Sermon April 11, 1999 Peace and Forgiveness on Easter based on John 20:19-23
Jesus Christ is risen! He is risen indeed! (Grace to you and peace from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.) Amen.
Do you know that the southernmost point of Africa has for centuries experienced tremendous storms. For many years no one even knew what lay beyond that cape, for no ship attempting to round that point had ever returned to tell the tale. Among the ancients it was known as the "Cape of Storms," and for good reason. But then a Portuguese explorer in the sixteenth century, Vasco De Gama, successfully sailed around that very point and found beyond the wild raging storms, a great calm sea, and beyond that, the shores of India. The name of that cape was changed from the Cape of Storms to the Cape of Good Hope.
Until Jesus Christ rose from the dead, death had been the cape of storms on which all hopes of life beyond had been wrecked. No one knew what lay beyond that point until, on Easter morning Christ showed us. His disciples trembled in fear, even after seeing evidence of His resurrection. Eventually, Christ turns their Cape of Storms into a Cape of Good Hope with His appearance and the peace He brings.
Our Gospel lesson today continues on where last week's lesson left off. Mary discovers the empty tomb, Peter and John see the cloths in the tomb and finally Jesus appears to Mary. In the evening the disciples remain behind locked doors. Notice that they were still quite fearful, for they did not have just one door locked, but the plural "doors." As they are hiding away, they probably did not expect what would happen next. Jesus just appears in the room. It doesn't say He came in through a secret opening and the doors were locked. There is no indication of any motion on His part. Rather than moving to get in their midst, He simply was there. Jesus comes in a supernatural fashion to be in the midst of these fearful disciples.
We hold in our church body the belief that Jesus could perform supernatural action with His body. Those churches part of the so-called "Reformed" tradition hold that Christ is limited by His body. Reformed churches trace their teaching to John Calvin. They would expect that once the Son of God was conceived in Mary He had to endure the limitations of a human body.
The Reformed churches have a hard time explaining Jesus' appearance among the disciples in our text. They would say that He had to sneak in or come in some other ordinary way. They discount the supernatural explanation and go with something from "reason." Perhaps they say the doors were not really locked. This appearance must be supernatural, as the text so indicates. The doors were locked and Jesus simply appeared without moving into position. He clearly went beyond the limitations of the human body, but God has no trouble with that.
The Reformed would further believe that Jesus can only be in one place at one time. Since He is at the right hand of the Father in heaven, He cannot be with us in the Lord's Supper. So, for the Reformed, the bread and wine only symbolize a Christ who remains in heaven. It becomes confusing when other Lutherans recently declared that there are no substantial differences between what they believe and several of the Reformed bodies believe about the Lord's Supper.
We would instead confess as the historic Christian church has confessed, that Christ has both a full human and a full divine nature, since He was conceived and at this time and on to eternity. Jesus has both natures but He is not limited to being present with His body in only one place at one time.
Perhaps you find yourself trying to explain God's supernatural actions away in some natural means. Do you ever find yourself doubting Christ's resurrection? Did He really perform all those healings? You wonder how might He have fed the 5000, without actually performing a miracle. Then, when appearing to the disciples as our text mentions, did He really climb in through the window? Does He really come to us in His body and blood in the Lord's Supper?
Our reason will often try to trick us into discounting the supernatural explanation for Christ's actions. The supernatural is beyond the natural. We have such a wonderful field of science which explains how things work and why they work the way they do. With this in mind, our reason wants to apply science to Christ to hold that everything Christ did can be explained away in terms of scientific processes. We might think they are just natural events.
This sort of doubting is sinful. We imagine Christ is not as powerful as He truly is. Being God, there is nothing that is beyond His reach. Truly, the resurrection itself shows this. Even though Christ was truly and fully dead for three days, He arose again to appear before the disciples living.
Often Thomas is made a scapegoat of all doubting. Yet, whether we doubt or sin in some other way, we all have sins to confess before God. Our sinfulness drove Christ to the cross.
Now, in our text, Christ appears, not dead on the cross, but alive in the middle of the disciples. He appears and gives them a greeting, "Peace to you!" This is a common greeting, but from Christ, it is much more. It is more than just words, instead it has power to give what it says. Christ really gives peace with these words. With the words He also shows His hands and side, exposing the wounds which were the very price which paid for that peace.
It is a powerful thing to realize Jesus bore the marks of His crucifixion. He showed the evidence, the receipt, if you will, that the debt was paid. Those marks are there for all people, regardless of what we do.
Think about it. It is not the faith of the disciples that put those wounds there. They didn't do something to cause them to appear. We did not do anything either. The marks are the objective evidence as to what Christ secured for us upon the cross. His wounds are already there for you and I. It is not our decision or our will that puts those wounds in place. The work is done, the deed is accomplished, the strife is over. The wounds declare that our sins are forgiven.
Jesus' greeting, "Peace to you," can properly be understood as an absolution. Absolution is having our sins forgiven. It means being told they are forgiven. Even those these disciples had fled Jesus, denied Him and failed to defend Him, He came and offered absolution. All that they did and still He comes to give them this. The peace He gives and the extended pierced hands and side takes all their guilt away.
The text reports that the disciples were overjoyed when they saw the Lord. To hear His words of peace, to see Him alive, and to see His sacrificial wounds must have been emotionally overwhelming for them. They rejoiced at seeing the Lord.
A second time Jesus says to them, "Peace to you." Then He commissions the disciples to be apostles, ones who are sent. Just as Jesus was sent from the Father, so the apostles are sent from Jesus. In the same was as Jesus was sent, so to the disciples are now sent. Sent to do what? This is where the peace comes in. Jesus gives them peace again, because they are to carry this peace out into a peace-less world. The summary of the Gospel is the peace that we have with God, having been reconciled and justified through Christ's wounds. Ephesians 6:15 calls it a Gospel of peace. Those who are to bring peace need to have received this peace.
This is a peace which the world needs to hear. We might think of Kosovo now when we think of a place needing peace. Yet, we need not look further than our own hearts to see one who needs to have peace with God. Our own sins separate us from God, but He offers us peace through Jesus' sacrifice upon the cross and forgiveness through His resurrection. Knowing that peace ourselves, then we can carry it out to all people. Each and every person in the world needs to hear of the peace they already have in Christ, for the wounds are already on His hands and side.
The Holy Spirit was given in the sending of these disciples to be apostles and also is given authority regarding sins. Jesus says, "If you forgive anyone his sins, they are forgiven; if you do not forgive them, they are not forgiven." The acts of forgiving and not-forgiving sins are the two supreme acts for which the disciples are sent and equipped. Jesus wants the forgiveness of sins dispensed to sinners who acknowledge their sinfulness. Those who deny they are sinners or who deny particular sins are those who thereby refuse Christ's forgiveness. To those who refuse His forgiveness, Jesus wants His forgiveness withheld. As Jesus now grants this power to His church, those who are sent are to act in His stead. He will act through them. To act in Jesus' stead means to act in His office or place. In fact, this power to forgive or not forgive sins is called "The Office of the Keys," based on the text of Matthew 16:19. There it is described as the keys to heaven. Forgiveness of sins opens the door to heaven, but unforgiveness closes that door.
The text speaks of forgiveness with the meaning of the guilt of sin being sent away. Indeed the guilt for sin is removed from the sinner completely, as far as east is from west. Their sins are thrown into the sea. They are blotted out so that the Lord Himself will not remember them.
The unrepentant ones, those who refuse forgiveness, will experience the opposite. Their sins will be retained. Their guilt will hold fast to them. The sinner who rejects Christ's free grace will instead find his sins so tightly fixed upon him that he cannot escape them now or ever. Judgment finds him thus with guilt still attached and he is doomed.
This power to forgive and not forgive sins is granted to all true believers in Christ, which is the Holy Christian Church. Believers assemble in congregations and call pastors to serve them. The pastor serves as a public administrator of this office of the keys in public worship.
In our service today, we confessed our sins:
O almighty God, merciful Father, I, a poor, miserable sinner, confess unto Thee all my sins and iniquities with which I have ever offended Thee and justly deserved Thy temporal and eternal punishment.
OR
O almighty God, merciful Father, I, a poor, miserable sinner, confess unto you all my sins and iniquities with which I have ever offended you and justly deserved your punishment now and forever.
Then we heard the absolution, spoken by the pastor, exercising the office of the keys:
in the stead and by the command of my Lord Jesus Christ I forgive you all your sins in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost (Spirit).
Many fail to understand what is happening when the Pastor says "I forgive." They mistake it to be a personal forgiveness from the pastor. They get confused because they will rightly remember that only God can forgive sins. This absolution, however, is spoken through the authority God granted to His church to forgive and not forgive sins. Thus the office of the keys is executed in our public services in our general confession and absolution.
Individual confession and absolution is also available. This is a special opportunity to hear from the pastor on an individual basis the forgiveness of your sins. Sins which are particularly a burden to the Christian are confessed in confidence to the pastor, who then gives a personal absolution. It is, of course, not a requirement as some church bodies would make it, but rather a freely available source of God's rich grace. It is yet another supply God provides.
In the time of Luther, individual confession and absolution was regularly practiced before one communed. It included confession of sins, but also a period of questioning regarding Christian beliefs. This would establish the confession of faith necessary for fellowship in the Lord's Supper. This practice has fallen into disuse in the last two or three generations.
This seems to be a sad failure of that which our Lutheran Confessions call us to practice. Luther wrote in one of our Confessions, the Smalcald Articles, the following:
Since absolution or the power of the keys, which was instituted by Christ in the Gospel, is a consolation and help against sin and a bad conscience, confession and absolution should by no means be allowed to fall into disuse in the church, especially for the sake of timid consciences and for the sake of untrained young people who need to be examined and instructed in Christian doctrine.
In our congregation, from your Pastor, individual confession and absolution is readily available for any who desire it. We continue to strive to practice the Gospel in all its wonderful forms which God gave us. As Christ showed the disciples the marks of His wounds, our desire is to also show you His marks, so that you might know that your sins too are forgiven, through the one who was crucified but has risen again, Jesus Christ. Christ is Risen! He is Risen Indeed! Amen.
Now may the peace of God which passes all understanding keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.