Sunday 24th April, Easter 2, A Sermon on touch, and Thomas
Lectionary Readings for the Second Sunday of Easter
Acts 5: 27-32
When they had brought them, they had them stand before the council. The high priest questioned them, saying, ‘We gave you strict orders not to teach in this name, yet here you have filled Jerusalem with your teaching and you are determined to bring this man’s blood on us.’ But Peter and the apostles answered, ‘We must obey God rather than any human authority. The God of our ancestors raised up Jesus, whom you had killed by hanging him on a tree. God exalted him at his right hand as Leader and Saviour, so that he might give repentance to Israel and forgiveness of sins. And we are witnesses to these things, and so is the Holy Spirit whom God has given to those who obey him.’
John 20: 19-31
When it was evening on that day, the first day of the week, and the doors of the house where the disciples had met were locked for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said, ‘Peace be with you.’ After he said this, he showed them his hands and his side. Then the disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord. Jesus said to them again, ‘Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.’ When he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.’
But Thomas (who was called the Twin), one of the twelve, was not with them when Jesus came. So the other disciples told him, ‘We have seen the Lord.’ But he said to them, ‘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.’ A week later his disciples were again in the house, and Thomas was with them. Although the doors were shut, Jesus came and stood among them and said, ‘Peace be with you.’ Then he said to Thomas, ‘Put your finger here and see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it in my side. Do not doubt but believe.’ Thomas answered him, ‘My Lord and my God!’ Jesus said to him, ‘Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.’
Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book. But these are written so that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name.
Sermon for the Second Sunday of Easter
This matter of Christian faith will never be a matter of what you can get your hands on.
We human beings thrive on touch, on embrace, on a physical exchange of warmth and delight as we meet one another. We were deprived of this during these past two and a half years, and it was a terrible loss.
It is a feature of our human existence that we surround ourselves with material things that serve as reminders of joyful events in our lives and beloved persons who have been part of them.
But sometimes we want to cling to these things, material things. It is natural not to want to let go.
Have you ever gone on a vacation that you wanted to remember forever? As a child, or even now? I used to always want to buy something in a National Park gift shop, to remember the wonderful vacation by. To put in a little box to take home with me, to hold in my hand, to set on my shelf so that I wouldn’t forget
it, ever. These things accumulate. Our sense of the necessity of having a visible, physical reminder of a marvellous experience changes.
But though we mature and grow out of having to buy a souvenir in every gift shop we visit, we remain weak human creatures—-we need love and reassurance and familiar things around us—-for many, it is things that remind us who we are and how much we matter.
This is why it is so hard to go through the possessions of someone we have loved who has died. These material things signify aspects of a life that we cannot cling to, cannot hold forever. We have witnessed its unfolding, we have participated in its fullness and beauty. But it has passed, and we must let it go. That beloved person now stands in the presence of the risen Christ.
And Jesus—-the triumphant, risen and ascended Jesus—-how do we appropriate this Jesus now, having, like Thomas, missed him that first week when he manifested his very self to the disciples?
We have nothing of Jesus’s things—-the Handkerchief of Veronica, the Shroud of Turin, among others, demonstrated to be forgeries—all the relics so
trafficked in the Middle Ages were simply manifestations of the need to touch something, even own something, that Jesus himself had touched.
But material things will not, in the end, give us back the person we loved.
We remember Jesus in our act of Eucharist, celebrated in the midst of the worshipping community—a solemn and joyful commemoration. Beyond this, how do we appropriate this Jesus so that he lives in us and among us?
The single thing to ponder from this story for today is that in the end, Thomas didn’t follow through on his demand to touch the hands and side of Jesus.
Once Jesus stood before him, the risen and returned Jesus, there, gazing directly at him, knowing what Thomas had laid down as a condition of believing—once Thomas stood in the presence of Jesus, he knew. He didn’t have to touch anything; he didn’t have to extend his hands and reach them out and feel the wounds that Jesus’s body still bore. Jesus was risen indeed, but not unwounded and unmarked.
The sheer presence of Jesus must have been unmistakeable and powerful—so unmistakeable, so powerful—that the response Thomas could not but make was immediate:
My Lord and My God!
He saw, and he no longer had to touch what he saw in order to believe. But Jesus’s parting words to him were:
Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.
For those of us who cannot confront the wounded but risen Jesus, cannot be illuminated by the sheer force of his radiant presence— the One who overcame the darkness of the tomb—-what confession do we make?
We are like Mary Magdalene, who in her grief mistook the risen Jesus for the gardener. We read this passage one week ago, on Easter. There are many famous paintings of this scene: it is traditionally called Noli me tangere, from the Latin. And it has traditionally been translated Do not touch me! Titian, among others, painted this scene in an unforgettable painting of the year 1514. It is in the National Gallery. Go and sit in front of it.
A better translation, though, is Do not hold on to me, or Do not cling to me! And this is something we find it almost impossible not to want to do.
Jesus had returned to his beloved followers to bring them reassurance and to bring them peace. But they wanted to hold on to him, so that they would know what to do next. They had no idea what all this meant, and it would just have been easier if Jesus had come back to stay.
Those first followers couldn’t imagine a life without being a physical follower of Jesus: observing him, listening to him, touching him, doing what he asked of them. But now they couldn’t. Now they had to open themselves to imagine a future where their mission would be to proclaim this risen and triumphant Jesus to all the world. To those who, like us, had not had the privilege and the wonder of seeing Jesus, like Mary, and like Thomas.
So we return to that question: Jesus—-the triumphant, risen and ascended Jesus —-how do we appropriate this Jesus now, having, like Thomas, missed him that first week when he manifested his very self to the disciples?
Jesus left us his peace, and he left us the gift of the Holy Spirit. And these gifts remain. As we pray for these gifts to be manifest in our lives they will make the power of Jesus’s presence real to us.
As to Peter and those first disciples in Jerusalem, the Christian life is entrusted to us as a response of witness to the truth of the Risen Jesus. It is hard, sometimes, to be always conscious of this great task. But the Holy Spirit never leaves us, and it is this same Holy Spirit that is always moving throughout the earth, in every place, at all times. In ways unknown to us, but real and powerfully felt by those whose lives are touched by its reality, the Spirit moves.
Our response can only be, like Thomas: My Lord and My God! May we be made joyful, in this Easter season, by the reality of Jesus with us. Amen!
The Revd Dana English
The United Benefice of Holland Park, London
April 24th, 2022