Thursday in Easter Week: Peace Be With You

Today's Scripture Readings

Acts 3: 11-26 (NRSV)
 

While the lame man whom Peter and John had healed clung to them, all the people ran together to them in the portico called Solomon's Portico, utterly astonished. When Peter saw it, he addressed the people, "You Israelites, why do you wonder at this, or why do you stare at us, as though by our own power or piety we had made him walk? The God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, the God of our ancestors has glorified his servant Jesus, whom you handed over and rejected in the presence of Pilate, though he had decided to release him. But you rejected the Holy and Righteous One and asked to have a murderer given to you, and you killed the Author of life, whom God raised from the dead. To this we are witnesses. And by faith in his name, his name itself has made this man strong, whom you see and know; and the faith that is through Jesus has given him this perfect health in the presence of all of you.

"And now, friends, I know that you acted in ignorance, as did also your rulers. In this way God fulfilled what he had foretold through all the prophets, that his Messiah would suffer. Repent therefore, and turn to God so that your sins may be wiped out, so that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord, and that he may send the Messiah appointed for you, that is, Jesus, who must remain in heaven until the time of universal restoration that God announced long ago through his holy prophets. Moses said, `The Lord your God will raise up for you from your own people a prophet like me. You must listen to whatever he tells you. And it will be that everyone who does not listen to that prophet will be utterly rooted out of the people.' And all the prophets, as many as have spoken, from Samuel and those after him, also predicted these days. You are the descendants of the prophets and of the covenant that God gave to your ancestors, saying to Abraham, `And in your descendants all the families of the earth shall be blessed.' When God raised up his servant, he sent him first to you, to bless you by turning each of you from your wicked ways."

Psalm 8 (BCP, P. 592)


Luke 24: 36b-48 (NRSV)

While the disciples were talking about how they had seen Jesus risen from the dead, Jesus himself stood among them and said to them, "Peace be with you." They were startled and terrified, and thought that they were seeing a ghost. He said to them, "Why are you frightened, and why do doubts arise in your hearts? Look at my hands and my feet; see that it is I myself. Touch me and see; for a ghost does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have." And when he had said this, he showed them his hands and his feet. While in their joy they were disbelieving and still wondering, he said to them, "Have you anything here to eat?" They gave him a piece of broiled fish, and he took it and ate in their presence.

Then he said to them, "These are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you-- that everything written about me in the law of Moses, the prophets, and the psalms must be fulfilled." Then he opened their minds to understand the scriptures, and he said to them, "Thus it is written, that the Messiah is to suffer and to rise from the dead on the third day, and that repentance and forgiveness of sins is to be proclaimed in his name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things."

Blog Reflection

What ever the different opinions of who Jesus was that are out there, it is pretty hard to not see that he must have been an extraordinary person to rise from the dead, and go to his disciples who abandoned him while he hung dying on the Cross, and his first words spoken to them were: "Peace be with you."  It is one thing to talk about loving a friend who has betrayed or left you in your hour of need.  It is quite another to do it and be authentic about it. 

This kind of thing puts a very different perspective on the kinds of things we face when we are rejected by someone close to us.  Jesus had been crucified.  He suffered for six long hours, bleeding and dying of suffocation.  The only disciple believed to come to him at the foot of the Cross was John as he beheld Mary.   Peter, the guy speaking to the crowds in reading from Acts today, denied Jesus three times.  When Jesus rises from the dead, he does not go to the disciples in anger to tirade them about not being at the Cross with him.  He does not scold them for their lack of faith when Mary Magdalene and the others brought them news of his resurrection.  Jesus wishes them peace.  He opens for them the Scriptures that referred to Jesus and all that he had accomplished.  There was no shame, just God's mercy and tender love.

As a gay man who has known a great deal of grief and hardship at the hands and words of Christians, I find this a difficult Gospel to digest.  On one hand I would love to go to those Christianists who are working to pass the MN Marriage Amendment this upcoming November and wish them God's peace.  On the other, I am angry as hell that I may not have the power to stop them.  I am also a Christian who claims belief in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ by which my sins and those of the one's who are determined to keep me and my partner, and other LGBT couples in Minnesota, second class citizens, are forgiven.  I still have to regard them as sisters and brothers in the Lord, however much I might despise or disagree with their actions towards the LGBT communities.  I need the peace that comes from the Risen Christ, to help me to have that peace within myself, so that I can be the best example I can be, even to those who disregard my citizenship as among God's adopted children.  This in no way means that I excuse what they are doing, nor that I necessarily have to be their new best friend, or be converted to their way of thinking, believing or acting in order to be a good Christian.  It also does not mean that I give up my work for equality, inclusion and justice, that I might allow them to validate the falsehood of their messages of hate and violence regarding LGBT people.  It does mean, that I must wish and pray for God's peace in them as I do myself, and anyone else for that matter.

Do we wish for peace for everyone in our lives?   Even for those who hurt us? 

Are we peace makers in our work places, churches, communities and homes?  

Are we at work to bring peace to those who are poor, hurting, oppressed and without the means of obtaining peace in their lives without some kind of help?

Is there the peace of the Risen Christ in your heart and life, as you face the challenges that are before you?

Whether we are experiencing joy because of the good things going on in our life, or we are hurting and discouraged, the Risen Christ comes to us and says: "Peace be with you."   Jesus Christ, risen from the dead is our peace.  He is the peace that is not necessarily the absence of conflict, but that peace even while enduring the most war like moments in our lives.  Whether we live the Gospel faithfully, or if we struggle just to get along with that co-worker that drives us crazy.  Jesus Christ is our peace that the world around us cannot give.  Can we trust in that peace today, so that we may bring that same peace to the world around us?


Prayers

Almighty and everlasting God, who in the Paschal mystery
established the new covenant of reconciliation: Grant that all
who have been reborn into the fellowship of Christ's Body
may show forth in their lives what they profess by their faith;
through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you
and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.  (Collect for Thursday in Easter Week, Book of Common Prayer, p. 223).


Lord Jesus Christ, you said to your apostles, "Peace I give to
you; my peace I leave with you:" Regard not our sins,
but the faith of your Church, and give to us the peace and
unity of that heavenly city, where with the Father and the
Holy Spirit you live and reign, now and for ever. Amen. (Prayer for Peace, Book of Common Prayer, p. 107).


Most holy God, the source of all good desires, all right
judgements, and all just works: Give to us, your servants, that
peace which the world cannot give, so that our minds may be
fixed on the doing of your will, and that we, being delivered
from the fear of all enemies, may live in peace and quietness;
through the mercies of Christ Jesus our Savior. Amen.  (A Collect for Peace, Book of Common Prayer, p. 123).