News Flash Mailing April 28 Vol 81 Issue 4-4

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I am grateful for the ways that we are still able to “gather” during this strange season in the life of our church, our community, our country, and our world. I am grateful for the ways that we can worship together, pray together, and uphold one another, despite our present circumstances and hardships. I am praying for each of you. May you sense God’s strength and peace surrounding you this week. God Bless You, Pastor Kristin Sermon for Sunday <strong>April</strong> 26, 2020 Rev. Dr. Kristin Whitesides I. Two weeks ago we celebrated Easter. But it was a different sort of Easter celebration this year, stripped down to its most basic elements. There was no sanctuary to gather in. There were no lilies and the music we enjoyed and the hymns we sang were enjoyed and sung in our own separate homes. All we had was the simple refrain: “Christ is Risen! He is Risen Indeed.” Since then, we may have wondered if Easter has changed anything. Just like the first disciples, who heard the good news from Mary but continued to huddle behind locked doors in fear, we too are still quarantined and isolated in our own homes. And yet, as we see in our Gospel text for this morning, even if we feel as if we have missed Easter altogether, the Risen Lord comes to us, wherever we may be. II. You see, after Jesus’ crucifixion, the disciples were terrified. They could no longer pin all their hopes and dreams on a powerful Messiah that would put them in charge. They no longer knew what their purpose was. They didn’t know what to do next. And so they hid out, lonely, scared, and grieving, huddled together behind locked doors. But Jesus found them, even there. Pushing past all the things that they had constructed to keep themselves safe, the Resurrected Lord came to them and said, “Peace be with you!” And then, as they were filled with awe and wonder, Jesus showed them his hands and his side, the marks and wounds that now identified him but did not define him. He commissioned them to go out and share the good news: That the one they had loved and followed and seen die on a cross was alive again! That their Lord was moving and working and showing up, even to them, even behind their locked doors. And right as they began to try to wrap their minds around this impossibly good news and incredible commission, Jesus was gone. III. When Thomas returned to the locked up room, perhaps from sending out job applications or picking up some groceries, the disciples told him, “We have seen the Lord!” Thomas began looking around but did not see Jesus anywhere. And as he looked around, he could not tell that anything had really changed. His friends were still locked behind doors in fear. The windows were still boarded up. No one had left the house to share the good news. They had just waited for him to come to them so they could tell him. Jesus had miraculously appeared to them, given them the gift of his presence and his peace, commissioned them to share the good news of resurrection and new life. But they were still afraid. Maybe that is why Thomas wondered whether or not he could believe what they were saying. It seemed like just another idle tale to him. For it had not seemed to make any difference in the actual lives of his friends. So Thomas said quietly, “Unless I see the mark of the nail in his hands and put my finger in the mark of the nails and my hand in his side, I won’t believe.” 2
IV. It seems like a particularly gruesome thing to ask for doesn’t it? But after the trauma and terror of the crucifixion, perhaps Thomas needed, more than anything else, to see for himself that that Jesus also knew about those wounds. After all, in that moment, all Thomas knew for sure was that the world was a scary place, full of death and violence and bad news. And so, when Jesus appears again, this time to Thomas as well, the first thing that he shows Thomas are the nail wounds in his hands. The gaping wound in his side. And in doing so, Jesus shows Thomas that he understands the pain Thomas is going through too. He knows about hurt and about the wounds that don’t completely heal but mark you instead with scars that you will bear forever. He reminds Thomas that he too knows what it feels like to lose things that you love, people you love, a life that you love. Maybe today that is the kind of reassurance we need too. We don’t quite understand how people can see the risen Lord and then carry on with business as usual. And we don’t want the shiny exclamations of good news that don’t seem to take into account the scary reality we find ourselves in. So how do we too come to terms with Easter when there is still so much pain? V. In the movie ‘Shrek,’ an ogre named Shrek and his donkey friend are sent on a quest by the loathsome Lord Farquaad to rescue a princess from captivity. Though they don’t know it, the princess has been enchanted by a witch so that during the day she is a beautiful, human princess, but at night she changes into the gruesome form of an ogre. The witch’s curse says that only true love’s first kiss will release her from the enchantment and allow her to take on love’s truest form. Following the rescue of the princess from the highest room in the tallest tower, Shrek, the donkey, and Princess Fiona journey back to her intended groom, Lord Farquaard. And yet, as the journey unfolds, Shrek realizes that he has fallen in love with Fiona himself. So, on the day of the wedding, Shrek rushes into the ceremony to object to the union. His entrance stalls the proceedings long enough that the sun sets and the enchantment is revealed— Princess Fiona is an ogre! In the midst of the outrage that follows, Shrek and Fiona share true love’s first kiss and then she is released from the curse. Only, as it turns out, ‘love’s truest form’ is that of an ogre, that “seemingly ugly, terrible, undesirable form, and not the form of a human like Fiona had anticipated and hoped for. And yet, it is the form of an ogre that connects her most to the one she loves—it is the form that they share. As Kerri Clark has written, “It is not unimportant that the resurrected body of Jesus bears the scars of his suffering and death.” 1 But it is, perhaps, surprising. Maybe we would prefer a God who emerges victorious from the grave without any wounds or scars. And yet, Jesus instead takes on “love’s truest form”—the form he shares with us—when he appears after his resurrection. A form that is still wounded and human. For in doing so, Jesus shows us that the God we serve understands why we are the way we are. Believing and yet scared. Faithful but still needing reassurance. Sent and called but still hesitant and halting. VI. Jesus reminds Thomas, and us, that he understands the full gamut of emotions and experiences that we are grappling with in these days. And he has not left us alone to deal with any of it on our own. Instead, he has come to us, even behind our locked doors of fear. He has shown us that uncertainty can be hope’s next-door neighbor. He has revealed his own wounds and then asked us where we hurt. And this is love’s truest form—a God who put on flesh to dwell with us, who created us with bodies of all kinds and called us good, a God who shares our suffering so that we might share in resurrection. Gently and carefully, Jesus has told us that though the wounds “Footnotes” 1 This connection to the movie Shrek was first mentioned to me by Kerri Clark, the pastor at Trinity Lutheran Church in Connellsville, Pennsylvania in reference to her sermon “Love’s Truest Form.” 3
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News Flash Mailing April 28 Vol 81 Issue 4-4

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