The Way of the Wounded

John 20:19-31

When it was evening on that day, the first day of the week, and the doors on the house where the disciples had met were locked for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you.” After he said this he showed them his hands and his side. Then the disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord. Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.” When he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them. If you retain the sins of any, they are retained.”

But Thomas (who was called the Twin), one of the twelve, was not with them when Jesus came. So the other disciples told him, “We have seen the Lord.” But he said to them, “Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands, and put my fingers in the mark of the nails and my hand in his side, I will not believe.”

A week later, his disciples were again in the house, and Thomas was with them. Although the doors were shut, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you.” Then he said to Thomas, “Put your finger here and see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it in my side. Do not doubt, but believe.” Thomas answered him, “My Lord and my God!” Jesus said to him, “Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.”

Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in his book. But these are written so that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name.

---

This day when the story of Thomas comes up for us – a week after The Big Day of Easter’s celebration – is always so timely. I don’t want to rain on what is still supposed to be our Easter parade, but just look at what has happened since we last gathered – or what has not happened, as the case may be – death and its grief are still around. Loved ones are still sick. That war still rages. It snowed on Easter Monday and Netflix is probably going to start adding commercials, for crying out loud!

It’s no wonder so many still struggle to believe what we celebrated so beautifully and with so much joy, just a week ago.

If our faith is only – or mostly – or too precariously – wrapped up in the happy, happy, joy, joy stuff of Easter lilies, chocolate bunnies, and easy Alleluias, faith and belief can be a hard sell to anyone who’s paying attention to the world around them.

It’s why I love that Thomas wanted to see scars, wounds, clotted blood and bruises to know the story of Jesus was true.

I’m sure it drove the other disciples crazy that he wouldn’t take their word for it; that he demanded his own proof; that he wanted to see for himself; that he doubted. We know people like this, don’t we? Maybe we are – or have been – like those disciples … the ones who just want someone in our life to have the kind of faith we have, on our good days, anyway. Or maybe we are – or have been – like Thomas, who just doesn’t buy it, who asks hard questions no one can answer, who needs more proof or more evidence or more whatever.

And why would Thomas, why should he have believed the disciples, anyway? We all know they were a bunch of knuckleheads, really. Deserters … Deniers … Doubters just as seriously as Thomas was, himself. They’d fallen asleep on Jesus in the garden, remember. Peter had pretended not to know him. Time and time again, right along with Thomas, the other disciples mistook his teaching or misunderstood the prophets or missed the point altogether.

At the very moment we read about in this Gospel story, it seems like they were still hiding in that room for some reason. Why are you still locked up and hidden away a week after the Son of God has been raised from the dead and then showed up to tell you about it? What in the world were they still afraid of? I wouldn’t have believed them, either.

So I wondered this time around if Thomas’ doubts were about more than just the facts of the resurrection. Like I said, I like that Thomas wanted to see scars, wounds, clotted blood and bruises to know that the story of Jesus was true.

I wonder if his need for that particular kind of proof was more than just about forensic evidence. I mean, I kind of doubt that Thomas was counting the stripes or measuring the holes to see if they matched the size of the spikes they used on Friday, or that he was looking for specific type of splinter in the brow of Jesus.

What if he really wanted to know that the suffering was as real as the resurrection? What if he really wanted to confirm that this was the kind of God they were dealing with? What if he needed to see and touch and feel for himself – not just that Jesus had come back to life – but that the God of the universe had really gone to such lengths … had really suffered so mightily … had actually sacrificed and bled and died, as he said he would, for the sake of these people; and for the sake of the world; for Thomas, himself?

“Unless I put my fingers in the marks of the nails… and my hands in his sides, I won’t believe.” What I mean is, Thomas didn’t want to hear Jesus’ voice or ask him some questions. He wanted evidence of the suffering he’d endured. And that seems meaningful to me.

That, to me, is as hard to believe as any of this, honestly. That the God of the universe would suffer like that… that power is made perfect in weakness… that mercy is mighty, somehow… that sacrifice is the way, in this selfish world… that humility matters in a world of egos… that the last will be first and the first will be last in a world that convinces us to win at all costs.

“This is not how gods behave,” Thomas might have thought. This is not how the world works, we all know. This goes against the grain and against the way we’ve been trained to be in every other realm of our lives. So, I need to see it, to touch it, to feel the Truth of it before I’ll stake my life – let alone my intellectual assent – on it for one more moment.

“Unless I touch the wounds …” “Unless I see the marks …” “Unless I feel the fullness of what I’ve been told to believe… How can I buy it? How would I follow it? Why would I dare to live that way?” It makes no sense.

It makes me think of anyone we admire who has chosen to live selflessly and sacrificially for the sake of the world and others in it – and who has the wounds to prove it. Mahatma Gandhi who was assassinated for living a life of non-violent protest and resistance to colonialism and civil rights abuses in India. Dietrich Bonhoeffer who was martyred opposing the Nazis during World War II. Martin Luther King, Jr., who gave his life for the sake of civil rights in our own country. Mother Teresa who gave it all up to love orphans, care for lepers, feed the hungry, comfort the dying.

These are the extremes of course … the martyrs and the saints … but there are others, we know, closer to home.

Someone who is generous “to a fault” as they say, but who is also content in ways that are enviable;

Someone who has more than enough, not because they’re rich, but because they’ve decided for themselves what “enough” means for them;

Someone who is happy with themselves and their life in the world, even if they have some wounds to show for their faithfulness.

Don’t you know people like that? Don’t you know someone who has given up something for somebody else in a way that has changed their own life – or that someone else’s life – for the better, because they wanted to, not because they had to? Even when it was hard? Even if it hurt? Even if it left a wound or two behind?

I think of the foster parents… the missionaries… the kidney donors; I think of the single moms and dads… the grandparents who do more than their share… every volunteer who puts in more time than it seems they could possibly have… the tithers.

This is the good news and the holy challenge of an Easter faith. And it can be so hard to believe sometimes that, like Thomas, we have to see it, touch it, feel it to believe that God’s ways are different; that God’s love is counter-cultural; that God’s grace is unlimited; that sacrifice and generosity are, actually, the way; that death leads to life; that giving and loving, that living and dying – like Jesus did – and like we’re called to do – really can change the world.

Amen

Maundy Thursday - "Anatomy Eats"

John 13:1-17, 31-35

Now before the festival of the Passover, Jesus knew that his hour had come to depart from this world and go to the Father. Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end. The devil had already put it into the heart of Judas son of Simon Iscariot to betray him. And during supper Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands, and that he had come from God and was going to God, got up from the table, took off his outer robe, and tied a towel around himself. Then he poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples’ feet and to wipe them with the towel that was tied around him. He came to Simon Peter, who said to him, “Lord, are you going to wash my feet?” Jesus answered, “You do not know now what I am doing, but later you will understand.” Peter said to him, “You will never wash my feet.” Jesus answered, “Unless I wash you, you have no share with me.” Simon Peter said to him, “Lord, not my feet only but also my hands and my head!” Jesus said to him, “One who has bathed does not need to wash, except for the feet, but is entirely clean. And you are clean, though not all of you.” For he knew who was to betray him; for this reason he said, “Not all of you are clean.”

After he had washed their feet, had put on his robe, and had returned to the table, he said to them, “Do you know what I have done to you? You call me Teacher and Lord — and you are right, for that is what I am. So if I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet. For I have set you an example, that you also should do as I have done to you. Very truly, I tell you, servants are not greater than their master, nor are messengers greater than the one who sent them. If you know these things, you are blessed if you do them.

When he had gone out, Jesus said, “Now the Son of Man has been glorified, and God has been glorified in him. If God has been glorified in him, God will also glorify him in himself and will glorify him at once. Little children, I am with you only a little longer. You will look for me; and as I said to the Jews so now I say to you, ‘Where I am going, you cannot come.’ I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”

---

We’re going to get serious in a minute – and very serious in a little bit – but here’s a little something for the kids. It might actually be for anyone old enough to remember School House Rock, too.

That weird, cheesy little blast from the past came to mind when I learned about a doctor a few weeks ago named Jonathan Reisman. He’s written a new book called The Unseen Body. Each chapter is about a specific body part or body fluid (yeah.) and everything that particular body part, or body fluid, might have to tell us about ourselves, our health, our body, and its function or purpose. So, as you might imagine, there’s a chapter on the heart and the brain and the liver and the lungs, and so on. And, as you might not like to imagine, there are also chapters on blood, urine, and feces, too.

As part of his research and his lived experience as a doctor, really – as someone who found great respect and reverence for the human body on the very first day he started dissecting his cadaver in medical school – Doctor Reisman also credits his medical studies and career as a physician with turning him into a “foodie” of all things, someone with a fascination with and penchant for discovering more about fine food and drink.

He says that when he started learning about which muscles in the human body correspond to which cuts of beef he was eating, for instance, he wanted to know more about that. So, not only did he do some research by way of slaughterhouses and butchers, but that led him to start collaborating with a chef on a project they call “Anatomy Eats,” where they gather people for dinner and he and the chef teach, talk about, and explain to the guests what it is – exactly – that they’re eating.

Like, each dinner has a theme – the cardiovascular system, for instance – where they serve three species of heart, cooked in three different ways. And they serve things like blood cookies and blood sausage, too. (I know enough about blood sausage to know I want nothing to do with a blood cookie.) And as part of such a meal – before or during dinner, I’m not sure which – he dissects a heart for his dinner guests, showing them the arteries and the valves, how it all works, what makes it healthy what causes it disease, and so on. Bon appetit!

Now, despite the fact that I don’t eat mammals or birds, I have zero judgement about any of this, but this is not a dinner reservation I would make. I actually give Dr. Reisman and whoever dares to attend one of his “Anatomy Eats” dinner parties credit for wanting to know that much about what it is they’re eating.

And it all made me think about Jesus – his Last Supper – and what in the world those first disciples must have been thinking when he invited them over to celebrate the Passover meal … when he started breaking bread and pouring wine and then talking about eating his body and drinking his blood, for crying out loud, I wonder if they felt like they were at some First Century version of an “Anatomy Eats” dinner party.

And they were in a way … with the Great Physician, in Jesus, after all … who was teaching them about what it would mean to eat and to drink and to be fed, and nourished and filled up with the body and blood of the Lamb of God.

Now, Jesus didn’t dissect any lambs … blood sausages likely weren’t on the menu … but he did show them what his body came to do – its function and purpose, if you will. When he disrobed at dinner; when he wrapped that towel around his waist; when he got on his hands and knees to wash the feet of his friends, Jesus modeled for his followers what servanthood looked like – he embodied humility, meekness, generosity, grace. And he invited them to do likewise.

And he gave them more clues that night, too, about what his blood would accomplish. His was a new covenant of sacrifice, mercy, and forgiveness of sins. His was a cup of goodness to be shared with the whole wide world.

And it wasn’t anything like a science project, but Jesus revealed his heart to them, in the end. And he invited them to show theirs, too. “Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. By this [kind of love and mercy; this sort of sacrifice and servanthood] everyone will know that you are my disciples.” “… if you have [this kind of] love for one another the world will know we’re in this together.”

And that’s what I think this Maundy Thursday, this First Communion, this Last Supper, and this Greatest Commandment stuff is all about, for us. There’s so much symbolism, so much emotion, so much ritual and tradition surrounding what we’re here for tonight.

And I think it’s hard to wrap our heads and our hearts around it all, really. And it’s hard to swallow, as it were – the fullness of what this meal and this commandment mean for us. And I’m not talking about the “gross” factor in all of this. I’m talking about the “grace” factor, here:

That God would take on flesh, I mean, and take up a cross and give his life for the sake of the world – and ask us to do the same.

That God would stoop to serve humbly, give generously, suffer sacrificially – and ask us to do the same.

That God would love people so deeply, without condition, with no strings attached, without a return on the investment – and command us to do that, too.

So we eat, we drink, we remember, we give thanks, and we hope …

We hope that the saying is true … that you are what you eat, in some way … and that this meal fills us with the same deep love, the same wide forgiveness, the same faith that even though we die, we will live – connected, one to another, and bound together by the grace of God, in Jesus, crucified and risen for the sake of the world.

Amen