March 30, 2008

1 Peter 1:3-9; John 20:19-31
“A Church with Nothing to Offer”

A young couple with children decided to go to church on Easter, so they checked out the church ads in the newspaper and picked one that was having an egg hunt before the worship service.

At the worship, the pastor was talking to the children up front during Children’s Time about the eggs the children had found and the empty tomb and its importance to all of us. He held out a yellow, plastic egg and asked the children what they thought was in it. After opening the egg to show it was empty, he told the children because the tomb, like the egg, was empty we no longer are subject to the death of sin. He said, “We should all be happy today because we are free!

One little girl stood up with her hands on his hips and said. . . .

"Pastor John, I'm not free. I'm four."


Check out the church ads on the religion page of the Saturday’s Gazette and you find some impressive sounding places of worship – places like: Community Church, Echo Hill, Family Fellowship, Good Shepherd, Home Page, King of Kings, Living Hope, Living Water, Lovely Lane, River of Life, just to name a few. There are sleek graphics of crosses, doves, people holding hands, and combinations thereof. There are catch phrases like “One people, one place, one purpose” or “A welcomed alternative.” Many boast of their assets -- their accessibility, their friendliness, their preaching, their ministries, their parking, their family life centers, their child care or nurseries, and their classes and study groups. Some churches on these pages seem to have it all.

Other churches, however, appear by contrast to have little or nothing to offer - absolutely nothing. And those are just the churches who have put forth the effort to take out an ad. What about all the churches in Cedar Rapids who have not? Take, for example, the church described in our text today.

Here, we get our first look at the disciples gathered together after the resurrection, the first glimpse, in other words, of the church at its very beginning, and, all in all, it is not a very pretty picture. Near the end of his life, Jesus had carefully prepared his disciples to be a devoted and confident fellowship of faith.

They were to be a community of profound love with the gates wide open and the welcome mat always out, but here we find them barricaded in a house with the doors bolted shut.

They were to be the kind of people who walk boldly into the world, heads held high, to bear fruit in Jesus' name, a people full of the Holy Spirit performing even greater works than Jesus himself (John 14:12), but here we find them cowering in fear, hoping nobody will find out where they are before they get their excuses straight.

In short, we see here the church at its worst -- scared, disheartened and defensive. If this little sealed-off group of Christians were to place one of those cheery church ads in the Saturday newspaper, what could it possibly say? "The friendly church where all are welcome"? - hardly, unless one counts locked doors as a sign of hospitality. Maybe it could be called "The church with a warm heart and a bold mission"? I doubt if we would want to call them bold or warm of heart, at least not at that particular time. Actually they were more like the church with sweaty palms and a timid spirit.

Indeed, John's gospel gives us a snapshot of a church with nothing – no plan, no promise, no program, no lively youth ministry, no powerful preaching, no parking lot, nothing. In fact, when all is said and done, this terrified little band of disciples huddled in the corner of a room with a chair braced against the door has only one thing going for it: the risen Christ.

1 James says, “Because Jesus was raised from the dead, we've been given a brand-new life and have everything to live for, including a future in heaven—and the future starts now!” And in John 20:22 we read, “Then he took a deep breath and breathed into them. "Receive the Holy Spirit," Here was a group of believers with no life left in them – no breath to speak of – and Jesus became present among them and gave them his breath, his life.

And that seems to be the main point of this story. In the final analysis, this is a story about how the risen Christ pushed open the bolted door of a church with nothing, how the risen Christ enters the fearful sanctuary or assembly room of every church and fills it with his own life. It is about Jesus being present. It is about Jesus empowering these timid men and women to a life that is full and complete - a Christ filled life.

Theologian Karl Barth once said that the line from the Apostles Creed, "I believe in the holy catholic church" does not mean that we believe in the church. It means rather to believe that God is present and at work in the church, that "in this assembly, the work of the Holy Spirit takes place. ... We do not believe in the Church: but we do believe that in this congregation the work of the Holy Spirit becomes an event." So you see, if we were to leave that statement out of the creed, we would deny the work of the Holy Spirit in this place, and our being empowered to become the body of Christ in the world.

And this breath Jesus breathed on the disciples gave them a sense of peace they did not know before. An assurance they no longer needed to feel afraid. A confidence in themselves they could do it. A trust in God they would be all right, and the church they were to become would be all right. It’s as if this peace empowered them.

Harry N. Huxhold, in his book Which Way To Jesus?, writes about a new shalom – a new peace. He says, “When Jesus appeared to the disciples, his greeting was, "Peace be unto you." The Hebrew word shalom, for "peace," is a most comprehensive word, covering the full realm of relationships in daily life and expressing an ideal state of life. The word suggests the fullness of wellbeing and harmony untouched by ill fortune. The word as a blessing is a prayer for the best that God can give to enable a person to complete one's life with happiness and a natural death. If the concept of shalom became all too casual and light-hearted with no more significance than a passing greeting, Jesus came to give it new meaning. At Bethlehem God announced that peace would come through the gift of God's unique Son. The mission and ministry of our Lord made it quite clear that Jesus had come to introduce the rule of God and to order peace for the world.

What is it we have to offer those who are looking for a church home, if not peace? What is it we might become, if not a blessing to those who most need it? What is it we can show others, if not God’s great love for all of us and our love for each other?