WONDERING GURU
3rd Sunday of Easter 14th April 2024- Year B
(Acts 3: 13-15, 17-19; 1 John 2: 1-5a; Luke 24: 35-48)
The disciples had very intense roller-coaster
experience of the events since the Palm Sunday leading up to the stories of the
Resurrection of Christ. Their faith had
been tried and tested. When all was said and done, most of them ran for their
lives in fear. Planning to save
themselves. One had even denied ever
knowing him. Talk about defeated. In today’s gospel we find that they have gone
back to the life they lived before they had ever even heard of this man Jesus
Christ.
Post resurrection the disciples think he is a ghost.
They can’t believe he is real. Why is this surprising? The resurrection of
Jesus is already well established amongst his followers yet we find this
morning that they are still in disbelief.
In fact, they have already gone back to who and what they were before
Jesus had called them. Friends, that’s what the defeated church looks like.
Going back to who you were before Jesus called you. If Jesus hadn’t intervened,
we would never have had the Gospels. We never would have heard the name of
Jesus Christ. If not for Jesus showing up post resurrection there would be no
church today no Christianity. Verse 45
says “Then he opened their minds so they could understand the Scriptures.”
Even after the resurrection, it’s pretty clear that
they still don’t get it. It is not until this morning that we hear “Jesus
opened their minds.” I believe that this awareness came to them only as a gift
from Jesus. Their minds never were able to grasp what God was saying to them
until he imparted it to them through his Spirit. Why? Because our minds will
never be able to grasp what God is saying to us until he imparts it to us
through his Spirit. I think the first thing we need to do is to acknowledge that
our awareness of God is extraordinarily limited until such time we receive the
gift of his Spirit. Understanding God cannot be learned it must be
experienced. As beneficial as Scripture
is, it is incomplete without the Holy Spirit. That is why the disciples were at
such a loss. They simply could not grasp the message without the gift of the
Spirit.
Resurrection of Jesus makes all the difference. Resurrection of Jesus rejuvenates the
defeated disciples. The resurrection of
Jesus rejuvenates the almost dead churches. Malcolm Muggeridge was a Marxist before he
found Christ. During the Cold War he travelled to Russia to write a story about
the Communist party and the decline of religion in that atheistic regime. After
conducting a series of interviews with officials in the Kremlin, he attended a
Russian Orthodox Easter service. The church was packed. At the close of the
service the priest said, “Christ is risen”, and the people shouted back, “He is
risen indeed!” Muggeridge looked into their faces and instantly realized that
they were right and that Stalin was wrong. He said it was the reality of their
joy that tipped the scales of his soul toward Christ.
Professor Charlie Moule, the famous NT theologian once
said: "the birth and rapid rise of the Christian Church ... remains an
unsolved enigma for any historian who refuses to take seriously the only
explanation offered by the church itself - the resurrection." The
Resurrection is a major pillar of our faith. St Paul puts it like this: “…if
Christ has not been raised from the dead, your faith is futile” (I Cor. 15: 17)
Reflect: What does a defeated church look like? What
does it take for new life to take place in the church?
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