Easter creates Alleluias, a heavenly drama, and a
new Presence empowering mission and forgiveness.
Between
Easter and Pentecost, the Lectionary takes the first reading each Sunday from
the New Testament book of Acts rather than from the Hebrew scriptures – from
the witness of the apostles instead of the witness of Moses and the prophets.
As Acts tells
it, the people with the Easter message encountered opposition!
Peter and his
associates are dragged into court for disturbing the peace! The Easter message, and the healing power of
Jesus’ name, get people all worked up.
The authorities who try to suppress the message are the same authorities
who turned over Jesus to the Romans for crucifixion. They are the protectors of the status quo in
the Jerusalem of Pilate. (All this is
reported in Acts 3-4:22, before our reading,)
In our reading,
the apostles once again have done jail time and are being warned yet again not
to use the name of Jesus in public in Jerusalem . The Judean authorities are concerned that
telling the story of Jesus keeps alive their responsibility for his death –
“you are determined to bring this man’s blood on us” (verse 28, NRSV ). Peter tells them, “We must obey God rather
than any human authority.” The apostles
take their stand as witnesses of the resurrection, in the face of the
establishment.
In making his
reply to the Jerusalem council,
Peter repeats in short form the message that
is causing the trouble. Jesus, whom you
killed, was raised by the God of the ancestors and now sits at the right hand
of God, exercising power as Leader and Savior on behalf of Israel ,
to whom he offers repentance and forgiveness of sins.
The business
of the witnessing apostles is to show the presence of this heavenly power by
bringing joy and healing to the people.
Psalm 150.
In the Psalms
we hear a great overflowing of Alleluias!
This is the
last psalm of the book (in the Western Christian tradition; Eastern Christians
have one more). It is one unbroken
sequence of Hallelujahs (translated “praise the Lord” or “praise
him”). This is simply the intensified
conclusion of a series of Hallelujah psalms that begins with Psalm 146.
The Greek
translation of the Psalms, used by the early Christians, does not translate this
praise shout, but gives it in its Hebrew form, “Alleluia.” This stands at the beginning of each of psalms
146 to 150, in the Greek
translation. The Latin scriptures and
liturgy took over this Greek form and gave us all the Alleluia choruses of
Western church music.
Some churches
have a tradition of giving up “Alleluia!” for Lent. They avoid using the praise shout during the
46 days from Ash Wednesday until Easter.
Then, it breaks forth with a riotous joy at the Easter news. This psalm reading is an insistent reclaiming
of the joyfulness of praise after that period of penitence and searching.
In this Year
C of the Lectionary, the Epistle readings during Easter season are taken from
the New Testament book of Revelation.
This first
reading for the season continues the spirit of the Psalm: it is mainly doxology. It is presented here, however, as the seer’s
beginning of his letter to the seven churches.
As the Easter season unfolds, glimpses and scenes of the vast visions of
God’s completing the new creation are shown from the book of Revelation, but
the opening is a revelation to the churches themselves of the heavenly glory of
the risen Christ.
The
benedictions proceed by triads.
The first prayer asks for peace from God, “who is and who was and who is
to come” (verse 4, NRSV ). Note it is not “who is to be,” a more Greek
ontological turn, but “who is to come,” the active perspective of salvation
history.
Peace is also
asked from Jesus Christ, who is also characterized by a triad: “the faithful witness, the firstborn of the
dead, and the ruler of the kings of the earth.”
The faithful witness was performed in the earthly ministry of Jesus, the
firstborn of the dead is the victory over death signaled by the resurrection,
and the rule over the kings of the earth is the assurance of Jesus’ heavenly
rule, later to become more dramatically evident in this book of visions.
The drama
continues with an exclamation. Someone
sees it:
Look! He is coming with the clouds;
every eye will
see him,
even those who
pierced him (verse 7).
And over the scene
of the one coming on the clouds the voice of God is heard:
I am the Alpha and
the Omega.
For what lies
ahead for God’s people, no vision is too vast or comprehensive.
The Gospel
reading for the 2nd Sunday in Easter is the same every year.
A week after
Easter, these things are emphasized: (1)
the joy of the disciples in the presence of the risen Jesus, (2) the
physicality of Jesus in this temporary presence to his believers, (3) the gift
of the Holy Spirit that brings forgiveness of sins, and, (4) in the Thomas
episode, “the transition from sight to faith.”
The Gospel
narrates the appearance of Jesus to the disciples as they are gathered
furtively in a locked room. Jesus
appears mysteriously among them, but his body is real. (John’s Gospel here re-tells the appearance
story given in Luke
24:36-43 ,
with the doubting Thomas episode added to it.)
There is
strong emphasis on the solid, physical aspect of Jesus’ resurrected body. It is a body not only seen but firm to the
touch. This emphasis on Jesus’ body
seems to increase as the traditions of the resurrection appearances
develop. In the early empty-tomb
tradition, Jesus is not present at all; then he is only seen; but in this upper
room tradition in Luke and John his body is touched and he eats and drinks.
In his appearance
to the disciples, Jesus commissions them for their work ahead. He “breathes” the Holy Spirit into them
and solemnly pronounces, “Receive the Holy Spirit” (verse 22). The climax of this action, however, really
has to do with the forgiveness of sins. “If you [who have received the
Holy Spirit] forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the
sins of any, they are retained” (verse 23).
This is an
awesome authorization! It is an early
stage in a long history of the Christian Church’s rituals of absolution. (The
equivalent in the Gospel According to Matthew is in Matthew 16:18-19.)
Our passage
includes the episode of doubting Thomas. Once the emphasis upon the physicality of the
risen Jesus began, this Thomas episode was probably inevitable.
What does it
take to convince some people? “Unless I
see” with my own eyes, etc., I will not believe. That the demand for physical seeing and
touching has already missed the nature of religious faith has long been
recognized. The seeing can always be further questioned, further explained. That is not what having faith is about, not
the kind of faith that creates a spirit-empowered life and the forgiveness of
sins.
William Temple comments on
this Thomas episode:
The Lord is calling His followers to enter on the
transition ‘from sight to faith’ – from outward companionship to inward
communion, from the discipleship which rests on a bodily Presence to one which
is perfected in spiritual union. (Readings
in St. John’s Gospel, p. 376)
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