John 24:35 - 48
I ran across an article recently which asked the question, “If you could be in heaven right now for an hour and visit with just one person, who would that be?” It’s a good question. I’m sure some people would name a favorite saint, and most would think about a parent or a loved one. But to pick out just one? What would be our standards? How could we choose?”
I gave myself that test. All of my relatives of my parent’s generation are there, hopefully. But I don’t feel a strong need to talk with Mom or Dad or Uncle Paul; I assume that if I get to heaven for real I’ll spend eternity talking or not talking with them, whatever makes us happy. I have a couple of cousins who have passed on. Same deal. As far as Saints are concerned, Ihave my favorites, but there again, what is the urgency? And then after a great deal of thought, I tentatively picked out one person -- my grandmother on my dad’s side. She and I were very close. She was the only daughter of a protestant Scottish coal miner and his fresh from Ireland catholic wife -- the product of a mixed marriage when that was almost unthinkable. Her four brothers went into the mines as well and like their dad, met early deaths from lung disease. Grandma put herself through nursing school at a time when that was only slightly more respectable than working in a dance hall. She married a real honest to goodness cowboy who eventually gave up alcohol for her -- only to take it up again the afternoon of her funeral. And she was an avid reader and seemed to have reasonable answers for every question I could ask when I was growing up.
I got a call during medical school that they didn’t expect her to live after she had undergone a cancer operation. I left my wife and our daughter and returned to Montana to spend a few hours at her bedside as she drifted in and out of consciousness. I said goodbye and returned to Stanford; she died a few days later. I didn’t go to the funeral.
Death doesn’t become real to any of us when we are kids or even young adults. There is a moment for each of us when we suddenly realize, deep in our bones, that we are mortal, that we are going to die, that we can’t do a thing about that. The death of my grandmother was that moment for me. The world had changed radically, and I’ve been preparing to die ever since. So I’d love to spend an hour with her -- it would definitely take the edge off of my fear of death.
That’s what happens in today’s gospel. Jesus takes the edge off of the fear of death that is in each of his apostles -- indeed in each human being who has gone through that life-changing moment when they realize they are mortal. And the only way this could have happened is if they were totally convinced that the person standing in front of them was the same one they had spent three years with, the same one that died on the cross. A ghost couldn’t do that -- you can hallucinate a ghost, and a ghost by definition is not the person it might represent. And the resurrection was not wishful thinking, or some other myth we could tell our unbelieving friends. Luke -- and the other gospel writers -- make clear that the tomb which had contained a dead body is now empty; and that Jesus had to tell Mary Magdalene to let go of him; and that he picked up bread and broke it in his two hands; and that he ate some fish because his body was hungry and could digest the fish; and that he bore the wounds of his crucifixion and dared Thomas to touch them. And in the last appearance recorded by John, he made breakfast for them. The apostles were convinced; they never looked back, even to the point of giving up their lives -- because Jesus had taken the edge off of the fear of death that was in them.
Do I still fear death? On some level, sure. I’m human. Even Jesus feared death, otherwise he wouldn’t be human. He begged his Father to let the cup pass from him. When we read that statement of his it seems so calm and resigned; but when you read the story carefully, he didn’t say it just once; he prayed intensely for a significant length of time -- long enough for the apostles to doze off twice.
And he invites you and I when he says, “Touch me and see, because a ghost does not have flesh and bones, as you can see I have.” The proof of the Resurrection, the real physical resurrection, is there in the pages of scripture and what came after, in the lives of the apostles and indeed over the next two thousand years. Some people who knew death had been conquered went to their own deaths cheerfully -- reluctantly, yes; aware of pain, sure -- but believing that if God could raise Jesus from death to life, and if Jesus promised the same for his followers, then he can certainly do that for you and I. The Resurrection is God’s promise that all that is a consequence of our sin and mortality will be made right; you and I and our loved ones will live again.
My faith needs the Resurrection. As Saint Paul said, “If Christ were not raised, then your faith is in vain, and you are still in your sins”. Without the Resurrection, we Christians are fools. And the world needs the Resurrection. And Jesus tells us in this gospel today, “You are witnesses of these things.” So pray that you will be a witness of these things by your own conviction that Jesus rose from the dead and lives even now.
