Luke 24:36-48
Easter lasts for 50 days for Christians.
- Most of the culture thinks it is over when we have vacuumed up the long thin ribbons of green plastic Easter basket grass from the floor.
- But long after the kids return to school following their “Easter Break” the church is still celebrating Easter.
The Lord be with you.
And also with you.
Our Gospel reading for today finds the disciples gathered together three days after Jesus died.
- All they knew was that their friend and teacher and Lord were dead.
- And in the face of loss…they were scared…and they were doubting.
- And this is understandable.
- And it was here that Jesus suddenly stood among them.
- And in their fear and disbelief he does not judge them.
- He does not rebuke them.
- He does not try and convince them of the truth.
- He just offers himself.
- See my hands…touch my feet.
- I am here. Do not be afraid.
- Let’s eat some broiled fish.
Today Jesus makes it clear to the disciples that you cannot know him at a distance.
- You cannot know Jesus through idealizing him as being otherworldly.
- Because the Jesus we read about today turns to his disciples and asks them:
- “So…do you have anything to eat?”
This reading is teaching us that if we get all transcendent and otherworldly…
- We may just miss Jesus all together because that’s him over there at the snack table.
- Jesus just stands there eating broiled fish with his bare hands…wounds and all.
Reading this story this week takes me back to when I was a student chaplain at the University of Minnesota Hospital.
- And how terrifying it was to think that I would be expected to come up with a satisfying answer to why a families loved one was on life support.
- A motionless woman in her 60s was on an operating table.
- A nurse was hooking up things while a doctor was putting on gloves.
- And I was thinking:
- Everyone seems to know what their job is but what am I doing here?
- The nurse looked at my badge and said:
- Your job is to enable us to be aware of God’s presence in the room while we do our jobs.
Well…it just didn’t seem like enough.
- Then later in the little family conference room with just enough space for four love seats.
- And as many boxes of tissue.
- I sat with the family in their loss.
- I stood by and witnessed the heart-wrenching emotional process we call grief.
- And I had no answers.
I brought them water…make some calls for them…kept asking the surgeons to give us more information.
- But words of wisdom I had none.
- But I soon learned that all I had to offer was my presence.
- A glass of cold water and a granola bar.
- Only later did I realize…that is just what Christianity is.
While talking to the family I found I just did not have much to say.
- And I had to fight the urge to say something.
- Even if it was trite.
- Just so I could feel like I had said something.
- OK…you hear a lot of things in hospitals and funeral homes.
- You know what I mean…like: God had a plan…we just don’t know what it is. Maybe God took your daughter because he needs another angel in heaven. When God closes a door…he opens a window.
These things are said because we simply cannot allow ourselves to entertain the finality and pain of death.
- So instead…what we say turns it into a Precious Moments greeting card.
- In moments of grief and loss we are afraid and doubting and we want answers just like the disciples did three days after Jesus died.
- But all anyone can really do is make some casseroles.
- And come over and sit with us.
And when that is all we have to offer it can feel like not enough.
- But the truth is…this is Christianity.
- Presence and stories and meals and defiantly believing that death is simply not the last word.
Reading today’s gospel we may look at it this way.
- Christianity is not spiritual…it is material.
- You cannot even get started without a loaf of bread some wine and a river…or a lake…or a pool…or a font of water.
Jesus comes to his followers…then and now…in our grief and loss and does not give answers.
- In our fear and disbelief…he does not judge…he does not rebuke…he does not try and convince us of the truth.
- He just offers himself.
- See my hands…touch my feet. I am here. Don’t be afraid. Let’s eat.
As the Body of Christ this is what we do for each other and for the world God loves so much.
- It is a witness to a God who promises to be with us.
- And in those prayers…we do not offer any answers.
- We just claim the promise as our own.
Jesus is made known when we gather and tell the story and share food at his table.
- And share food in the fellowship hall.
- It is common. It’s simple. And it really…really…is