, of births and deaths, some things happy and others hard, but all of them important.

Well, that's one thing about “most important.” The other thing is, I’m always nervous about saying something is “most important” because thinking that way tends to disparage other things, make them seem less important than they really are.

Christmas is by no means unimportant. The Ascension, All Saints, the Epiphany … the list goes on. We’ve got a year full of Christian feasts and fasts. All important, and I don’t want to get into the business of comparing them. They’re all important parts of the Christian year, of the Christian faith. So if you ask me if Easter is the most important, I’m going to say, “Yes … except for all the others.”

No single service is most important, and no single service or sermon contains the whole of the Gospel message. No single part of the Gospel, or of the whole Bible for that matter, is so important that it stands absolutely on its own. Luther called John 3:16 the “the heart of the Bible, the Gospel in miniature.” But John 3:16 on its own does not sustain us, does not fully instruct us outside the context of the Gospel in its fullness.

But imagine if John 3:16 – “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but have eternal life – imagine that this verse were taken away from you. You had it once, but now it’s gone. That it once sustained you but now has been taken away.

Or imagine that the Exodus story – the whole salvation of the Hebrew people from slavery through the Red Sea into the Promised Land. Imagine that this story, which may once had given you such hope, imagine that it were taken away forever.

Or the psalms – never more to hear “The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.”

Or even your hymns – no more “Faith of our Fathers,” no more “Amazing Grace.”

Where would you turn, what would you do? Where would you turn for consolation in time of grief if all of Scripture were to be yanked away? Where would you turn for words of praise in times of gladness? What would lend shape to your faith, to your daily journey through this life?

And worse … imagine, if it’s possible, that Jesus were taken away from you. What utter devastation. What an empty, unimaginable hole in your life.

And there … there you are with Mary Magdalene on this Easter morning. The tomb is empty and she cries, “They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we do not know where they have laid him.”

The disciples who came, they left for home. But Mary, she stood there crying at the tomb. Where else was there worth going? One place was as good as another now … now that Jesus was gone, now that there was nothing good left. Now that there was a dark, empty tomb where once there had been life. What to do but cry, what to do but weep?

“Woman, why are you weeping?”

They were angels. “Why are you weeping?”

Mary was so distraught that the sight of angels meant nothing to her. All she could see was what wasn’t there – her savior. “They have taken away my Lord.”

“Woman, why are you weeping?”

This time, not an angel, but her Lord. And she was so distraught that the sight of the risen Savior meant nothing to her. All she saw was someone who wasn’t who she was looking for – Jesus, her friend, her very life.

For Mary, it all changed in a moment. From weeping to a cry of joy. From despair to hope. All in a word – “Mary!” A word that told her that Jesus recognized her when she could not recognize him. A word that said, “I am here. I have arisen. Alleluia.”

If she could have, Mary Magdalene would have held onto that moment forever. That moment of instantaneous joy, when her heart was refilled and her spirit renewed, when Jesus said her name and she knew that he was risen – that she was not alone and, indeed, never had been and never would be alone. That moment of joy, that flashing moment of immortality of the soul.

Jesus knew this. Knew that she would hold onto this, this most important moment ever, that this would become her whole life compressed into a moment like no other. And he said, “Do not hold onto me.”

Time had to move on. The Son had not yet returned to the Father. Jesus had not appeared to the disciples. There was much to do. For him, for her, for the world. “Do not hold onto me.”

Ah, but she wanted to. And we want to. To hold onto that one moment, that one day, that most important time in our lives, whatever it may be. But there is more to life than a moment.

In fact, there is more to salvation than a moment. More than a life decision, more than a warming of the heart, more than the moment of commitment.

There is what we do with that commitment. There is what we do with The Word. There is what we do and how we live and what we continue to believe once we see that Jesus has risen.

Jesus said, in effect, “Yes, I am standing here at this most important time, the moment of resurrection … but go. Let go and tell the others. Let go and be a witness. Let go and spread the Gospel.”

How hard for Mary. She had lost Jesus once, and now … and now? How hard for us. We have a moment in time that defines us, that we love dearly and now … and now? How very hard.

Mary is able to turn and go because she knows that once risen, Jesus cannot and will not leave her ever again. She does not have to hold on because he will not let go.

This most important moment will stretch on through the rest of her life, forever more. For the Risen Christ would live in and through her as she told the Good News of Christ and lived the life of the Christian.

The Psalmist says, “On this day, the Lord has acted; we will rejoice and be glad in it.” But this day, the Day of Resurrection, will pass. And tomorrow will come and tomorrow after that, and one day will tell its tale to another.

There will be no need to hang onto this one day, this one service, this one moment with Christ. Do not hold on, because this most important day, this most important message will remain with you, remain in you.

When you see the Risen Christ in the hearing of the Word, in the breaking of the bread and the sharing of the cup … when you have seen the Risen Christ in your neighbor’s heart … you then can go out into the world to say, like Mary, “I have seen the Lord.”

And others will see the Lord as the Lord lives in you.

Amen.

Heavy Lifting at Easter

Easter Vigil
April 11, 2009

Mark 16:1-8


I started out Holy Week a little under the weather, which is not the way you want to start Holy Week if you’re a priest.

Deacon Stan, who quietly keeps an eye on what I’m up to around here, gently suggested that perhaps if I didn’t try to do too much and do it all single-handedly, then maybe, just maybe, I wouldn’t wear myself out and be so susceptible to every little bug that comes around.

Well I say that clearly the man’s a lunatic and can’t be trusted.

Or maybe, just maybe, he could have a point there.

Do you know someone like that? Are you someone like that? Someone who thinks you have to do all the heavy lifting, all alone, without help?

Many of us reach that point, but from different approaches. Some give a theatrical sigh, say “Oh don’t worry, I’ll just take care of it myself” and then do alone what we probably could have gotten others to help us out with. Sometimes that comes from getting insufficient help one too many times.

But sometimes it comes from drawing the wrong conclusions from one or two bad experiences– you’ve probably heard someone curse how badly a delegated task was performed and declare, “Well, I guess if you want it done right, you have to do it yourself.”

That’s a pretty wrong-headed conclusion, but one that folks often come to. It comes from a lack of trust, sometimes from an inability to communicate well, and very often from an overdeveloped sense of self-worth.

Then there are those who simply don’t get around to asking anybody to help, who just dive into things and take on too much and– well, somebody eventually ends up unhappy. It’s not always intentional with folks like this, but the result is the same– we put ourselves, our own needs, and our own powers at the center of our lives. Other people, their talents and the offerings of their lives – not on our radar.

We want to do the heavy lifting ourselves. All by ourselves.

A friend recently talked to me about a situation in her life and said she’d been advised to pray about that situation. She said to me, “Praying is fine, but it seems like I ought to be doing something about it.”

I told her, “Well, you are doing something about it..”

I said, “By praying, you are keeping it on your agenda – spiritually and logistically. Every day, when you say prayers, you raise it up to God and to yourself.

“And remember that prayer isn’t one-way; it’s a conversation with God. By inviting God into the process, you’re taking responsibility, but you’re also admitting that you cannot do this 100 percent by yourself.”

She said I was starting to make sense, which surprised her! But it wasn’t enough. It didn’t sound enough like real action.

So I said, “I don’t know about you, but when I’m facing a hard issue in my life, I’d much rather pray about those hungry folks overseas and give thanks for beautiful weather and just about anything other than what I’m facing. I’d rather clean my room and pay my taxes and wash the car than sit down and work through the hard things in my life.

“But if I’m praying about it– and I mean really praying about it, entering into an honest face-to-face with God about it– then I can’t duck it. It’s right out there to be dealt with. If you think you’re really praying about something, but then find yourself just letting it lie once your prayer time is over … well, then you’re just playing at prayer.”

She was quiet a minute and I asked her if she’d been praying about her issue. And she said yes. And I asked her what else she was doing, and she started listing all the things she was doing – calling this person, compiling that information, checking off her possibilities and to-do list.

We decided that maybe all that praying was informing those things she was doing, what she considered “real action.” It was real action all right, but action that followed prayer – it came out of that prayer, it was a result of that prayer.

I think she was getting it. She was getting it right. She was getting her priorities in order by asking God directly for help in her life. By wrestling with an issue with God on her side. By telling God, “I’m going to work on this, but I can’t do all the heavy lifting by myself.” She was getting it right.

I sometimes get it right, but not nearly often enough. My friend won’t always get it right. You won’t always get it right.

When we fail, we’re probably trying to do it all alone. When we get it right, we’re asking someone else to help take up that load– asking Jesus to walk beside us, to be in conversation with us, to remind us that we are not alone.

When the sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother James, and Salome brought spices, so that they might go and anoint the body of Jesus.

I’m gratified to see from Scripture that one Mary or the other had not sighed, rolled her eyes and said, “Don’t worry, I guess I’ll just take care of it myself.” They were together

As they walked on that morning toward the tomb, they began wondering aloud, “Who will roll away the stone for us from the entrance to the tomb?”

That strikes me as important. Maybe it’s just a throwaway line, meant to set up the reader for the coming surprise. But I’m struck by what they say: “Who will roll away the stone for us?”

This is something important, don’t you think? It’s a bit like heading off to the cemetery with the casket and saying, “Hmm, I wonder who will dig the grave for us?” This is a major effort, not something these three women could handle themselves. Perhaps in their grief, they simply didn’t think of such details.

Have you ever seen a picture of an ancient Middle Eastern tomb and the stone that would cover the entrance? One method was to cut a large stone wheel– taller than a man– and position it so that when you pulled out the block, it would easily roll down across the entrance. Moving it again– well, that was easier said than done.

But on they went, Salome and the two Marys; on they went to the tomb, assured that it would work out.

I don’t know if they prayed on it. I do know that in the time after the crucifixion, they would have been in prayer. Prayer for understanding of what had happened to their beloved friend. Prayer for the power to make it through this horrible time of grief. And prayer that they would– somehow, someday – be reunited with Jesus.

All I know is that St. Mark the Evangelist tells us that these women did not make this particular problem a stumbling block. He says they knew what needed to be done, would do it together, and then– if there were any problems, such as that large stone, they would seek help.

They would not do all the heavy lifting themselves. To their surprise, and perhaps in response to their prayer, the stone had been rolled away. Had it been rolled away by the young man in the white robe? By Jesus himself?

It didn’t matter. Not really.

The stone had been rolled away. The heavy lifting had been done. Jesus was there once again, to walk and talk with them, to guide them on their way. To continue their conversation – now face to face, tomorrow in glory.

A conversation in prayer. Prayer that will help to lift our burdens today, and tomorrow, to lift us up to see him face-to-face in glory.


Amen.