Place, Peace, And Presence Matter

Let’s start at an obvious place for the week after Easter. The baskets are empty, the colored grass has been vacuumed up. Beautiful cards have been put away. Nice clothes are back in the closet. All that is left are a few jelly beans that no one wants to trust. Easter is over … or, is it? On Monday, when students returned to school, one little guy, a fourth grader, had a dark, nasty bruise on his arm that was hard to miss. His teacher asked, with a measure of concern, “How did you bruise your arm?” He answered matter-of-factly, “I ate some Easter candy.” Not quite believing the simple answer, she pressed, “Eating Easter candy will not give you a bruise.” He replied without missing a beat, “It will if it’s your big brother’s chocolate rabbit!”

So much for chocolate bunnies and empty Easter baskets. Today we want the meaning of Jesus’ resurrection to continue and never stop. To do that, we want to discuss three components to Jesus’ appearance to the disciples that can be helpful to us as we continue our journey of faith. They are place, peace, and presence.

(1) Among the many details of the Easter story are some that are simple – easy to miss. One of them is place – the place where Jesus chose to meet His disciples after He rose to life. He met them, not in a grand sanctuary or palace, not in their homes, not by the Sea of Galilee, not in the Garden of Gethsemane, but in a locked room that was hidden from most people. Why there? Precisely because it was the place the disciples were huddled together in fear. They had witnessed Jesus’ agonizing death, and, no doubt, feared that something similar could happen to them. To quiet and reassure them, Jesus went to them where they were.

Take heart because He does the same for us - He meets us where we are – wherever that may be. Certainly here in a beautiful sanctuary, but also in hectic places of work, in sterile hospital settings, in dark rooms in the middle of the night, in noisy classrooms. Wherever we are, because He loves us with an everlasting love, God comes to meet us.

(2) The place where Jesus meets us matters, not because of its beauty or simplicity, but because wherever it is, it is the place He comes to give us peace. True peace – peace of heart to quiet fears, peace of mind to still doubts, peace when there is turbulence in our families and marriages, peace when jobs are tenuous and health is fragile. When you do a dictionary search for the opposite of peace, you find words that are tinged by the effects of sin: discord, trouble, conflict, war, fighting, upheaval, anxiety, worry – life much as we know and sometimes live.

To quiet the disciples – and us - Jesus reassured them, “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives.” What does His peace look like? What does it feel like? Try this. Two artists were commissioned by a benefactor to paint a portrait of peace – true peace. They went their separate ways and set about to illustrate the meaning of peace. When it was time to show their work, the first artist unveiled a canvas depicting a carefree boy sitting in a rowboat on a placid lake without a ripple to disturb the surface. The sky was blue, the flowers bright, the clouds white and fluffing, a dog sleepy quietly on the shore. Everything looked serene. It was quite good. Then, when the other artist unveiled her work, it illustrated a black sky with ominous clouds, howling winds, driving rain, blowing leaves, bent over flowers, a torrent of rain. But, as you looked closer, you could see in the crevasse of an oak tree, that a bird had built its nest there, and, in spite of the turbulence around her, the mother bird sat peacefully brooding her eggs. Here she was safe from her predatory enemies, shielded and protected from the raging storm. Even more than the first, it was peace – like the days after Easter in a locked room with fearful disciples. God with us, no matter what.

(3) Place and peace matter; and, so does presence – our presence. Because ten of the disciples were present in the locked room, they experienced Jesus’ calming presence and heard His calming words of peace. But, ten disciples are not twelve disciples. Who was missing? Judas and Thomas.

At about this same time Judas felt pangs of guilt for betraying Jesus and he went to the Chief Priests to return the thirty pieces of silver. Matthew tells us in his Gospel: “Judas was seized with remorse and returned the thirty pieces of silver to the chief priest. He confessed, “I have sinned in betraying innocent blood.” But, the chief priest said, “What is that to us? That’s your responsibility.” So, Judas threw the money into the temple and left. Then he went away and hanged himself.”