Third Sunday of Easter 2024

 

Third Sunday of Easter

Lectionary readings: Acts 3.12-19 and Luke 24.36b-48

Why do we have this frankly improbable story? Well, the Church proclaims that, improbable though it may sound, Jesus was raised from the dead, and that his resurrection was bodily. But I don’t think that is why we have this story. That is why the world has this story, to know that Jesus has triumphed over the forces of death. But we—the Church—have this story to train us to meet the risen Jesus in our own lives, now.

In this story, of the risen Jesus appearing to his disciples, we learn several things.

We learn that our bodies matter: that we are not simply souls, temporarily residing in a body; but that body and soul belong together.

We learn that we meet Jesus in food: in the fellowship of eating together, in the people we eat with; not restricted to (but in a special way in) the bread and the wine of communion.

We learn that our thoughts and feelings and experiences and emotions matter. The disciples are startled, and experience terror, fear, rising doubt, joy, disbelief, and wonder, all smushed together. It is A Lot. The disciples in the upper room are like chrysalises inside protective cocoons, that life-stage between caterpillar and butterfly where the insect is being utterly undone and made anew.

Our thoughts and feelings, and our experiences and emotions, can lead us towards God and our neighbour, our fellow human beings. But they can be intense, confusing, painful; and we so often seek to deaden intensity, impose order on our confusion, and numb our pain. We may self-medicate with alcohol, or use our television as an avoidance strategy, or even inflict pain on others in doomed attempts to protect ourselves from pain. Such responses to our bodies cause us to move further away from God and others.

Jesus responds by speaking peace and proclaiming repentance and forgiveness of sins.

The peace Jesus speaks is wholeness. It is not the absence or repression of thoughts, feelings, experiences, and emotions, but their harmonious integration; the experience of life in all its fullness; our whole being—our souls and bodies—at home in its own skin, and secure in our connection to others.

Repentance is a change of mind, a turning towards the other, an alignment with God and others. And it goes hand-in-hand with forgiveness of sins, with addressing and dealing with the ways in which we have responded to our thoughts and feelings and experiences and emotions that have caused us to turn away from God and others, where we have colluded with the forces of death rather than participated in the life of the very Author of Life.

So how might we respond to this good news story today? I’d like to offer three options.

First, if you know that you need that peace that Jesus offers, you are invited to come to the front where I will anoint people with the oil of healing that was blessed at the Cathedral in Holy Week. You might come seeking healing of body or soul; for yourself, or on behalf of someone else. I won’t enquire as to why you come; I shall simply anoint your head and hands and ask Jesus to bring wholeness where it is needed.

Second, at the back of the church you will see a representation of the tree of life. And you will find many heart-shaped leaves, of different colours; most have different colours on their front and on their underside. The invitation here is to notice the thoughts and feelings our bodies bear today—there may be several—and to choose a colour that represents each feeling; and to add those leaves to the tree. For example, grief might be purple, like a bruise. Sadness might be silver. What colour is jealousy, or disappointment, or contentment, or joy? To clarify, the aim is not to add all the leaves to the tree, but to create a representation of who we, as the body of Christ, are today—and to recognise that Jesus comes to bring life however he finds us.

Third, if you are more cerebral, or perhaps less mobile, you might just want to sit where you are and pay attention to your thoughts and feelings and listen for whatever Jesus might want to say to you about them. For he comes to bring us life. He comes to empower us to love God with our whole being; and to have self-compassion and love for others (which go hand-in-hand, the extent of the former being the limit of the later). And his Spirit speaks to our spirit.

To summarise, come to the front for anointing; go to the back for leaves; and stay where you are for listening. You may, of course, do all three. You have ten minutes. Over to you.