by CCW | 11 April 2010 15:01
Peace and forgiveness flow from the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. They are the first-fruits of his resurrection in us, it seems, at least as this is signaled in John’s Gospel. Jesus appears behind closed doors where the disciples are huddled in fear. He proclaims peace and forgiveness. He institutes the means by which his peace and his forgiveness continue with us – through the Holy Spirit breathed upon the disciples who will be the apostles of his church. They are sent forth to bestow the peace and the forgiveness of God to a fearful and an uncertain world, a world of darkness and deceit, a cruel and dangerous world, “as everybody knows”. “Whosoever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them; and whosoever sins ye retain, they are retained”.
What an awesome charge! And, yet, how little understood. Sometimes known as ‘the power of the keys’, the proclamation of God’s forgiveness through the ordained ministry to his penitent people effects what it signifies. If we truly confess our sins and truly seek God’s forgiveness, then we receive the grace of forgiveness objectively proclaimed in the words of absolution pronounced by the priest and signified in the sign of the cross. We are forgiven. That is the grace which extends from the Upper Room “the same day at evening”, the day of the resurrection of Christ. It is as if we are there in that very moment and in that very room, as if time has stopped and we are caught up into eternity.
Our lessons point us to something very simple and quite profound. It is this. The sacramental life of the Church is no mere empty show. Something happens in the liturgy. There is the grace of the sacrament of absolution; there is the grace of our incorporation into the life of the Trinity through the sacrament of baptism; there is the grace of our continuing to be sustained and nourished in that divine life through the sacrament of the altar. The sacraments flow out of the passion and resurrection of Christ. We participate now sacramentally and liturgically in the redeeming work of Christ. At every service, Christ appears, as it were, behind closed doors to speak peace and forgiveness to us all and to bestow healing and salvation upon us all.
For “this is the victory that overcomes the world, even our faith.” We participate in what Christ has done for us. His death and resurrection, as the Collect makes clear, are our justification, thereby making us right with God, with ourselves and with one another. Our justification is in him. What Christ has done is attributed to us, placed upon us, imputed or extended to us. We have only to live it. That, of course, is the greatest challenge. But the Father looks down upon our sinful and sorry humanity and sees his Son, Jesus Christ. His victory over our sins means our victory over all that stands opposed to God. This is our faith. It means our willing acceptance of what has been accomplished for us; only then does the grace of his life begin to live in us.
The closed doors of our minds have to be opened to the presence of Christ within through what is proclaimed and made visible in the liturgy of the Church. That opening of our minds is the life of Christ’s resurrection in us, banishing our fears and bestowing his peace, vanquishing our sins and pronouncing his forgiveness.
This gospel passage stands between the story of Mary Magdalene coming to the tomb in her early morning grief and the story of Christ appearing in the same room proclaiming the peace of his resurrection to ‘doubting’ Thomas who was not present “that same day at evening”. Both stories bear eloquent testimony to the resurrection and its meaning for us in our lives. Both Mary and Thomas undergo a change, a resurrection of their understanding, if you will; the griefs of the one and the doubts of the other are transformed into cries of faith and witness. They are raised up out of their sorrow and uncertainty. “If we receive the witness of men, the witness of God is greater.” This is the witness which Mary and Thomas receive and pass on to us.
These stories show us that the testimony of the resurrection is no story of human fancy and invention. The resurrection is the great re-creative work of God. We can only enter into the mystery which God has made known to us by “the Spirit and the water and the blood”. In so doing we are raised up out of the tombs of our souls; the closed doors of our minds are opened by the presence of Christ in our midst. Such is his victory for us and in us, if only we will live it.
Here it is proclaimed. Here it is made visible. By “the Spirit and the water and the blood” in the sacramental life of the Church.
Fr. David Curry
Octave Day of Easter
April 11th, 2010
Source URL: https://christchurchwindsor.ca/2010/04/11/sermon-for-the-octave-day-of-easter-2/
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