Descent of the Holy Spirit (source)

This Litany to the Holy Spirit was prepared using the traditional form of a litany. The contents of the litany are based on scripture, the Book of Common Prayer, and an Eastern Orthodox prayer to the Holy Spirit.

O God the Father, Creator of heaven and earth,
Have mercy upon us.

O God the Son, Redeemer of the world,
Have mercy upon us.

O God the Holy Spirit, Sanctifier of the faithful,
Have mercy upon us.

O holy, blessed, and glorious Trinity, one God,
Have mercy upon us.

Spirit, intercede for us with sighs too deep for words,
Pray for us.

Spirit, intercede for the saints according to the will of God,
Pray for us.

Holy Mary, Mother of God,
Pray for us.

Blessed Philip, patron of our parish,
Pray for us.

Holy Spirit, who is equal to the Father and the Son,
Keep us in eternal life.

Holy Spirit, who proceeds from the Father,
Enter our hearts.

Holy Spirit, who has spoken through the Prophets,
Open our ears.

Holy Spirit, who enlightens and strengthens for your service,
Dwell in us.

Holy Spirit, who in the beginning moved and brooded over the face of the waters,
Move and brood over our lives.

Holy Spirit, who is God’s life-giving breath,
Breathe in us.

Holy Spirit, who blew through the Valley of Dry Bones giving life,
Enliven us.

Holy Spirit, who overshadowed Mary that she might give birth to the Son of God,
Grace us to give birth to the divine in our time and place.

Holy Spirit, who rested on Jesus at his baptism,
Rest upon us and renew our baptismal life.

Holy Spirit, who as a tongue of fire rested on and filled the apostles,
Burn in us with the power of your love.

Holy Spirit, who descended on the day of Pentecost,
Teach us and lead us into all truth.

Holy Spirit, who descended on the day of Pentecost,
Unite us in the confession of one faith.

Holy Spirit, who descended on the day of Pentecost,
Empower us to serve you as a royal priesthood.

Holy Spirit, who descended on the day of Pentecost,
Encourage us to preach the gospel to all nations.

Come Holy Spirit,
Our souls inspire.

Spirit of understanding,
Come.

Spirit of counsel,
Come.

Spirit of fortitude,
Come.

Spirit of knowledge,
Come.

Spirit of piety,
Come.

Spirit of Godly fear,
Come.

With the fruit of love,
Fill us.

With the fruit of joy,
Fill us.

With the fruit of peace,
Fill us.

With the fruit of patience,
Fill us.

With the fruit of generosity,
Fill us.

With the fruit of gentleness,
Fill us.

With the fruit of self-control.
Fill us.

Lamb of God, you take away the sins of the world,
Send us the Advocate.

Lamb of God, you take away the sins of the world,
Send us the Spirit of Truth.

Lamb of God, you take away the sins of the world,
Send us the Holy Spirit.

V: Come, Holy Spirit, fill the hearts of your faithful,
R: And kindle in them the fire of your love.

V: Send forth your Spirit, Lord, and they shall be created,
R: And you shall renew the face of the earth.

O Heavenly King, Comforter, Spirit of Truth who are present everywhere, filling all things, Treasury of Good, and Giver of Life,
Come and dwell in us, cleanse us of every stain, and save our souls, O Good One.

Holy Spirit, you came as Christ’s own first gift for those who believe, that we might no longer live for ourselves, but for him who died and rose for us: Complete his work in the world and bring to fulfillment the sanctification of all. Amen.

Almighty and merciful Lord, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit,
Bless us and keep us. Amen.

Icon of the Theotokos (source)

Recall a moment when you held another person so close that you could hear his or her breathing, the sound of life. Maybe it was your husband or wife, a parent, your child or grandchild, a dear friend. Cheek to cheek. You could feel his or her breath brush across your face and he or she felt yours. The two of you shared and breathed the same air. Giving and receiving. Breathing in. Breathing out. There was only one breath, one life, one love.

That was a moment of holy conspiracy. The intimacy of that conspiracy is beautifully shown in this icon of the Most Holy Theotokos. Mary cradles Jesus and pulls him close to her. Jesus’ left arm is on Mary’s shoulder. His right arm reaches around her neck pulling her face to his. They are cheek to cheek giving, receiving, and sharing the breath of life. They are coconspirators.

The word “conspire” literally means “breathing with” or “to breathe together.” For most of us, I suspect, conspiracy brings up ideas of wrongdoing, secrets, and planning to do something illegal or harmful to another. That is a reality in our world today but it is not the only or even the final reality. There is another conspiracy about in our world. It is God’s conspiracy, God’s breathing with you and me. It began long ago and has never ceased.

In the beginning God took dust from the ground and breathed humanity into existence. The breath of God parted the Red Sea and blew God’s people through the wilderness to a new life in the promised land. In the valley of dry bones Ezekiel watched the breath of God return life to old, dry, brittle bones. God’s breath came upon the Blessed Virgin Mary so that the child to be born would be holy and called the Son of God. The breath of God gave voice to Jesus’ teaching and preaching of the good news. God’s life-giving breath was present at and the source of Jesus’ miracles. The breath of God swept through Jesus’ tomb, defeating death, and proclaiming, “He is not here.”

The breath of God, God’s Holy Spirit, is not simply a thing or an event. It is the abiding and transforming presence of God’s life with us and in us. Wherever life is being created, renewed, put back together, or inspired the Spirit is present. God is breathing and the conspiracy has been accomplished.

God breathes and we live. God breathes and our lives are put back together. God breathes and we are re-created. We cannot explain it but we know it when we see it. It looks like lives of love and self-giving, mutuality and intimacy, forgiveness and reconciliation, generosity and compassion, healing and wholeness, prayer and holiness.

What does it mean that God has been conspiring with creation from the beginning? It means that there is only one breath, one life, one love. It means that God never gives up on you, me, or any other person. It means that God breathes God’s life through humanity: through the patriarchs, prophets, apostles, and martyrs; through the Blessed Virgin Mary and all the saints; and, most profoundly, through the life, death, resurrection, and ascension of our Lord Jesus Christ. It means that we are to be co-conspirators, co-breathers, with God. It means that God is here with us, among us, and in us, as close as our next breath.

So breathe. Breathe long. Breathe deep. Just breathe. Participate in the conspiracy.

Those are the kind of things we say when we are leaving, departing. We give our last minute instructions for what the other should do after we have left. When I was growing up I heard some of these from my parents. I said some of these to Brandon when Cyndy and I would take him to church camp. I remember saying some of these to Randy before leaving him at the airport for his flight to Marine boot camp. I suspect each of you has said and heard these or similar words. They are our departing instructions to one we love. With those words we entrust the future well being of that loved one to himself or herself.

It would be easy to hear today’s gospel as Jesus’ departing instructions to his disciples. It would make sense. After all, it is the night of the last supper. Jesus knows he is leaving. He will soon be crucified and the disciples will have to find their way without his physical presence. So why not give some last minute instructions about how to act, what to do, the way they should treat each other? That’s what we might do but that is not what Jesus is doing. That is a misinterpretation of the text.

Jesus is not entrusting the future of the disciples to themselves. He is entrusting their future to God. His words are not departing instructions but a departing prayer. The disciples are God-entrusted not self-entrusted.

Today’s gospel is not a conversation between Jesus and the disciples but a prayer from Jesus to his Father, and our Father. Today we overhear Jesus’ prayer for us. His prayer isn’t for our benefit only but for the life of the world, so that the world may believe the Father sent Jesus. Our unity becomes the sacramental presence of God in the world. Our oneness continues the embodiment of God in human flesh and life.

This unity is not, however, something we do or create. Jesus does not tell the disciples to be nice to each other, to get along, to eliminate their differences, or to agree upon a common a plan or purpose. He doesn’t prescribe tolerance, uniformity, unanimity, or consensus. We are not the recipients of instructions but the subject and beneficiary of Jesus’ prayer.

Jesus prays three times for oneness. “That they may all be one.” “That they may be one.” “That they may become completely one.” The oneness for which he prays is modeled on the unity of the Father and Jesus, their shared life. He prays that we would be completely one as he and the Father are one. Jesus’ prayer echoes the ancient Jewish prayer, Shema Yisrael, “Hear, O Israel: the LORD is our God, the LORD is one (Deut. 6:4).

That Jesus is praying to the Father for our oneness, rather than giving instructions, means that unity is of and from God. It is not something we do or create. It is the very life and being of God. We do not establish unity, we participate in and manifest to the world the already existing oneness that is God.

This doesn’t mean we can just sit back and wait for God to answer Jesus’ prayer. We too have a part in answering Jesus’ prayer. Our oneness must take tangible and visible form if it is to show the world the invisible and spiritual life and presence of God. In some way our lives in relationship to God and one another become the answer to Jesus’ prayer.

Our lives and relationships are to be outward and visible signs of God’s inward and invisible presence. We can become and live this, however, only when we know ourselves to be God-entrusted rather than self-entrusted. That means our life comes not from ourselves but from God. That’s what allowed Jesus to choose the cross. That’s why he prayed rather than instructed. It’s how we become one as Jesus and the Father are one.

Right about now some instructions would be really helpful but I don’t have any. Jesus didn’t give any. There is no list. I can’t tell you what to do but I can tell you where to begin looking. This oneness exists at the intersection of our love for God and our love for each other. It is the intersection of the vertical axis and the horizontal axis. Unity is cross shaped. That point of intersection is, according to St. John’s account of the gospel, the hour of Christ’s glory, his death and resurrection. That is the preeminent image of a God-entrusted life. That’s where we find our oneness. That’s what we show the world.

Each time we live with a God-entrusted understanding of ourselves boundaries soften, divisions are not as deep, and relationships reconcile. Each time we take a step toward a God-entrusted understanding of ourselves and let go of a self-entrusted life we move towards oneness.

When, in love for God and each other, we surrender our self-entrusted life to a God-entrusted life we embody the Father’s answer to Jesus’ prayer and we are one as Jesus and the Father are one. In that moment we have, as a friend of mine says, “met the glory of God and it is us.”

+

This sermon is for the Seventh Sunday of Easter, Year C, and is based on John 17:20-26.

May he who ascended into heaven prepare a place for you; that where he is you might also be, and reign with him in glory. Amen.

May you who believe that our Lord Jesus Christ ascended into heaven, also in heart and mind there ascend, and with him continually dwell. Amen.

And the blessing of God Almighty, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, be upon you and remain with you forever. Amen.

Ascension of Jesus (source)

There was a belief that this pool of water called Beth-zatha had healing properties and that it could change one’s life. It was said that every now and then an angel would stir the water, the water would begin to bubble, and the first one in the water would be healed. The man in today’s gospel won’t get up off his mat until he sees the first bubble. He is living an “as soon as” life.

“As soon as the water bubbles then I will get up off my mat. As soon as I get to the water my life will be better. As soon as I get into the water my problems will be fixed.”

The pool of Beth-zatha is an illusion. It convinces us that our life is nothing more than our circumstances. It deceives us into believing that life is to be found outside ourselves. It tricks us into living an “as soon as” life. Most of us know what that is like. We say to ourselves or maybe even out loud to another, “As soon as this or that happens everything will be better. I’ll be happy. My problems will go away. I’ll be satisfied. All will be well.”

The pool of Beth-zatha has a strong attraction for us. Children often say, “As soon as I get big, grow up, am an adult ….” It continues throughout our life. “As soon as ….”

• I graduate, get a job, get a better job;
• I get married or get out of this relationship;
• I have more time, more money, a better house;
• He changes the way he acts;
• She apologizes;
• I feel better or get through this time in my life;
• They do what I want;
• I get a vacation, retire, move to the mountains;
• I get over this grief and no longer feel sad;
• I lose ten sounds, get in shape.

“As soon as ….” You can fill in the blank with most anything. The problem is there will always be another pool of Beth-zatha. Meanwhile life has been put on hold. The pause button has been pushed. We sit on our mat, self-imprisoned by the circumstances of our life.

The imprisonment is so great that when Jesus asks the man, “Do you want to be made well?” the man doesn’t even say, “Yes.” Instead he offers circumstances and excuses. “I have no one to put me in the water. When the water bubbles others get there first. They take cuts.”

I’m not suggesting that the circumstances of our lives are irrelevant or have no effect. That’s just not true. They do affect us. We are, however, more than the circumstances of our life. Life is not to be found outside our various situations or circumstances but within them. To believe something other than this is to live constantly looking for the next pool of Beth-zatha.

Jesus does not help the man get into the water. He comes to him on his mat, the same mat and situation the man so wants to escape, and speaks words of life and resurrection. “Get up off your mat!” To quote Jesus a bit more accurately, “Stand up, take your mat and walk.” The man does not leave his mat behind. It goes with him. His circumstances are real. The difference is he now carries them. They no longer carry him.

Jesus doesn’t change our outer circumstances. He changes us. He calls us into a new way of being, seeing, acting, speaking, thinking. When we stand and rise to that new life we discover the circumstances have somehow changed. That doesn’t necessarily make life easy or mean we no longer have to deal with the circumstances of life. It makes our circumstances more manageable and we engage them from a different place and position. The pool of Beth-zatha is drained of its power over us. There is freedom where there was once imprisonment. Inertia gives way to creativity. Once stagnant waters now bubble with new life.

The life Jesus offers does not happen “as soon as ….” It happens in this place, at this time, in these circumstances. Are you sitting on your mat? Are you looking for a pool of Bethzatha? “Stand up, take your mat and walk.”

+

This sermon is for the Sixth Sunday of Easter, Year C, and is based on John 5:1-9.

The Protection of Philip

“Lord, show us the Father, and we will be satisfied.” We may never have said those exact words but I’ll bet most of us understand and know what Philip is asking. He has expressed a deep and universal desire of humanity. Sometimes we say, “You know, something is missing. I just feel restless. Nothing seems to satisfy.” In those moments we have echoed Philip’s words. It is the longing to stand in the presence of holiness, to see God, and to know ourselves as transcendent.

That Philip would say this in a face to face conversation with Jesus reveals a common misunderstanding about God. It is the myth that God is distant, far away, and removed. “Have I been with you all this time, Philip, and you still do not know me?” It’s as if Jesus is saying, “Do you not see, not understand, who is right in front of you?” Somehow we have been convinced that the entrance into divine life and the presence of God are not to be found in this world, and that’s just wrong. It’s not true.

Our entrance into the divine life is not found apart from the material world but in a deeper experience of the material world. That’s a part of what it means for God to become human. That’s a part of what the incarnation is about. That’s what Jesus is telling Philip. It’s all right before our very eyes.

Humanity is the most compete expression of God’s creation. It is the place where God lives and the fullest revelation of God’s life. “If you have seen me, you have seen the Father,” Jesus tells Philip. Don’t think this is only about Jesus’ humanity. He has the same human nature as you and me. That means that our entire life, in relationship with Christ, becomes the entrance into the divine life.

From the moment of our birth up to and including our death we are all making entrances. Some seem routine and ordinary: entering home and family at the end of the day, entering work or school in the morning. Some entrances are about change: moving to and entering a new community, entering into marriage or parenthood, retirement, disease, old age and failing health.  There are also emotional entrances. We enter into seasons of grief, places of fear, times of joy. In some sense our life is a series of entrances. Over and over again we enter places, situations, and the lives of other people. What do we see? What do we hear? What do we experience?

Our entrances are more than simply movements in time and space, from one location or minute to the next. Each entrance is the invitation to move to a deeper awareness and recognition that the place in which we stand is already filled with divine life. Each entrance is the opportunity to see that the world is already transfigured with the Father’s presence and beauty.

I suspect, though, we don’t often think much about our entrances and the doors through which we pass. Too often we enter unaware. We forget to look and see what is right in front of us. We need reminders. That’s what our newly renovated narthex is about. It is a threshold place, a reminder to slow down, to look, to listen, to unveil our hearts, our eyes, our ears, and experience that we are always stepping into the presence of God in Christ. That’s true every time we enter this place and it is true every time we leave this place.

That truth is not, however, limited to this place. So don’t leave the narthex behind. Carry it within you. Let it remind you that every entrance we make has a narthex, a threshold moment, pointing us to the one who is “the way, the truth, and the life,” and reminding us that fullness of God is right in front of us.

+

This sermon was for the Feast of St. Philip, May 1, and is based on John 14:6-14. That day was also the unveiling of our parish’s newly renovated narthex.

The Revelation to St. John

“I saw a new heaven and a new earth,” St. John says. “I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God.” I heard “the one who was seated on the throne [say], ‘See, I am making all things new.’”

In the last two weeks I have seen and heard something very different. A bombing in Boston. An explosion in West, Texas. An earthquake in China. A collapsed building in Bangladesh. These things are happening not only at the state, national, and global levels. They are local too. I know that for some of you the ground under your feet is shaking and unstable, the structures of your life have collapsed, your world has exploded.

With all that I have seen and heard I go back to the Revelation to St. John but I don’t want to read his words again. I want to see what he saw. I want to hear what he heard. I don’t think I am alone in that. The people of Boston want to see and hear. The people of West want to see and hear. The people of China want to see and hear. The people of Bangladesh want to see and hear. Many of you want to see and hear. The darkness of the circumstances, however, makes it difficult to see and hear that all things are being made new.

How fitting it is then that today’s gospel takes us back to another dark night; a last supper, a betrayal, a departure, an impending death. It is the night before Jesus’ crucifixion. He has fed his disciples. He’s washed their feet. Judas has stepped out into the night of betrayal. Jesus tells his disciples that he is leaving and that they cannot go with him. Peter and Thomas will ask what everyone is thinking. “Why not?” “Where are you going?” “How will we find our way?” They, no doubt, feel the structures of their lives crumbling and the ground shaking. Their world is changing.

The disciples will have to learn, see, and trust that even in the midst of terror and tragedy, chaos and pain, death and sorrow all things are being made new. So must we. We too must learn that God’s “making new” happens in the midst of, not apart from, the circumstances of our lives and world. Even as that is the disciples’ work so too it is our work and it is not easy work. It is some of the most difficult work we ever do. Ultimately, it is the work of love.

“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.”

This commandment is Jesus’ departing instructions. It is less something to be accomplished, done, and more a way of living and being, an orientation and disposition. It will insure Jesus’ presence among the disciples and continue his work of making all things new. “Love one another.” The space Jesus once physically occupied amongst his disciples is now to be filled with their love for one another.

There is something about our love for one another that is iconic, revelatory, and makes Christ present in whatever circumstances we might find ourselves. Jesus’ command to love one another is both our preparation for and our participation in his resurrected life here and now.

Love reveals the new heaven and new earth. Love is the gateway, the entry, into the new Jerusalem. Love makes all things new. Love is both the means and the goal, a journey that has no ending and a destination that has no fixed point.

The love Jesus commands is independent of who the other is or our feelings about him or her. It is not determined by our assessment of his or her qualities or lovability. It takes us beyond sentimentality, emotions, and familial kinship. It is less about a feeling and more about a choice. If we are Jesus’s disciples we show it by choosing to love one another. The mark of Christ’s disciples is not what they believe but how they love.

Love is the commitment, attachment, and loyalty to another that is embodied and enacted in concrete ways. We do not believe or reason our way into loving one another. We act our way into loving another. That’s what Jesus did. His life, death, and resurrection are nothing less than the embodiment and enactment of love. You and I, his disciples, continue that through our love for one another.

It’s all pretty simple when you get right down to it. It’s about people, life, and circumstances. It is about seeing that “the home of God is among mortals.” It looks like people running towards the explosion to help the injured. It’s eyes looking for movement in the rubble, ears listening for a whimper, and bare hands digging for life. It’s a bedside vigil when all you can do is hold a hand. It’s standing next to another and listening to his or her diagnosis. It’s cooking and delivering a meal to one whose appetite has been stolen by sorrow. It’s the courage to sit with the pain and loss of another knowing you have no idea of what to say or do. It’s the giving of one’s money to care for another whom we have never and will never meet. It’s a silent night of tears and prayer.

These and a thousand other acts like them are the acts of love that have been done for us and, by God’s grace, we do for another. When I see these things happening I see a new heaven and a new earth and I know myself to be living in the new Jerusalem. When I hear stories about these acts of love I experience all things being made new.

St. John’s vision is a reality as close as the person next to you and as broad as the stranger on the other side of the world. “I give you a new commandment, that you love one another.”

+

This sermon is for the Fifth Sunday of Easter, Year C, and is based on Revelation 21:1-6 and John 13:31-35.

These last reactions reminded me of the hermit in a story from the life of St. Silouan (1866-1938), a monk of Mount Athos. The story is told by Archimandrite Sophrony on page 48 of his book, St. Silouan the Athonite.

I remember a conversation between [Silouan] and a certain hermit who declared with evident satisfaction,
‘God will punish all atheists. They will burn in everlasting fire.’
Obviously upset, [Silouan] said,
‘Tell me, supposing you went to paradise, and there you looked down and saw someone burning in hell-fire – would you feel happy?’
‘It can’t be helped. It would be their own fault,’ said the hermit.
[Silouan] answered him in a sorrowful countenance:
‘Love could not bear that,’ he said. ‘We must pray for all.’

I am not condoning or excusing the bombing in Boston or any other act of violence. I recognize, however, how easily “all atheists” can be replaced with the name of our favorite person or people to blame. This is true not only for the bombing in Boston but for all the times we or those we care about have been hurt by another. Sometimes they are guilty. Other times they are not. Regardless, “Love could not bear that.”

St. Silouan the Athonite (source)

St. Alban’s Psalter Gospel Scenes, 1130 (source)

“Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands, and put my finger in the mark of the nails and my hand in his side, I will not believe.” That one sentence has left Thomas forever labeled Doubting Thomas. That’s the Thomas with whom we are most familiar. Maybe, however, there’s another side to Thomas, a twin, that we often overlook. That’s the Thomas that wants to believe. That’s the Thomas Jesus comes to in today’s gospel.

This is a story about believing, not doubting. If it tells us anything it tells us that resurrection is difficult to accept, to believe. It’s not just an idea or a fact to which we give agreement or assent. It is a whole new way of being. If we’re not wrestling with what resurrection means, it’s place in our life, and how it manifests itself then maybe it’s just not that real for us.

Thomas may be the one that gets labeled but the other disciples also reveal the difficulty of believing. On the evening of the first day of the week, the day Jesus was resurrected, they are hiding. God opened the tomb and they locked the doors. God emptied the tomb and they filled the house. Jesus appears to them in their locked room. He speaks to them. He breathes life into them. A week later they are in the same place, behind the same locked doors. Not much has changed.

Despite how we’ve labeled him Thomas is not doubting. He is struggling with how to believe and what to believe in. He wants to see and touch for only one reason. So that he too might believe. There’s something faithful and authentic about that. It’s a struggle most of us probably know.

What do you want to believe about Jesus’ resurrection? What gets in the way? What makes it difficult to believe? How are you wrestling and struggling with the resurrection of Jesus in your life?

I want to believe that Jesus’ resurrection offers peace but I see wars across the world, families in conflict, and relationships broken. I want to believe that Jesus’ resurrection overcomes death but I still cry for and feel the absence and loss of our son, Brandon. I want to believe that Jesus’ resurrection is real but I don’t see much difference between my life this week compared to the week before Easter. Most of you can probably make similar statements about how your “belief” doesn’t really fit with what you see and experience.

We can quickly and easily get to the same place as Thomas. I know I can. Unless I see wars cease, conflict resolved, and relationships reconciled, I will not believe. Unless I feel Brandon’s presence, the tears dry up, and the pain goes away, I will not believe. Unless I experience some measurable difference in my life, I will not believe.

We’re not all that different from Thomas. We each live with at least one “unless clause.” Unless I see, unless I touch, unless I feel, unless I experience, I will not believe. It reveals our struggle and desire to believe. It also reveals our misunderstanding of faith and the resurrection.

Far too often we condition the resurrection not on the power of God but on the sufficiency of the evidence. Each condition becomes just another lock on the door. It won’t keep Jesus out but it will keep us trapped inside and it won’t be long before our house becomes our tomb.

The resurrection of Christ does not meet our conditions. It empowers and enables us to meet our conditions. It lets us unlock the doors and step outside even when we don’t know what is on the other side.

The resurrection does not end wars. It reveals the sanctity and dignity of life so that we might speak and work “for justice, freedom, and peace.” It is the compassion behind the tears we weep and the prayers we offer for all who are “victims of hunger, fear, injustice, and oppression.” The resurrection does not magically fix relationships. It is the energy and perseverance behind our work to reconcile relationships and resolve conflict. It is the power by which we love our neighbor as ourselves. The resurrection does not eliminate our pain or tears over the death of a loved one. It is the “strength to meet the days to come with steadfastness and patience; not sorrowing as those without hope but in thankful remembrance of [God’s] great goodness, and in the joyful expectation of eternal life with those we love.” The resurrection does not offer measurable results, productivity, or efficiency. It guarantees our life and our future with God.

Resurrection is not an idea to be grasped or a case to be proved. It is a life to be lived. Every time we live in the power of the resurrection we engage the world, one another, and our life in a new way. We move from saying, “Unless…,” to saying, “My Lord and my God.”

I don’t know if Thomas put his finger in the mark of the nails or his hand in Jesus’ side. St. John doesn’t say and for good reason. It doesn’t really matter what Thomas did. That’s not the issue. This story isn’t about Thomas. It’s about us. How will we live? What will we do? Have we come to believe?

+

This sermon is for the Second Sunday of Easter, sometimes called Thomas Sunday, and is based on John 20:19-31.