(Homily for Gayton Road Christian Church's Sunday Worship on Apr 3, 2016, Easter II)
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Security vs. Scars
Today’s story is really two stories: a story of the disciples and a story of Thomas. And in a way, the two stories are the same story. They are both stories that depict an inner conflict, a spiritual skirmish, an emotional encounter. In the one corner, security. In the other, scars. Security is the defending champion, what reigns in the hearts of the disciples and Thomas. The scars of Christ are the contender, what challenges the hearts of the disciples and Thomas.
The Disciples and the Security of Locked Doors
In the first story, we find the disciples huddled fearfully behind locked doors. They are afraid for their lives, frightened that the authorities who put Jesus to death will come after them next. They cut sympathetic figures because their survival instinct is natural. When the weather gets rough, we batten down the hatch. When conflict looms on the horizon, we circle the wagons, raise our fists, patrol the border.
The irony, of course, is that while security fears for its life, it actually forfeits life. In an effort to secure life, it suffocates it. What is life behind locked doors, life that knows nothing but the same, nothing but what already has been? It becomes like a snow globe, where however much you shake it, what is inside remains the same. It becomes like a rerun television show; however good the episode may be, it becomes boring, tedious, drained of the life that once made it interesting.
And so suddenly the resurrected Jesus, the Jesus who defies death—this Jesus defies the securely locked doors. He comes and stands among the disciples. And he proclaims not a message of security but a message of peace and scars. “Peace be with you,” he says, and he shows them his scars. “Peace be with you,” he says a second time, and then he challenges the security of their lock-up lifestyle: “As the Father sent me, so I send you.”
In our world, people mistake security for peace all the time. Our world thinks peace needs protecting, by weapons and walls and warnings. But Jesus leaves no room for this confusion. He shows them his scars, which are what true peace can get you in this world. And he tells them: Get out of this room and back into the world. “As the Father sent me, so I’m sending you.” I’m sending you as peacemakers into a world of violence, as lovers into a world that demands calculations and a bottom line, as dreamers into a world that fears the future.
Thomas and the Security of Certainty
In the next story, which is but a variation of the first, “same song—second verse,” we find that security is still wearing the title belt, that it has not yet yielded to the scars of Jesus. For one thing, it’s a week later, and the disciples are still behind closed doors. But more importantly, we find Thomas seeking the security of certainty. He doubts the news of the resurrected Jesus. Thomas cuts a sympathetic figure because his seeing-is-believing attitude, his scientific stance is natural. It is our attitude too. Why settle for curiosity and conjecture instead of certainty? Why trust in the truths of the heart instead of cold, hard facts?
The irony, of course, is that while certainty desires to secure life, to make life secure in the knowledge of something, it actually freezes life, frames it as a still-life never to move again. The certainty and security that Thomas so desires, is the kind that would substitute knowledge for experience. It’s the kind that trumpets, “Jesus lives!” without ever thinking to ask, “Does he live in me?”
And so suddenly the resurrected Jesus, the Jesus who defies death—this Jesus defies the freezing, fixing, finalizing certainty of Thomas. He proclaims instead a message of peace and scars. “Peace be with you,” he says, and he shows him his scars. Now the traditional interpretation is that Jesus is simply satisfying Thomas’ doubts and securing his belief. But I believe there is something deeper going on here. Indeed, Jesus says that it’s a blessed thing not to have seen, not to have certainty, and I think what he’s getting at is the idea that certainty can get in the way of the peace he proclaims.
In our world, people confuse certainty for peace all the time. Certainty, we say, gives us “peace of mind.” But Jesus leaves no room for confusion. Peace, his scarred hands and body say, is not certainty. If God were in the business of certainty, of establishing facts, then God would have sent down a host of angels and established the kingdom of God through force and any other means necessary. The scars say something different, that peace operates not in the certainty of its outcome but in uncertainty. Peace is the vulnerable way of love, a love that loves come-what-may.
Trust in These Scars
In both of today’s stories, Jesus introduces himself by doing the same two things: saying “Peace be with you” and showing his scars. It is difficult to escape the conclusion that these scars are a crucial part of the peace Christ proclaims. Resurrection does not erase the scars, as though they’re no longer necessary. And Jesus doesn’t hide them. Rather he bears them as an important witness to the radical way of peace. These scars, he seems to say, are how new life happens.
So what Jesus says to the disciples, what Jesus says to Thomas, is what Jesus says to us today: Don’t trust these securely locked doors. Don’t trust the certainty of what you can already see, what you can already touch. These things will only get you what you already have. Trust in my peace, as uncertain and insecure as it is, [1] as scarred as it is. Only in its powerless power will you find new life.
Make no mistake, the message of Christ is madness, or as Paul would later say, “foolishness.” To us, scars are a sign that the world is hurt, broken, messed-up. Indeed, in their heart of hearts, Thomas and the disciples may have doubted Jesus even as he stood among them. For if they had looked around them, they would have seen that things were just as hurt, broken, and messed-up as before. The lion was not yet lying with the lamb. The swords hadn’t yet been beaten into plowshares. There still was not that great reconciliation and peace that the prophets of old had promised. And if anything, the scars of Jesus were a testimony to this; they were a witness to the brokenness of the world.
But in today’s scripture, Jesus seems to say that the scars are more than a sign of brokenness. They are also a sign of the peace that redeems that brokenness.
Our world has it all mixed-up. Locked doors and cold, hard facts do not secure life but rather sacrifice it. Locked doors and cold, hard facts are death. It is only in the uncertain and insecure scars of Christ—and the peace that they proclaim—that we find a life beyond where we are.
Prayer
God of peace and scars—
Defy us where we would close the door
For fear of losing what we have,
Confront us where our certainty
Stops your kingdom in its tracks,
And breathe among us
The new life of your holy Spirit.
As you sent Christ into the world,
So send us,
Trusting and proclaiming and living out
The good news of your scarred love.
In the name of our life and resurrection, Jesus Christ. Amen.
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[1] Dorothee Soelle, The Window of Vulnerability: A Political Spirituality (trans. Linda M. Maloney; Minneapolis: Fortress, 1990), 10-11, claims that “the conversion from security to peace is the most important religious event” in her world.
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