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  16/4/06 (Easter Day)  
  A New Beginning John 20:19-31

     

  You may have read something about the National Geographic discovery of the long lost "Gospel of Judas" in the last week or so. There's been a bit in the papers about it, discussing whether Judas was really a traitor or was in fact acting on Jesus' instructions. At first hearing it sounds like the usual story of a manuscript being found that in some way disputes the Biblical account of Jesus' death and resurrection, and there's certainly a bit of that in it. But the interesting thing in the whole discussion has been that no-one is questioning the historical account of Judas betraying Jesus, of Jesus being put to death by the Romans or even Jesus' resurrection.
  It's almost as if the historicity of the Easter events is being taken as a given, which would be a good thing, wouldn't it? Well, I'm sure that those who are here today would take it as a given anyway. The events of that first Easter Day are well attested to. The evidence for Jesus rising from the dead is sufficient to satisfy any trial jury in the land. Yet as we saw last week, just seeing the evidence isn't quite enough. We also need to experience the results of that resurrection event. It would be too easy to simply go through the motions of remembering that first Easter day without letting it impact on how we live and think and act. We could just sit down to our special Easter day dinner of roast lamb and potatoes, listen to the Messiah on the stereo and that'd be it. But this event requires more of us than that.
  When Jesus appears to his disciples hidden away in an upper room somewhere in Jerusalem, behind locked doors in case the secret police come looking for them, he knows that his resurrection still needs to be experienced in their lives as well as his. So he says 5 things to them. 5 things that will enable and empower and inspire them to begin their new life in the power of his resurrection. He stands among them and says:
  "Peace be with you"
  This might just have been a standard greeting. You know. If Jesus had been an Aussie he would have said "G'day!" But in this context there's more to it than that isn't there? In this context Jesus has just finished his great task which was to bring peace on earth among those whom God favours! Jesus' death on the cross means an end to the breakdown in the relationship we have with God. Jesus rising to new life is the means by which we can be drawn up with him to new life with God.
  The importance of this is shown by the fact that he repeats his greeting. Peace be with you! Peace in this context is a huge concept. It's not just the absence of war or conflict. It's much more positive than that. In the Jewish mind peace, or shalom meant completeness, well-being, harmony. It incorporates for example, the idea of living in a harmonious community with others who share our love for God. Listen to how the psalmist expresses it in Ps133: "How very good and pleasant it is when kindred live together in unity! 2It is like the precious oil on the head, running down upon the beard, on the beard of Aaron, running down over the collar of his robes. 3It is like the dew of Hermon, which falls on the mountains of Zion. For there the LORD ordained his blessing, life forevermore." Or Zech 8:12: "For there shall be a sowing of peace; the vine shall yield its fruit, the ground shall give its produce, and the skies shall give their dew; and I will cause the remnant of this people to possess all these things." It's an image of God's people living under his blessing, because their relationship with him has been restored. It's an image of his people living together with relationships unsullied by the taints of sin, by anger or vengeance or gossip or jealousy or factions or whatever might break down the community and as a result enjoying prosperity and comfort that's unheard of.
  Most of all the peace he speaks of is peace with God as a result of his saving work on the cross. Rom 5 begins "Therefore, since we are justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, 2through whom we have obtained access to this grace in which we stand; and we boast in our hope of sharing the glory of God." Jesus' death and resurrection makes it possible for unworthy sinners like us to enjoy the grace of God, to experience his glory forever. That's what Jesus means when he says "Peace be with you!"
  But still, that's not enough is it? Not only do we need to experience this peace for ourselves, but to make the peace of God complete, to fulfill the shalom in our experience we need to tell others about it. We need to build a community of faith. So Jesus says:
  "Go"
  "21Jesus said to them again, 'Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.'" There's a recurring theme in John's gospel. Jesus has been sent from the Father so he can choose others who will be sent out by him. He tells them what he's experienced at the Father's side so his disciples can pass that message on. And now he sends out his own disciples to do the same thing that the Father sent him to do. So what is that? What is it that John's gospel portrays as central to the work of Christ? Let's think about that for a moment.
  What does Jesus do, according to John's gospel? He comes into the world in perfect obedience to the Father's will. He comes as one of us in order to save us and in order to show us what the Father is like. He's set apart by God, filled with his Holy Spirit and lives in total obedience to God's will. So too, Christians, who have been taken out of the world, are now called to go back into the world, empowered by the Holy Spirit, as we'll see in a moment, to live lives of obedience so others will see what God expects of his people. He comes to save us, and we're called to bring that salvation to the world (again we'll see that in a moment) so that all who believe might have eternal life (3:16-17). We're to model new life as God's sons and daughters (1:12-13). We're to show what it means to be freed from slavery to sin because the Son has set us free (8:34-36).
  In other words, as we saw when we studied Acts a couple of years ago, we're to continue Jesus' work in the world. But if we're to do that we need God's power. So he says:
  "Receive the Holy Spirit"
  Jesus breathes on them as though he's breathing his own spirit into them. Remember last week, if you were here, how Spirit and wind or breath are all the same word in Greek and Hebrew. So this breathing is a symbolic action, pointing to the moment when the Spirit would be poured out on them. But let me suggest something else as well. Do you remember in the Gen 2 account of the creation of Adam, how God made the man from the dust of the ground and then "breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and the man became a living being." Given the way John begins his gospel with a clear reference to Genesis 1, there's every chance that here he's wanting us to think about Genesis 2. This is Jesus completing the work of bringing new birth to his disciples. We know of course that the Spirit wasn't poured out until Pentecost. John knew when he included this incident in his gospel that his readers would know the historical details of that event. But he puts it here because the giving of the Spirit is central to Jesus' commission to go as his ambassadors, as his envoys, to continue the work that the Father had sent him to do.
  They need to be filled with his Spirit in order to truly represent him; and in order to remain obedient, in order to understand what the Father desires, in order to proclaim with boldness a gospel that's foolishness to Greeks and a stumbling block to Jews. They need the Spirit's power if they're to preach a gospel that saves. This is the next thing he says.
  Forgiveness of sins
  "If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained." This is one of those passages that's caused great concern through the ages. Is Jesus giving the Apostles the right to adjudicate over people's right to forgiveness? There have been times in the church's history when that's exactly how this has been interpreted and when this power has been terribly misused. But in this context that's not what he's saying at all. What he's saying is that our task as Christians is to continue the saving work of Jesus in the world. In other words, our task is to bring the gospel of forgiveness to those who need to hear it. We're to proclaim it, live it out in our lives, model it so people hear its message clearly. The forgiving then comes about as God works in the person's heart. As the gospel is proclaimed, one of two things happens. Either they repent as they hear of the love of God shown in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, or else they choose to turn away from God's offer of forgiveness and are left where they started, with their sins weighing them down. John 3:19-21 expresses this beautifully: "This is the judgment, that the light has come into the world, and people loved darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil. 20For all who do evil hate the light and do not come to the light, so that their deeds may not be exposed. 21But those who do what is true come to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that their deeds have been done in God." When you preach the gospel clearly sins are forgiven or retained, not because you decide but because your hearers decide either to turn to God or away from him.
  But finally, Jesus adds to this commission to go out in his name by giving them a promise.
  Promise of Belief through the Apostles' testimony
  In fact he gives this promise to Thomas. Thomas missed the first appearance of Jesus but he was the sort who needed to see with his own eyes. Remember he was the one who had encouraged them to go to Jerusalem with Jesus, even if it meant they were likely to be killed along with him. But now he's a bit disillusioned. He'd obviously hoped for better and his hopes had been dashed. So he isn't going to get his hopes up again unless he can see Jesus face to face and actually touch him, put his hand in the hole in his side and in the nail holes in his hand. So Jesus comes again to satisfy Thomas' scepticism.
  But it's more than that, isn't it? By then the other disciples may have been beginning to wonder whether they'd imagined it as well. And they still needed the encouragement to get out and do what Jesus had commanded them. So Jesus comes and speaks to Thomas, but you can't help but think that he's speaking to all of them. "Do not doubt but believe."
  It's a normal human experience to have doubts isn't it? We worry about all sorts of things. Some trivial, some more important. I think it's really important to notice that Jesus doesn't rebuke Thomas so much as encourage him at this moment. He could have stood in front of him and said something like this: "Listen you whinger, get up off your backside and start doing what I told these others to do. What's the big idea doubting whether I'd come back to life. Of course I have!" But he doesn't say anything of the sort. He holds out his hand and says "Put your finger in here. Reach out and put your hand in my side." Only then does he encourage him to believe rather than doubting.
  And when Thomas responds with his amazing statement of faith: "My Lord and my God!" he gives him and the other disciples this great promise: "Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe." There are many who will believe even though they haven't had the opportunity of first hand experience like Thomas. How will they come to belief? Through the testimony of Thomas and the other disciples. Through the preaching of the gospel. By reading the things that are written here and coming to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God (v31).
  So this blessing on those who believe is also a promise to them and to us, that belief will come about if the gospel is proclaimed. Sins can and will be forgiven as people hear the gospel and respond to it.
  Over the next 4 weeks most of us are going to be using the Ephesus Code prayer journal, I hope. You may have already started before you came to church this morning. It follows the evolution or the life cycle of the church in Ephesus from the initial preaching of the gospel, to its growth as a Christian community, to maturity and finally to decline. I hope that one of the things that we'll learn from this time studying God's word in depth is the centrality of the call to proclaim Christ in all we do; that our praying might be shaped by the reality of Christ's death and resurrection on our behalf and that our desire at the end of it might be to see more and more people experience the peace that comes from knowing the forgiveness of God.
  Jesus risen life is meant to be lived out by us his disciples as we share with others the great news of his death and resurrection, of peace and forgiveness available to all. Let's pray that that might be the case.

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