“Fear”
John 20:19-31
Our Gospel Lesson this morning begins on the evening of Easter.
The doors are shut; they are “locked for fear of the Jewish leaders.”
And this is understandable.
The disciples were, after-all, followers of this Man who the Jewish leaders hated—hated enough for them to talk the Roman authorities into killing in the most horrible of ways
The disciples were guilty by association.
Jesus was a radical leader Who had been challenging the status quo and reinterpreting everything that people believed.
He had been a major threat.
And if He was a threat, what about His followers who, it now seemed, had somehow stolen His body.
The religious leaders had placed guards at the tomb and sealed the tomb up real tight, so that this exact kind of thing wouldn’t happen.
But it did happen!!!
And now, the disciples would be to blame for the missing corpse.
They may, very well, at this point, have become the MOST WANTED in Jerusalem—the next ones in line for Roman Crosses.
Can you imagine the fear?
Fear is one of our most powerful emotions.
Fear shuts all sorts of doors in our lives.
Think of the things people miss out on due to fear.
As youngsters we may fear joining sports teams because we are afraid of failure or performing in front of others.
We may avoid parties and social gatherings due to social anxiety.
Think of all the possible friendships people miss out on due to fear.
Or the successes career-wise…
…or in making a positive difference in this world.
Or what about the fear of public speaking?
What doors do we sometimes allow fear to close?
Fear of flying is a common fear and fear of heights.
What fears do you have?
Do you have any fears that stunt your ability to live your best life?
Fear shuts all kinds of doors in our lives.
It can shut the door to anyone who is “other” because it sees them as a threat more than a friend.
Fear can cause us to live in a mode of fight or flight rather than the deeper experiences of faith, hope and love.
Fear can also cause us to react to what we fear rather than reflect the One we worship.
At its most basic level fear is being turned inward on self.
It comes from our survival instinct.
Our self-preservation mode.
When we are afraid, we are usually worried about me, myself and I.
And when we live in a state of constant fear, our brains can actually become re-wired so that everything looks like a threat.
Fear had the disciples behind locked doors, and fear can keep us behind locked doors as well.
But that’s not living—not really.
Despite the locked doors the disciples were hiding behind, despite the walls Jesus came and stood among them.
And He said to them, “Peace be with you!”
“Peace be with you”???
What does Jesus mean by this?
He has already shown that He has no intention of blasting the disciples’ enemies off the face of the earth.
So, where’s the peace?
He even shows them His hands—where He was nailed to the Cross and His side—where the soldiers cut a hole with a spear.
But maybe that is the point.
Think about it: The scariest possible things anyone could ever dream up have happened to Jesus.
He was humiliated.
He was rejected.
He was sentenced to death.
He was beaten up.
He was laughed at.
He was talked about.
He was called a criminal.
He was arrested.
He was stripped and nailed to a Cross for all to see.
And He died the most painful and agonizing death possible.
And you know what?
In showing His wounds to the disciples Jesus is showing them that the worst that the world can do to someone…
…All the things we fear the most—cannot overcome and defeat Him.
Jesus has beat them all.
And so, what remains to be feared?
We are told that after Jesus said, “Peace be with you!”, and after He “showed them his hands and side…The disciples were overjoyed.”
And then, He said again, “Peace be with you.”
But this time, He added something else: “As the Father has sent me, I am sending you.”
Wait a minute!
That doesn’t sound like a peaceful command to me?
He is telling the disciples that He is sending them on the same mission that got Him killed!
Where is the peace in this?
And so, we find that the peace Jesus is talking about has little or nothing to do with the absence of conflict…
…with the absence of the things we humans fear the most.
Jesus isn’t telling them they are going to be rich or that they will now be living a life of ease.
They aren’t going to be immersed in tranquility and everyone is not going to be their side.
After-all, the Father didn’t send Jesus into the world to keep the status quo.
Instead, Jesus’ peace takes chances.
It stirs things up.
It makes people angry.
It lives life on the edge.
It invites into its life the outcasts and the marginalized, and turns upside down the ways of the world—seeing the last as first and the first as last, the blessed as cursed, and the rich as poor.
Jesus’ peace welcomes and includes people of different races and religions—folks who would normally hate one another—to, instead, love one another with action such as what takes place in the Parable of the Good Samaritan.
It means that the supposedly good and upstanding are not embarrassed to hang out with the hated, the lowly, the despised, the debased, the rejected, the isolated, the freaks….
…and therefore, the normal definition of “good and upstanding” goes right out the window!!!
Everyone is invited in.
Everyone is loved.
Every fear is faced and overcome!!!
It is the peace of living within the inbreaking of the Kingdom of God while still on this earth.
What did Jesus promise these very same disciples back in John Chapter 14?
“Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you.
I do not give to you as the world gives.
Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.”
Oh, there is that fear thing again…
…except instead of “being afraid” and locked behind those horrible doors of fear…
…Jesus flings the doors wide open and enables us to overcome and face the fears that have plagued us, held us back and held us down.
And how does He do this?
He does the same thing He did for the disciples on that very first Easter evening: “he breathed on them and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit.”
You see, by ourselves, we humans are not capable of following Jesus and doing the things He did.
The power of sin is simply too great.
The power of fear is too much for us.
By ourselves, we want to fit in, we want to maintain our social status, we want to keep our privilege and good names—all of which are threatened by Jesus’ kind of Peacemaking.
It’s not easy to be a peacemaker in a world marked by war, racism, sexism, fear and hatred of the other.
But what did Jesus say in Matthew 5 during the Sermon on the Mount?
He said, “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God.”
And that is what we are when we receive Christ’s Holy Spirit and decide to follow Him.
We are Children of God.
And Children of God are in the world, but not of the world.
Children of God are merciful, meek, they hunger and thirst for what is right, they are pure in heart, and they are persecuted because of righteousness.
But they also are filled with Peace.
God’s peace.
The peace which transcends all understanding…
…the peace which guards our hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.
Now all of Jesus’ disciples weren’t there that first Easter evening when He came and stood among them.
Thomas, was, for some reason somewhere else.
Perhaps he was out checking Jesus’ tomb to make sure it was empty, just as Peter and the other disciple had done that morning.
We don’t know.
But Thomas, teaches us an excellent lesson in this passage.
He teaches us that Christianity is something that we must experience for ourselves.
Do you think the other disciples told Thomas over and over and over again what had happened when he wasn’t there?
You better believe it.
“We have seen the Lord!” they told him.
But did that make him a believer?
No.
He had to see it; experience it for himself—just like all of us must experience Christ for ourselves in order to be changed, converted, saved.
And so, just like Jesus came back for Thomas, Jesus comes back for us—each and every one of us as well.
For it is by the grace of Jesus Christ that we are saved.
Jesus comes to us offering us the free gift of faith.
“Unless I see the nail marks in his hands and put my finger where the nails were, and put my hand into his side, I will not believe,” Thomas says as he takes his stand.
At least he was being honest.
And sure enough, a week later “the disciples were in the house again, and Thomas was with them.”
And, “Jesus came and stood among them and said, ‘Peace be with you!”
The same way He greeted the others.
Then He said to Thomas, knowing what Thomas needed in order to believe, “Put your finger here, see my hands.
Reach out you hand and put it into my side.
Stop doubting and believe.”
And in one of the most remarkable professions of faith in the Bible Thomas exclaims: “My Lord and my God!”
It’s a profession of Jesus’ deity.
This very same man that Thomas had been following for all this time was indeed God!
Thomas sees it now more clearly than he has ever seen anything before.
Thomas Merton tells us that: “It is not enough to believe in the Resurrection, we must participate in it.”
And that is what happens to Thomas.
And that is what happens to everyone who is born of God!
The Resurrection changes the entire ballgame.
Suddenly, life has new meaning.
We experience grace in such a way that it is indescribable.
We are cleansed of our sins.
And, we are prepared, if we make the decision to do so, to face this world unafraid…
…to face what we once feared with peace and joy, even.
And this is the thing…
…And I’ve still got a long way to go on this front, but I think I may be moving in the right direction…
…those of us who call ourselves disciples of Jesus must be willing to commit ourselves to Jesus’ kind of peace-making, something that can be just as challenging today as it was 2,000 years ago.
The radical vision of the Kingdom of God is no less threatening to society—and even to the religious establishment today than it was in Jesus’ time.
And those who work for the inclusion of the ostracized, the love of enemies, and justice for the oppressed should be prepared for rejection and harassment.
Deitrich Bonhoeffer put it bluntly: “When Christ calls a person, he bids that person to come and die.”
But in doing so, He is calling us to come and live Resurrected Lives with Christ in the Kingdom in the here and now and on into eternity.
Are you living behind any locked doors of fear?
Is anything keeping you from living and being the person you know God is calling you to be?
If so, the living Christ comes to all of us, unhindered by our fears, unblocked by our defenses.
If a shut tomb can’t hold Jesus in, a shut life can’t either.
If you haven’t done so, won’t you allow God to show you His hands and His side?
Won’t you listen as He proclaims: “Peace be with you!”?
Won’t you go where He sends you after He breaths upon you the Holy Spirit?
What have you got to lose, other than your fear?
