Peace be with you
“Woe to you, you unfaithful, betraying, denying, fear-filled former disciples.” That’s what Jesus could have said when he entered the room. Like the ghost of Christmas past in Charles Dickens Christmas Carol, Jesus could have shown his disciples all of their failings in the past.
Instead, Jesus says, “Peace be with you.” He says it twice in his first meeting with the disciples and then again, when Thomas is with them. “Peace” be with you.
Like the Hebrew word “Shalom,” the Greek word for “Peace”, Eirene, can be simply a greeting. But when Jesus says it to his disciples who are hiding behind locked doors out of fear – fear that Judas may betray them too, fear that would be outcasts in their own community, fear that they will be turned over to the Roman authorities as Jesus had been. Into all of their fears, Jesus says, “Peace” be with you.
For those of us who have grown up as Christians, we can almost take for granted Jesus’ resurrection. “Christ is Risen. He is Risen indeed” has been on my lips since I could talk. But when your heart is full of fear, it is hard to get past the fear. And so Jesus does something else. He breathes the Holy Spirit onto the disciples. This is the first giving of the Holy Spirit – not as it comes at Pentecost – with fire – but as simply breath, the breath of God.
For Jesus has come to them, not to scold them or to shame them. Instead, he comes to them with peace, showing them his wounds, his hands and side so that their fear could be turned into joy. And, then with joy-filled hearts, Jesus again says them, “peace be with you” This time, they are ready to receive that peace, a peace that passes all understanding— even for what their heads were telling them could not be - a resurrected Jesus.
This sounds like the end of a good movie. The friends are reconciled, all are filled with peace and good will… and the credits start to roll.
But this is not the end. When Jesus breathes on the disciples and fills them with the breath of God and then says, “As God has sent me, so I send you,” this is the beginning of the disciples’ role as apostles, as “those who are sent.”
Jesus also gives them three instructions. First, “Receive the Holy Spirit.” Then, filled with the Holy Spirit, Jesus gives them authority: “If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven. If you retain the sins of any, they are retained.”
I love the first part: “If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven.” For we are all sinners in need of forgiveness. That is to say, we all do and say things that are not kind, that are not loving and are not in keeping with being and acting in the way Jesus would have us act. We also commit the sins of “omission.” We neglect to share our resources, say a kind word, pray for those who are hurting or advocate for the stranger, the vulnerable or those who have been wronged. And, because of the way our economic and societal system works, we also confess that we sin a community when we don’t care for God’s earth, sea, sky and people. We all desperately need to confess our sins.
In his Small catechism, in the section called, “the office of the keys,” Luther writes, “Confession consists of two parts: one, that we confess our sins; the other, that we receive absolution, or forgiveness, from the pastor or confessor as from God himself, and in no way doubt, but firmly believe that our sins are thereby forgiven before God in heaven.”
We can be confident that, by God’s grace, God will forgive us for God is gracious and merciful and forgives all our sins. You can count on it. And, we need to hear that word from someone with skin on. This is why we almost always begin with confession and absolution – except for the season of Easter in which we focus on giving thanks to God for all God has done. But we normally begin worship with a time of confession – and absolution because you and I each need to hear these words of forgiveness – given for you.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer warns us against skipping to the absolution too quickly, without taking time to truly repent. He writes, that cheap grace is “the grace which amounts to the justification of sin without the justification of the repentant sinner who departs from sin and from whom sins departs.” In other words, it is not enough to say, “My bad. I confess it.” Repentance is more than acknowledging that we sin. It is asking God to help us to become less self-ish and more Christ-like and when we do this, we receive Christ’s costly grace. In giving us forgiveness of sins, we receive a gift that help us to live. Forgiven, we are free to share Christ’s peace with one another.
However… Jesus also tells the disciples: “If you retain the sins of any, they are retained.” This sounds dangerous. Is Jesus really giving mere mortals the authority to retain sins?” I’ll confess it always makes me nervous. Not only do I worry: “Who am I to retain someone else’s sins?” but I also worry about the ways that this power could be abused by us mere mortals. As a result, I often skip over this verse like a hot tamale.
However, as I was preparing for today, I heard this passage read from the Message Bible. And I heard something new! Eugene Peterson translates and interprets this verse a little differently, in the form of a question, “If you don’t forgive sins, what are you going to do with them?”
“If you don’t forgive sins, what are you going to do with them?” This question gives me pause – because we all – I’m assuming – at least I -- have had times in which someone has said something mean or I have been wronged – and I’ve hold onto that grievance. I remember it. It sticks in my craw. I think this is pretty human.
And so what happens to that grievance? Maybe you forgive it – even if the person doesn’t ask for forgiveness. Maybe you forget about it. But…if you hold on to it, if you remember and dwell on the grievance, if it sticks to you and you just can’t forget about it. Then what? “If you don’t forgive it, what are you going to do with it?” Chances are, it festers… under the surface… and hurts you.
Last year I went to my 40th college reunion – how could it be? I’d like to say I was only 9 when I went to college – but that’ wouldn’t be true. But because it was a “big one” I saw a lot of people that I had not seen for a long time. It was fun to reconnect and to hear the life stories of people who I had known at that transformative time in our lives. Except for one person – who had been a part of my close circle in college. Out of nowhere, he said some rather snarky sounding things to me – but the words that he said didn’t actually make much sense so I chose to just let it go. I did not want to spend any time questioning him about it – and neither did anyone else at the table. The subject was quickly changed. Later, someone asked, “what was that about?” I didn’t know and they didn’t either and so the snarkyness was ignored, brushed away as the result of maybe a bad night sleeping in a dorm room again or something else in his life.
But then a month or so ago, I was attending a workshop on prayer and he was there too. It was a Sunday afternoon so I running late – no surprise - and sat in the back. But during the break, he came up to me. We did the usual check-in of “how’s your family” – and then, right before the break ended, he said, “I want to ask your forgiveness for the times in the past when I have been a jerk to you.”
My mind started to race. What is he talking about? Did he mean those snarky comments that I didn’t understand at the reunion? Or was it something else? I paused for just a moment. And in that time, the Holy Spirit gave me a nudge and I realized, “Oh, he’s confessing. He’s asking for forgiveness.” And so, I took another breath and then said, “If you have, I have already forgiven and forgotten it.” He looked a bit surprised. And then there was an awkward pause and – again my mind raced and thought, “Oh, maybe he is asking me to confess something that I have said or done.” And so, I said, “I want to ask you for your forgiveness for the times that I have hurt you.” He looked a little surprised and then smiled and said, “If you have, I have already forgiven and forgotten it.” And in that moment, a felt the warmth of Christ’s peace embrace me.
Peace be with you. Jesus says it three times in today’s Gospel. He says it twice the first time he enters the locked doors to disciples who were afraid. And then, 8 days later, he says it again – maybe especially to Thomas who had not been present with the others, who was having a hard time of believing without seeing. But after seeing Jesus, Thomas responds with profound confession of faith, “My Lord and My God.”
And then Jesus speaks to you and to me, “Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.”
Brothers and sisters, siblings in Christ, Peace be with you. Christ’s peace be with you.
Later today we will share the peace of Christ with one another. This is a time to not just greet one another. This is a holy time in which we are offering the peace of Christ to another in preparation of receiving the gift of Christ’s body and blood. Like Thomas, you are about to see Christ’s wounds in his body and blood.
And so, I invite you to look in someone’s eyes and say, “May Christ’s peace be with you.” And the other person can also say, “May Christ’s peace be with you.” And then, since we did not have confession today, I want you to say, “Christ forgives you all your sins.” And the person receiving them can say Amen. Christ forgives you all your sins.
This is the Good News that we receive today. We receive not a cheap grace, not an easy flippant forgiveness. Rather we receive Christ’s costly grace of love and mercy. And so, brothers and sisters friends in Christ, May Christ’s peace be with you; in Jesus’ name. Amen.