“The Resurrection: Christ Alive In Our Midst”

April 22, 2012

Luke 24: 36-48

Let’s begin with some trivia, the category being ‘Art and Culture.’ What 19th century French stockbroker turned Post-Expressionist painter, painted “The Yellow Christ,” was a roommate of Vincent Van Gogh, and said this: “I shut my eyes in order to see.” [Paul Gauguin] As in art, sometimes in things spiritual it may be necessary to close our eyes to the world and distractions around us so we might be open to God’s presence, the risen Christ in our midst. So, close your eyes and consider this: in your living this past week, where or when did you experience the risen Christ? What helped make Christ ‘real’ to you?

I can imagine the resurrection story from Luke today could be read or heard over and over again every year two weeks after Easter – and still not mean anything to someone or affect their lives in any real, significant way. It would be just a story from a long time ago. If that were the case for us, when it came to affecting our lives, nothing would ever really change. Perhaps that is because in our hearing, we remain only observers and never actually see ourselves in the story as the disciples.

Luke says the disciples were frightened, confused and full of questions. We are told that when they saw Jesus, they were bewildered or dumbfounded. They didn’t know what to think. I don’t know about you, but that could be me some days; I could easily be one of the disciples in that room, hiding behind locked doors. Because when it comes to God, sometimes I don’t understand, sometimes I have my doubts – even disbelief at times. In that room, the disciples’ minds and hearts needed help. Today, in this time and place, ours may as well.

How do we explain the resurrection? When going beyond a Bible dictionary or ‘cookie cutter’ definition, we may actually struggle with expressing our understanding in words. That is especially true if our understanding lacks clarity or contains contradictions still unresolved. But, all that is good, and even helpful. Parker Palmer, author, educator, and activist, who focuses on issues in spirituality and social action, among other things, points out that: “The moments when we meet and reckon with contradictions are turning points where we either enter or evade the mystery of God.”

Maybe like the disciples in the story, we still question and wonder what exactly happened. Suddenly, Jesus was right there, standing in front of them, offering them peace. He asks for food. He blesses them. And he commissions them to action. The disciples’ experience of his presence was, as Charles Cousar writes, "mysterious but real.” It wasn’t something they could have made up – he was there. He was really there with them. They just couldn’t explain how he got there.

Jesus was alive, yet to the disciples he is somehow different. He is not the same, not quite like he was before the crucifixion. He is not a ghost, an apparition, or a spirit. He can still eat solid food like them, but now his body can go through walls and locked doors. He is the same, yet not the same. In the face of this new reality, the disciples will be prepared for a new mission not just to the people of Israel but, to the entire world. They are not quite ready yet. They is something else they need, something more. They are in need of dramatic transformation. Their eyes need to be opened, as well as their hearts.

The combination of seeing Jesus, of being with him, and the sharing of the Word together, opened the disciples' hearts and minds. Whenever we shine the light of the gospel on our lives, perhaps our hearts and minds are similarly opened. And we, too, become people of hope. The resurrection is God's affirmation that we matter. God did and is doing something new in the resurrection of Jesus, and in a sense, God is doing something new each time we experience the risen Jesus. So, what then does all this mean to us? Will we be changed?

The resurrection story is a retelling of the disciples’ experience of the risen Jesus – something that still happens today, in many different ways. Some say that trying to make sense of it all can be easier in a community that shares our experience, our questions, and our call. The experience of the early disciples who touched Jesus, put their hands in his wounds and heard his voice, fed his hunger and received his blessing, is the same experience of Christians today who feed the hungry, break bread together, hunger for God's blessing, and respond to the call to turn their lives toward God once again.

Now, because of the resurrection, things can be different. And that is the good news! There can be new life. All the sorrow and shock that immobilizes and confuses us, as well as the disciples, disappears and sets us on a new path. Isn't that what repentance is? Isn't that what transformation feels like? Nothing ever is quite the same, including us. Oh, this change doesn’t happen completely and all at once. Instead, Cynthia Lindner writes, “it happens "by fits and starts, in hours of doubt and moments of exhilaration, with days of numbness and mourning punctuated by brief moments of holy presence and powerful certainty… (or at those times) resurrection may seem most unexpected.”

Barbara Brown Taylor's description of the embodied experience of Jesus was proof, she says, to the disciples that "he had gone through the danger and not around it." So much of our time and energy can be spent finding a way around things, rather than living through them. We don't want to experience pain, or even to come face to face with the suffering of other people. After all, what can we do? And yet, Taylor says, we bear hope for the world because of the commission Jesus gave the disciples and the whole church long ago, that we be the Body, and the Image, of the Risen Christ in the world today.

The resurrection story is about Jesus overcoming death, but it is also about the transformation of Jesus’ disciples, and a changing of their hearts and minds. The risen Christ entered their lives where they were at – jaded, critical, judgmental, and closed-off in heart and mind – and turned them around. Suddenly, for them, everything was different. The risen Christ can also enter our lives and turn them around, especially when we have become tired and weary and judgmental and closed-off in heart and mind. For us, everything can quickly change. The power of the resurrection, an experiencing of the risen Jesus, allows all of us to step out in faith whenever there is an opportunity to respond to a God who continues to save, send, and bless us today. May Jesus be real for us and may Christ be alive in our midst today and every day.