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April 19th – Second Sunday of Easter (white)
Readings: Acts 4:32-35; Psalm 133; 1 John 1:1-2:2; John 20:19-31
With a man soon to celebrate his 50th wedding anniversary at the church’s marriage marathon, the minister asked Pete to take a few minutes and share some insight into how he managed to maintain his marriage with the same woman all these years. The husband replied to the audience, “Well, I treated her with respect, spent money on her, but mostly I took her traveling on special occasions.”
The minister inquired “Trips to where?”
“For our 25th anniversary, I took her to Beijing, China.”
The minister then said, “What a terrific example you are to all husbands, Pete. Please tell the audience what you’re going to do for your wife on your 50th anniversary. ”
Pete: “I’m going back to go get her.”
That’s one way to a healthy marriage! But I don’t know that I’d teach that method in my marriage prep classes! As all married persons can attest, marriages are hard. Come to think of it, every meaningful relationship we have can be tough. It seems as if there are so many factors that can make it hard to have healthy families today. One statistic I came across had the divorce rate in the Soo the highest in Canada at well over 50%. Divorces can have a ripple effect on families of course: they split the husband and wife but also bring added stress to the children involved, and extended families. Now we have many mixed families, folks coming to live in the same house bringing children with them from different marriages. New boyfriends are often times even called ‘dad’, perhaps the fourth or fifth ‘dad’ a child has known in their lifetime. It must be hard for these kids to grow up respecting a heavenly Father when there’s been a great deal of confusion about earthly fathers they’ve known.
I think we’re also more private then we used to be, especially in Canada. We value our own space, our privacy, our families. And other people can be this kind of threat to our existing relationships. Do you know your neighbors? Perhaps if you’ve lived in the same house for 20 years you will, but how long did it take to get to know them? I know I’m not the most outgoing person and haven’t been too intentional about getting to know my neighbors. My mother and I were talking about this the other day - about how people used to be more hospitable and welcoming. She told me about when she and my father were younger they attended a church in Mississauga where after every service a group of the young adults would meet up in restaurants or each other’s homes for fellowship. For them church wasn’t just a worship service, it was a community that extended beyond its walls. And we just don’t see that kind of community too much these days. When was the last time you invited a non-family member over for dinner? When was the last time you were invited into someone else’s home?
Family is truly very important, and sometimes family bonds need protection. I’ve really noticed how important family is to this church. Grandparents travel all day long for the chance to see their kids & grandkids – and they do this several times a year. Part of this speaks to the changing demographics we’re experiencing – employment and educational opportunities are quite minimal in towns like Sault Ste Marie so families are separated as children seek to make a life elsewhere. More folks are flocking to the cities, more folks are unemployed, and this creates stresses on the families.
Believe it or not, this situation was not all that different from the time of the Early Church. The world was changing. The influence of Greek culture first propagated by Alexander the Great melded with the unrivaled organization and vast reach of the Roman Empire to create a cultural force Israel had never seen. Greek language, philosophy, and morality threatened traditional Judaism while the Roman economy was driven by trade due to their vast roadways and technological advances. In short, the world was getting smaller, and all those living in the Roman Empire, including the Jews and early Christians, were often forced to seek opportunities in other areas of the Empire to support their families. “The new cosmopolitanism of the Greco-Roman world had resulted in a more mobile society, one in which individuals—both Jewish and Gentile—were often separated from the family and its protection.” The traditional Jewish family, where generations lived together and protected each other, was being torn apart.
So it ought to startle us, as it most likely did to observers living at the time, that the first Christians (many of whom were Jews), would extend their borders rather than close them. What I mean is, our tendency when times get tough is to spend less, give less, and we gradually become less and less hospitable, especially to non-family. Yet Acts tells us that “the whole group of those who believed were of one heart and soul, and no one claimed private ownership of any possessions…” (4:32). They sold what they had and distributed to those in their group who were in need. Can you imagine cashing in your kids’ college fund to cover a down payment for a house for the person sitting in the pew in front of you? Can you think of what it would be like when you can’t cover your grocery bill having someone from the church drop off a load of groceries on your front door? This was the kind of community the early church fostered.
What brought this about? Was it some new political ideology? Thinkers of the day had often commended giving to the poor; Plato himself has even been accused of being a communist for his vision of an egalitarian society. But this was different. The key, the author of Acts tells us, is that these actions were connected to the powerful preaching and miracles performed by the apostles: “With great power the apostles gave their testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus…” (4:33). The ‘testimony’ the disciples gave wasn’t just the words they spoke, it was their loving acts of compassion. Somehow fostering hospitality and community gave witness to the resurrection of Christ. Somehow Jesus, through the Spirit, was forming a new community to live in his grace and power.
“In Jesus Christ…there was now a new family: the church. It was to the fellowship of other Christians that the men and women of the resurrected Lord submitted their goods for the well-being of all, and it was to that fellowship that they looked for support in time of need…Societies may change, as may the structures of economics and finance, but the needs of people for support and strengthening do not change.” (Texts for Preaching)
Was this just an ideological movement? No, their identities were changed. They were ‘in Christ’, in ‘the light’ (1 John 1). They were resurrected with Christ – their lives took on new meaning, their allegiances are rearranged. So long as family is all there is we will never be moved to love beyond the natural – we will become trapped by circumstance, by our own needs to have family love and affirm us. In The Great Divorce CS Lewis tells the story of one man’s journey to heaven, to live in the ‘real world’ with his creator where the light was brighter than any he’d seen, the grass greener and firmer, and wonders untold awaited him. On his journey he encounters a mother who had lost her son. She had been so consumed with her son, and the memory of losing him, that she refused to wait to see him. She could not see the beauty of heaven or make the journey towards God. In her fury she couldn’t see that it was her own rage that separated them. Or as one Angel put it, “You’re treating God as only a means to [to your son].” She was a wounded, fearful person, whose virtue (love) became a vice when it kept her from the desire to know and love God more than her son.
Fear often finds its way into our relationships. Two married men were talking together after work. "So, how did you make out in that fight with your wife the other night?"
"She came crawling to me on her knees," the friend replied.
"That so?" asked the first man.
"Yes, I’ll never forget what she said to me."
"What was that?"
"Come out from under that bed, you coward.”
Joking aside, we know that fear cripples relationships. Fear that a husband doesn’t deserve his wife’s love eventually drives him away. Fear that one will not be able to feed one’s family pushes neighbors out the door. Fear over what will happen to us as we mourn the loss of a loved one separates us from the world and those within it who love and need us.
This was the disciples’ situation after Jesus’ crucifixion. Our gospel finds the disciples locked in a room, fearing that they would be next on the chopping block. Afraid of what to do next. Afraid of the future; regretting the past. One man once said, “Many of us crucify ourselves between two thieves - regret for the past and fear of the future.” I can relate to that. Like the disciples I have regrets about my past, particularly the ways in which I’ve hurt or betrayed the trust of those I love most. The disciples, all of them, betrayed Christ by denying him. They thought they were ready to follow in his footsteps. They were wrong. And now they didn’t know what the future was to hold for them.
In the midst of their grief and fear their resurrected Saviour appears. “Peace be with you.” Not believing their eyes, the disciples need Jesus to show them his scars, his wounds of love. Now they rejoice at the sight of their Lord! Jesus says again, “Peace be with you.” The disciples were experiencing the risen Christ.
“The Gospel reading shows Jesus now come unexpectedly into the company of the bewildered, fearful disciples. In that moment of fear, they are no community. They have lost every dimension of community— except their shared sense of fear, which is no basis for community. It is the intrusion of Jesus into their life that regathers and reconstitutes this community. Three times the newly alive Jesus says, “Peace.” It turns out that his word is not only greeting, but assurance, and in the end summons to a new life of “belief,” a life of faithful, obedient living.”(Texts for Preaching)
When we ‘share the peace’ we are giving each other an experience of the risen Christ, because the Spirit of Christ, the Spirit of the resurrection, dwells within each one of us. Jesus sent the disciples out, as he had been sent by the Father, to spread that peace, to build a new family on earth built on the foundation of Christ’s teaching, power, and death & resurrection. When we say “peace be with you” to someone, do we really mean it? Are we willing to be hospitable to those we greet, especially those gathered within these walls to whose spiritual family we belong?
Jesus’ resurrection heals community. Jesus’ life casts out fear. Our lives ought to do the same. My challenge to all of us here today is that when you hear the words “peace of Christ” being spoken by one greeting you, see the risen Christ in that person offering it to you. Recognize the love of God on their face. And as you offer peace to another, know you are offering Christ. And I challenge you to invite at least one person you exchange the peace with today over to your home, or out for a coffee, to build community with them. Let us extend our fellowship beyond the walls of this church so that our testimony, the testimony of the resurrection of Christ, would not be in word only, but also in our hospitality and loving deeds. Amen.
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