Regathering the Flock

Scriptures:     Acts 5:27-42                           Psalm 150

Revelation 1:4-8                    John 20:19-31

For this week and next, we will be reading from John’s account of Jesus’ post-resurrection appearances.  This week, we read of his appearance to the disciples and Thomas in the upper room.  Next week we will read of Jesus’ appearance to Peter and the other disciples as they were fishing.

But back to the disciples in the Upper Room as described in today’s reading.  Before his arrest, Jesus had quoted  Zechariah 13 to say that “the shepherd would be struck down, and the sheep would be scattered.”  And indeed, when Jesus was arrested, the disciples scattered, with only the women and, according to John’s gospel, the beloved disciple remaining with him at the cross. 

But, it would seem that after the crucifixion, the disciples found one another.  Like sheep huddling together against a storm, the disciples huddled together behind locked doors, as John’s gospel says, for fear of the Jews.  They grieved, and likely they exchanged stories about Jesus:  “Remember when he healed that blind man?  Remember when he cast the demon out of the man who lived among the tombs?”  They likely would have done all they could to remember, to keep their memories of their teacher from fading away.

And it’s at this point that I have to take a moment, especially in light of yesterday’s synagogue shooting,  yet another shooting at a house of worship, to remind us that John is using the term “Jews” in a specific way, to refer to those Jews who do not follow Jesus, especially the authorities who had power to arrest and pass sentence.   We need to remember that Jesus was a Jew, the first disciples of Jesus were Jews, as were the religious authorities who opposed Jesus.  Jesus had no intention of establishing a new faith, but was teaching from his own Jewish tradition.  John’s gospel was written at a time when the disciples of Jesus were being cast out from their religious communities, and so it was like a family feud, with all the ugliness and blaming and finger-pointing that family feuds entail.  I say all this because the language about Jews in the Gospels – gospels written and intended as good news – has brought two thousand years of bad news in the form of violence and exclusion and charges of being Christ-killers against those of the Jewish faith – and we do God no service by promoting violence or exclusion.   Perhaps we can learn from the example of Pope John Paul II, who addressed Jews as “elder brothers in the faith of Abraham”.

So the disciples of Jesus were huddled behind locked doors, for fear of the religious authorities.  It doesn’t take a lot of imagination to sense what they were feeling – grief at the death of their teacher, guilt and shame for having abandoned him, fear for their own lives, and being completely at a loss as to where to go from there.   In that moment of being completely overwhelmed by grief, there was no ability to plan for the future.  Perhaps a time would come for that, later, much later.  But for now, all they could do is  huddle together and try to draw comfort and strength  from one another.

And suddenly, we’re told, Jesus stood in their midst.   Beyond the question of how he got past a locked door, we might wonder at their initial reaction.   Would Jesus chastise them for their failures:  “Well, Peter, do you know me now?  Peter, James, and John, do you think you’ll could try to stay awake?”  But Jesus put any fears to rest by saying, “Peace be with you!”  We’re told that Jesus showed them the wounds of his crucifixion, and said to them again, “Peace be with you.  As the Father has sent me, so I send you.”  He breathed the Holy Spirit upon them, and conferred on them power to forgive sins.  It’s really quite remarkable, when we think about it – these disciples had messed up badly, had deserted Jesus, and when Jesus returned, he not only returned to them, not only forgave them, but conferred new power upon them, the power of the Holy Spirit.    It’s not the best analogy, but if a teenager had borrowed the family car and wrapped it around a tree, do you think the parents would respond by giving the teenager a new and even better car of their own?  And yet Jesus responded to the disciples’ failure and betrayal not only with forgiveness, but by conferring new authority on them.  It’s notable that while elsewhere in John’s gospel Jesus speaks of the Spirit as an Advocate and Teacher, here he links the Holy Spirit with the power to forgive sins.  As Jesus had forgiven them, Jesus wants them to forgive others.

Jesus was back, and all was well – except Thomas wasn’t with them.  Maybe they had sent him out to pick up the pizza.   We know the story – the other disciples told Thomas what they had experienced, and Thomas said that unless he saw the print of the nail and the mark of the spear in Jesus’ side, he would not believe.  A week later, they were again gathered behind locked doors, Thomas with them this time, when the whole sequence of events replays for Thomas – Jesus appears and shows Thomas his wounds, as he had shown them to the others, and Thomas could only say, “My Lord and my God!” – which actually a greater recognition of Jesus than had come from the other disciples to this point.   And then Jesus offered a blessing on those who have not seen his wounds – that is to say, on John’s readers, including us – and yet believe.

At this time each year, I say that as far as I’m concerned, Thomas gets a bad rap as being Doubting Thomas.  He didn’t have any less or more faith than the others; he just wanted to experience what the others had experienced – and Jesus graciously granted Thomas’s request.  I do think it says something important about Jesus that he was not willing to leave Thomas behind just because he wasn’t with the rest at the time of Jesus’ earlier appearance.  Like a shepherd caring for a flock, Jesus went in search of the one sheep, Thomas, who had gotten separated from the others.    Just as Jesus blessed the penitent thief on the cross, just as, according to the first letter of Peter, 3^rd and 4^th chapters, Jesus even preached to the departed and disobedient spirits in hell, Jesus wanted to leave nobody behind.  This is the quality of love that God shows for us – and this is the quality of love God calls on us to show one another and those around us.   It’s also striking that though, at his first appearance to the disciples huddled behind locked doors, Jesus sent them forth, they apparently didn’t go much of anywhere, because they were still huddled behind locked doors a week later.  Perhaps Jesus did not want them to go unless all of them, including Thomas, could go together.

Our reading from Acts chapter 5 shows Jesus still gathering a flock, this time through the work of the disciples.  And we’re given a very different portrait of the Peter and the other disciples.  No longer are they huddled behind locked doors.  They are boldly telling others about Jesus, and facing down the religious authorities who try to stop them.   The difference is that the Holy Spirit has been conferred upon these disciples, and there’s no stopping them.   At this point the followers of Jesus haven’t been driven from the fellowship of the synagogue – but the religious authorities are looking on them as we might look on members of some religious cult.  The authorities try to shut down the discussion around Jesus, and the disciples refuse to be shut down.  They know the truth of what they’ve experienced to the marrow of their bones, and refuse to be quiet about it.

The reading from Acts from the lectionary was actually quite short, and ended with the disciples and the religious authorities at a moment of conflict, but I wanted to read a bit further this morning so we could see how the conflict played out.  We’re told about a man named Gamaliel, a Pharisee respected by all.  We hear this name later in Acts, as the Apostle Paul after his conversion, in giving his testimony, speaks of his having been educated at the feet of Gamaliel.  Anyway, we’re told that Gamaliel stood up and asked that the men be taken outside the room.  And then he tells them about two other recent would-be messiahs, Theudas and Judas the Galilean – not the one who had betrayed Jesus, but another Judas – who had gotten up on soapboxes, made a lot of noise, attracted some followers for a time – but after their deaths, the followers were scattered to the four winds and no more was heard from them.  Gamaliel counsels to leave the disciples alone, saying that if what they’re doing is not of God, eventually the failings of what they’re doing will become evident and it will eventually fall of its own weight without their having to do anything, but if what they’re doing truly is of God, they don’t want to be found opposing God.  Gamaliel’s approach is remarkably tolerant – we might even say Spirit-filled in its way.   The others in the council aren’t so tolerant – they order the disciples to be whipped – but the disciples are allowed to go their way, rejoicing that they were allowed to suffer dishonor for the sake of Jesus.  Remember that it was for fear of dishonor that the disciples had abandoned Jesus after his arrest – but now, equipped with the Holy Spirit, they are only too happy to accept the dishonor they had earlier tried to avoid, in order to gather disciples for Jesus.

Jesus wanted to leave nobody behind, and was willing to appear a second time so that Thomas was included.  This mission of gathering followers for Jesus has been passed on to us, his present-day disciples.  And some churches use coercive means to hold on to their flocks, not entirely different from those who arrested Peter and the other disciples.  But that’s not the way of Jesus.  We are to invite, not to try to compel.  We are to draw people to Jesus, not through fear, but through love.  Next week we’ll read of the conversion of Paul, who under his earlier identity of Saul had used fear and coercion and force to persecute the church.  But it was love that led Paul to Jesus, and it is the love that others find here that will lead our neighbors to Christ.  Love is not easy.  God may call us to love people who are not entirely loveable, as Saul was far from loveable before his vision of the Risen Christ.  But love is our calling, all the same.

I don’t think any of us have failed Jesus as spectacularly as his first disciples did by betraying and abandoning him, and yet Jesus entrusted them with the Holy Spirit and with the mission of gathering people into community with Jesus - and few since the early disciples have been as spectacularly faithful in carrying out this mission.   We at Emanuel Church are called to be faithful in reaching out to our neighbors, not from a place of coercion, but in love.  If our neighbors are already part of a faith community – that’s wonderful! What a blessing for them!   In this day in which synagogues and mosques and churches are under attack, we want all faith communities to be places of safety for their members.  But if they are seeking, may they find God’s love here among the gathered flock of Emanuel Church.  Amen.