5/31/20
(Acts 2:1-21; Ps. 104:25-35,37; 1 Corinthians 12:3b-13; John 20:37-39)
The men in the family I grew up in tended to be conflict-avoiders. I’ve always thought of this as mostly a good thing, because it recognizes some important truths about life: that we’re all different – God made us each uniquely – and what unites us is more important than what divides us. So the operative principle was, don’t sweat the small stuff; let’s be friends.
Which is fine as far as it goes. But, aside from the fact that that attitude tends to sweep things under the rug that need attention, and can turn into worse problems, it also tends to prevent real listening. Which means that we miss opportunities to learn; to hear truth that we don’t know; to clear up misunderstandings; to recognize new gifts which God is giving us.
I have one near relative in whom this tendency has created a habit which drives me crazy: in conversation, he’ll finish your sentences for you. This is to show that he already understands and agrees with what you’re about to say. Except that, usually, what you were actually about to say isn’t exactly what he says you were about to say. So it’s not really a conversation (even though he thinks everything’s going swimmingly; because he’s not really listening.) Now, in the great scheme of things, this is a tiny complaint. But it relates to a much larger reality of the Christian life which is one of the things we lift up on this day, the day of Pentecost.
In the ECCT, for some years now we’ve had a little document going around titled “Rules of Engagement”, which is a guide for honest, meaningful dialogue. The first two rules are the most important. Rule One: It’s okay to disagree. Rule Two: It’s not okay to blame, shame, or disrespect. (Just think how much our national discourse would be improved if everybody obeyed those rules.) The reality they recognize is that the world is a troubled place: always has been, always will be. And Christian faith looks that square in the face. In the Lord’s prayer, we say, Thy kingdom come. This means we acknowledge that God’s kingdom is mostly not here yet. And God calls us as people of faith to join in bringing it here, making it a reality in this world.
Christians are not conflict avoiders. To the contrary: we look for it. You can’t be part of the healing process if you don’t know what needs to be made whole. It is precisely our mission to look for those places where the world is broken, and to heal, to reconcile. And we are enabled to do this in, and through, the gift of the peace of Christ; which goes hand in hand with the gift of the Holy Spirit.
This is concisely reflected in today’s gospel story from the gospel of John, a resurrection story. This encounter between the risen Jesus and the disciples occurs on the day of resurrection, Easter Day. The disciples, at this point, are paralyzed by fear. They’ve retreated to the house in Jerusalem in which they’ve been meeting and have locked the doors “for fear of the Jews”: that is, fear of the religious authorities (that’s what the words “the Jews” mean in the gospel of John: that small group of people in power) These are the ones who had just tried and convicted Jesus for being a blasphemer and handed him over to the Romans for execution. The disciples – who were of course themselves all Jews, and believed that Jesus was the Messiah, the Chosen One of God, which those authorities had pronounced to be blasphemy, and punishable by death – the disciples are afraid the same thing is going to happen to them. It’s just two days since Jerusalem was boiling over about all this, and the situation’s still very hot. That’s why they’ve locked the doors; and why they themselves are locked in fear, and incomprehension.
Now, today is Pentecost, so probably the main thing you heard in this story was Jesus breathing on the disciples and saying, Receive the Holy Spirit. But the first thing he does when he comes through those locked doors – comes through their fear, their paralysis – the first thing Jesus does is tell them, Peace be with you. This is not a greeting: it’s a gift of the Spirit, which the resurrected Christ is giving them. And before he gets around to the Holy Spirit, he repeats it: Peace be with you. At this point it’s the most important thing he can give them: peace: his own peace.
In the gospel of John Jesus talks about peace only one other time: in chapter 14, in John’s telling of the Last Supper. He has told his disciples that he’s going to die, and he’s giving them his final teaching. He tells them, “I will ask the Father and he will send you another Advocate…the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name.”
But then Jesus gives his own parting gift to them: “Peace I leave with you. My own peace I leave with you.“ The peace that Jesus gives is not a cease-fire. It’s not the absence of conflict. As we heard, Jesus says, “I do not give to you as the world gives.” The peace of Christ lives in the middle of conflict, goes right there; because it’s the one essential, that heals.
Because what we call the peace of Christ is in the knowledge of the resurrection: the knowledge that we are never lost to God; that God reaches right through fear, and ignorance, and death itself: all the different dark powers that threaten us in this life are finally revealed to be powerless, an illusion; it is the knowledge, finally, of what in Christian faith we call our salvation. There, is the peace of Christ. The letter of Paul to the Colossians tells us, “Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts.” In our lives as Christians, as apostles sent out in this chaotic world, may that always be true of us. Thanks be to God.