The Reverend Ronald J. Kolanowski
April 19, 2009
The Second Sunday of Easter, Year B

Today is called Low Sunday.  It’s also the Sunday we hear of the disciple who wasn’t present when Jesus first appeared on Easter Sunday.  It’s the week we hear of Thomas, who gets the label doubting associated with him throughout the ages.

We’ve heard this gospel so many times we practically know the dialogue by heart.  It’s unlikely, dare I say doubtful (pun intended), that I can shed any new light on the gospel.  I’ll simply share with you what strikes me from our text. 

There are two resurrection stories today.  The first is Easter Sunday, when Jesus appears to the disciples.  The second is a week later when they are gathered again. 

It was the custom of Jesus and his followers to gather on the first day of the week.  Both stories of Jesus’ appearances take place during their usual Sunday gatherings. 

The disciples gather behind locked doors out of fear for their lives.  They had just witnessed the horrific death of their leader and feared that those who put Jesus to death would do the same to them.  Jesus appears in their midst and offers the usual cultural greeting used to this day throughout the Middle Eastern and Islamic world:  Peace be upon you.  Thomas, who is missing, assumes the disciples have had some kind of hallucination.  A week later the group has their usual gathering again; this time Thomas is with them.  Jesus is in their midst and greets them:  Shalam.

Thomas’ uncertainty from the report of the first appearance a week earlier is turned into one of the most direct confessions of faith in all of scripture.  Upon seeing Jesus, Thomas exclaims, “My Lord and my God.”  It is the only time where Jesus is called God without qualification.

The most striking thing for me this morning is that Jesus appears each time within the assembled community.  Jesus doesn’t appear to Thomas alone.  He also doesn’t appear to Thomas in the group to embarrass him for his unbelief.  He doesn’t judge him.  Appearing to the group is central to the resurrection account.  Jesus appears to the group because it is within the group that they could continue learning about him, support each other, and be effective witnesses to the life of faith Jesus offers them.

In the final verses of today’s gospel passage, Jesus tells the disciples that many would come after them who would not have the same experience that they did.  No one would again walk and talk with him as the disciples had; and yet, these others would also come to believe.  Even the writer of this gospel says that the things about Jesus were written so that others may come to believe in Jesus as the Messiah and through believing have life in his name.

So, in one sense, Jesus was offering Thomas a chance to experience seeing him risen the same way the other disciples had.  In doing that, Jesus also further strengthened the faith of that particular gathered community.

In another sense, Jesus is strengthening us all.  We, too, are a gathered community – getting together at the beginning of the week in very much the same way the apostles did.  They gathered to share their real life experience of knowing Jesus and working with him.

The apostles remembered Jesus’ saying, “Do this in remembrance of me.”  We gather to share in that story.  For us, it is a remembrance of the story handed down to us, but unlike many of our family stories, this is not just a remembrance – we continue to share in the presence of Jesus through the Eucharist.  How that happens is a mystery, but in that mystery lies the powerful sense of belonging that draws us back here each week. 

We come here week after week with faith, but also with questions and doubts.  For some of us the current economy makes us question whether we’ll keep our jobs; for some of us who have lost jobs, we begin to doubt ourselves and our abilities, doubts that question our self-worth.  For some facing illness or aging we bring doubts about the future and what it holds for us.  And we keep coming with faith and doubt.  We come to break and share the bread and the cup that we might be nourished and strengthened, to confront our doubts and face the reality of our lives.

As Susan Metz of the School of Theology at Sewanee observed, “This image of the community gathered in prayer for strength and to keep the story alive is a very important one for all of us in the church today.  On Easter, in churches all over the world, the paschal candle was held high and brought into dark churches.  ‘The Light of Christ!’ and then ‘Thanks be to God!’ was sung by thousands of congregations of several different traditions.” 

It is this hope that resurrection is true not only for Jesus, but for us as well.  It is doubtful that if resurrection were not true for us that the community would have been gathering for over 2000 years.  If the story did not apply to us, Jesus’ resurrection would have been a nice story from the annals of history and no more.

But we, people of doubt and faith, gather again and again on the first day of the week in the hope that the story of Jesus is true for us, and that one day we shall come face to face with the risen Jesus and exclaim as Thomas did, “My Lord and My God.”  Amen.

Copyright © 2009 by The Reverend Ronald J. Kolanowski