John 20:19-23
“What to Do After All the Eggs are Gone?”
By: Rev. Ken Sauer, Pastor of Grace UMC, Soddy Daisy, TN www.graceumcsd.org
When I was in college, I had a born again experience.
It was the most pivotal time of my life.
Nothing has been the same since.
I had been very caught up in the world when this occurred, but behold, all things had become new!!!
My biggest problem, though, was: “Now what do I do?”
One sunny day I was walking across campus, wondering and praying about this very thing, when I saw, on a bulletin board, a flyer which simply read: “Bible Study” and then it gave the time and the meeting place.
Boy, did this excite me, and I was there at the appointed time.
I became very involved with this new group of friends…
…it became the center piece of my activities.
We would meet every Wednesday afternoon by a statue on campus.
There we would have Bible study.
Every Tuesday afternoon we would set up a table outside the campus center with Christian tracts and invitations to come to the Bible study.
Then we would go out to the students on campus and witness to them.
I can still remember the hundreds of conversations I had with other young people about Jesus and the meaning of life.
I remember praying the “sinner’s prayer” with a number of people.
I remember, for the first time in my life, having other people who looked to me for help, healing and answers.
Those are fantastic memories.
I wouldn’t trade them for anything in the world!
In our Gospel Lesson for this morning we find ourselves with the disciples in the evening of the first Easter.
And although Mary Magdalene had seen the Lord, and had run to them with the glorious news about His Resurrection—they had not experienced this for themselves…
…so they didn’t know what to think; they didn’t know what to do.
In their minds, Jesus was gone—for good.
And they were terrified!
For three years they had dedicated their lives entirely to following Jesus.
He had been their Lord, their Mentor—the One they looked to for all of life’s answers…
…He was their leader Who had always told them “What to do next.”
What a lost band of people.
They had seen Jesus arrested.
They had seen what the ruling officials had done to Him.
They had seen Him die the most horrible of deaths.
So terror had become their master…and what a cruel master that is.
They were afraid that their turn to be crucified would come next.
So they huddled together in the Upper Room, behind closed doors, listening fearfully for every step on the stairs and for every knock at the door.
They sat there, shaking in their sandals…
…and as they sat there, Jesus was suddenly in their midst.
Wow!
People have often wondered why Jesus didn’t come through the door…knocking first.
Why didn’t Jesus use the stairs?
It is because our God is not a God of fear, but of peace, love and grace.
If Jesus had come up the stairs and knocked on the door, it would have scared the disciples to death!!!
So instead, He just came and “stood among them and said, ‘Peace by with you!’”
And this is what Jesus does for us as well.
Jesus doesn’t force His way into our lives.
He doesn’t come with threats.
He is with us always, filled with grace and love and peace.
God is not out to scare us…
…God is out to comfort and save us.
We are told that Jesus showed the disciples “his hands and side,” and that, “the disciples were overjoyed when they saw the Lord.”
And that is what happens to each one of us—when in the midst of our terror, we see that Jesus is with us, and we need not be afraid!
But then what?
What are we to do once we have experienced the transforming power of the Risen Christ in our lives?
We can’t stand around and do nothing.
And we certainly can’t go back to our old way of living.
Sure, we can try, but we will never be happy in it…once we have tasted for ourselves that the Lord is Good!
Our lives are never the same once we have met Jesus Christ, the Risen and Living Lord!!!
Jesus gives us the answer in our Gospel Lesson for this morning.
He says, “As the Father has sent me, I am sending you.’
And with that he breathed on them and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit.”
It’s interesting, the fact that Christ breathed on the disciples seems to imply that He could now communicate with them something of His own nature which before hand He had been unable to do.
Remember that during His earthly ministry, the disciples loved and followed Jesus, but they never really understood Him.
Why were they able to receive the Holy Spirit now and not earlier?
Could it be that before the crucifixion the disciples had been too self-assured, too confident, too in control?
But now, as they sat terrified behind locked doors, they were humbled, and made painfully aware of their shocking instability and insufficiency?
Could it be that in the valley, where they were stripped bare of all confidence, pride and control—they were at last willing and ready to receive what Christ could give them?
The disciples had been to the mountaintop with Jesus.
Remember, Jesus had picked them out of all the people in the world to be His first disciples.
That must have made them feel pretty good about themselves.
They had traveled with Jesus as the crowds had swelled to see and hear from Him.
They had seen Jesus heal people, restore sight, bring people back from the dead, feed thousands of people with only a couple of sardines and a little bread.
Life had been good.
And there is nothing wrong with that.
The mountaintops are amazing places to be…
…but, you know what?
So are the valleys.
For it is in the valleys that we are laid bare.
It is in the valleys of life that we see that we are not able to make it on our own.
It is in the valleys that we call out to Jesus the loudest and with the most urgency!
And it is in the valleys that we are most able to trust in, and allow Jesus to take control of the reigns.
So, let’s not have a pity party in the valleys of life…
…let’s be thankful to God for bringing us closer to God through our trials and tribulations!
Because by ourselves we truly can do nothing.
And to try with our own strength to have a peace-filled and worthwhile life is to be dogged by failure.
We must live in Christ, and draw our strength from Christ and Christ alone if we are going to live—really live!!!
You know, its amazing how Jesus Christ commissions the first disciples, making them real Christians—a term that really means “little Christs.”
Have you ever thought of yourself as a “little Christ”?
Pretty amazing is it not?
It’s amazing that God leaves it up to us to continue Christ’s ministry here on earth.
So, “little Christs” Jesus says to you and Jesus says to me: “As the Father has sent me, I am sending you.”
What an amazing calling!
There really is nothing more important, and no task greater in all the world!!!
YOU and I as the Church—as Paul tells us, we are “The Body of Christ.”
We are to be a mouth to speak for Jesus…
…we are to be feet to run His errands…
…we are to be hands to do His work!
And that means Jesus needs you and Jesus needs me!!!
Our community is filled with people who are ‘caught up in the world.’
They are troubled, unsettled and without peace.
And because to this, they turn to things which will cause them great harm—potentially ruin them.
But we have the answer!!!
We have met the Risen Christ.
We have a great task to perform.
It is a task that will take all of our will-power, all of our nerve, and a lot of sweat and hard work.
But there is no other task which is more worthwhile.
Our task is to be Jesus Christ to a lost and broken people.
We are to “Go” and tell the Good News to strangers, neighbors, family, friends.
We are to let them know that Jesus Christ is ALIVE.
We are to let them know that Jesus loves them, died to forgive them, and desires a relationship with them that has no strings attached!
Our mission in life is the same as the commission that Jesus gave the first disciples.
The people He had hand-picked!
How amazing is that?
Jesus has hand-picked you; Jesus has hand-picked me.
It doesn’t matter whether you are a doctor, lawyer or an Indian Chief—Jesus says to us: “As the Father has sent me, I am sending you.”
You know what that means, don’t you?
Jesus perfectly did His Father’s will.
He listened to God the Father, had such a close relationship with Him that He was able to say, “I and my Father are One.”
We are called to be “One with Christ, One with each other, and One in ministry to all the world until Christ comes in final victory and we feast at His heavenly banquet.”
We may be tempted to say, “Sure, that sounds like a fantastic idea, but it doesn’t work.”
Nonsense! It does work…when we receive the Holy Spirit and live into our calling.
We must put our total and 100% trust in Christ, just as Christ put His total and 100% trust into His Father’s hands.
Christ went to the Cross, because it was the Father’s will.
What are we willing to do for Jesus?
How about instead of just handing out invitations to our church, we start talking to people about Jesus?
How about we start ‘taking it to the streets’?
How about we pray for the opportunity to share with people about our salvation and personal relationship with Christ…in the line at the grocery store…
…on the golf course…
…at home…
…at school…
…at work…
…at the ballfields…
…on an airplane…
…wherever we find ourselves, let us be “little Christs” to a world who needs to hear the most important and life changing, life saving message there is!!!
May it be so.
Amen.
