It is a strange reversal, when you think about it. Jesus is out of the tomb, risen from the dead, on the loose in the world – and the disciples? Hiding behind locked doors, prisoners of fear. I imagine them in a dark, cramped room, with little air, little conversation. Nobody has remembered to get something to eat, but nobody really feels like eating anyway. I wonder how long they’ve been in there.
Mary has told them, “I have seen the Lord!” She has shared with them the words of the Risen One. But her Easter message clearly hasn’t connected. John doesn’t say they didn’t believe her or that they didn’t know what her words might mean. They just don’t show any signs of life. One of the stories about the apostles John didn’t write down, but one I like to visualize in my mind, is about Mary pulling her hair out in frustration: all she had were words, and her words were not enough to break the paralysis of fear and shame, not enough to let them hear what she had heard, and see what she had seen.
Then Jesus came and said, “Peace be with you.” The first word of the Risen One to the gathered disciples was peace. The last time they had been together, that night before he was crucified, he had told them, “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. I do not give as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled, and do not let them be afraid.”[1] And now Jesus stood among them and spoke peace into their troubled, fearful hearts. He showed them the wounds in his hands and his side, and his presence transformed the dark, tomb-like room into a wide-open space of joy and laughter. Jesus was once again the center of their lives, and their fear melted away.
“Peace be with you,” he said, not, “Shame on you, you sorry bunch.” He didn’t say, “OK, friends, we need to talk,” but, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.” In the blink of an eye, they began to know themselves as sent ones, and they began to remember the world, not as a frightening threat, but as the object of God’s love. Only moments ago, they had been little more than lifeless bodies in a tomb—now they were a community with a mission, sent by the Risen One.
In the book of Ezekiel, the prophet looks at a valley full of bones, and the Lord asks him, “Mortal, can these bones live?” And the Lord tells him to prophesy to these bones, to speak to the bones and say to them, “O dry bones, hear the word of the Lord. I will cause breath to enter you, and you shall live. I will put breath in you, and you shall live, and you shall know that I am the Lord.”[2] In Ezekiel’s vision, the bones represented the people of God in exile: lifeless, dry, dispirited and discouraged. I imagine Mary must have felt like she was talking to a pile of bones when her words couldn’t break through the pall of fear that lay on the other disciples. But now Jesus was in their midst and he breathed on them and they received new life. This small band of fearful men and women, held together solely by habit, shame and fear—now they were the church, commissioned and empowered by the living Christ, born into living hope. Can these bones live? We will see; the mission of Christ continues, with his disciples serving in his name, telling the story, forgiving sins, bearing fruit—until the peace of Christ fills earth and heaven.
Since the days of Mary and the other apostles, frightened disciples could be church because the Risen One keeps breaking in on us, breathing on the white bones of our lives, leading us out of our tombs, and entrusting us with gifts for ministry in Jesus’ name, for the life of the world.
The resurrection isn’t merely something that happened to Jesus two millennia ago, but rather something that began with him, something that continues with those who hear the word of life. It is the transformation of our old, tired world into the new creation. It is the breath that brings life to dry bones. It is the dew from heaven that renews the earth. It is the wind that blows our little boat to the future of fulfillment.
Thomas wasn’t there when Jesus came. That makes him one of us, one of the many who weren’t there that night. And all we have is what Thomas was given, the words of witnesses. “We have seen the Lord,” the other disciples said to him, but their words, much like Mary’s before, didn’t land, didn’t click, didn’t trigger an eruption of joy. He didn’t know whom or what they thought they had seen, what apparition might have fooled them. He needed to see for himself, and more than see. “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.” He needed to see, he needed to get close, he needed to touch. Thomas wanted proof—not some elegant argument about the general possibility of bodily resurrection, but tangible proof that this Risen One was indeed Jesus, the One who had died on the cross. He didn’t need more words, he had to see for himself, he needed to get close enough to touch the body.
A week later the disciples were again in the house, and Thomas was with them. I find that remarkable, because many people hesitate to express their need for something more tangible than words for fear of being labeled spiritually challenged, but Thomas didn’t hesitate—and he didn’t go home. When they came together, he was there with them—with his questions, with his doubts, his needs. According to this gem of a story, the community of disciples consists of those who have seen and those who have not—and no one is pushed out or forced in; they’re together.
And now the scene repeats itself, solely for Thomas’s sake, we suppose. Jesus comes and stands among them and says, for the third time now, “Peace be with you.” He turns to Thomas and, far from rebuking him for his stubborn insistence on something more tangible than words, says, “Put your finger here and see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it in my side. Do not doubt but believe.” And Thomas responds, “My Lord and my God.” In the Gospel of John, the one who doesn’t settle for repeating the words of others but holds on for his own experience of the Risen Christ, makes a confession of faith unlike any other in the gospels.
Many in the church have remembered Thomas as the doubter par excellence, and those in positions of power love bringing him up whenever uncomfortable questioners need to be quieted. I don’t think we should label him a doubter, though. To me, he’s one who insisted on resurrection faith rooted in experience, rather than the authority of an individual or a group. One who insisted that the risen Christ of our proclamation is still recognizable as the Crucified One.
The Gospel of John opens with exalted language,
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, and we have seen his glory.
Close to the end of the Gospel, it is Thomas who utters the final words spoken by a disciple, affirming the confession of Jesus as Lord, in the presence of Jesus, crucified and risen.
At the beginning of his ministry, Jesus calls his followers to come and see, and that call doesn’t change now that Jesus is present through the Holy Spirit. We are called to come and see. On Easter morning, the disciple whom Jesus loved came to the tomb and saw the linen wrappings; then he went inside, got a little closer, and he saw and believed. Mary Magdalene had seen angels at the tomb, but they had no comfort for her; then a stranger spoke her name, and she recognized Jesus and believed. The disciples believed when they saw the risen Jesus, and they rejoiced, “We have seen the Lord!” Thomas believed when he saw Jesus and heard him speak, and he moved from questioning the testimony of Mary and the other disciples to adding his own voice to theirs.
We weren’t there when the disciples huddled together in fear and confusion, and Jesus came and gave them peace, and Thomas wasn’t there either. And when the Lord came and stood among them a second time a week later, we suppose it was for Thomas’s sake, but not solely for his sake. “Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe,” Jesus said to Thomas, for all of us to hear. The blessing of life in fullness is not just for those who have seen what they saw, but for all who have come to believe what they believed: that in the life of Jesus, the life of God is revealed. We have not seen what the first disciples saw, but we have heard their witness. And we follow the call that comes to us through their word and the work of the Holy Spirit.
And we continue the mission of Jesus Christ, seeking to embody his peace and forgiveness, linking arms with any who work for justice and peace in God’s beloved world. We believe, not because we have seen, but because Jesus continues to break in on us, breathing on the white bones of our lives, leading us out of our tombs, and sending us. We believe in Jesus, because he so fiercely believes in us. And so we practice resurrection until the peace of Christ fills earth and heaven. And we add the testimony of our lives to the great cloud of witnesses, declaring what we have heard, what we have seen with our eyes, what we have looked at and touched with our hands, concerning the Word of life.[3]
[1] John 14:27
[2] Ezekiel 37:1-14
[3] 1 John 1:1