Terrified.
That's how the disciples are described in the Gospel today. Terrified at the appearance of
Jesus.
We, too, should be terrified. Not at the prospect of ghosts walking through the walls or because
Jesus has become something different in the resurrection – but because God has resurrected the Jesus that
we all know. The same Jesus that was teaching before the crucifixion is resurrected to teach those same
principles.
Jesus wasn't safe before the crucifixion and he has not become safer in the process of dying and
being raised. You would think that he might have learned something in being tortured and killed and
betrayed. You would think he might have been resurrected and said, "OK, now we'll try a different
approach." But he didn't. Jesus was tortured and killed by the authorities and betrayed by his friends and
came back to be the very same Jesus that had caused the authorities to be so afraid in the first
place.
The Jesus that shows up on the evening after the resurrection is the same Jesus that the disciples
knew. We would say that he has the same personality or the same core values as the Jesus the disciples had
known and loved.
So what were some of those values that we might find terrifying?
Just 72 hours earlier Jesus had been at a meal with his disciples. He took off his robe, wrapped a
towel around himself and washed their feet. Then he said to them that this is what he means by loving one
another. "You should love as I have loved you." He gave his life in loving those friends and they knew
what real love meant to him.
Now he is back and is speaking of forgiveness. When that love that he had commanded had failed and
all of his friends ran away, he showed up to explain that in God's love there is no failure, there is only
forgiveness. He speaks of forgiveness of the sins of the world, beginning with forgiveness for those who
had betrayed him the most.
“Love as I have loved you. Forgive as you have been forgiven.”
Here is one of the core values of Jesus that might terrify us. Forgive as you have been forgiven.
God announced the forgiveness of the sins of the world to those who had betrayed him the most. Jesus
didn't appear before Pilate and ask that a proclamation be sent throughout the Roman Empire. He didn't
appear to the soldiers who had nailed his body to the cross – nor did he tell the Jewish authorities who
were so afraid of him that they had him arrested and killed. He told his friends who had betrayed him that
they should announce forgiveness to the world.
That is still our task as Christians, to proclaim the good news of God's forgiving grace in this
broken world. But how did the disciples think that they should go about doing that, and how should we? Did
they run into the streets of Jerusalem and shout, “All ye all ye in come free! The game's over and we all
get forgiven and get to go to home base!” We certainly want to proclaim God's forgiveness to all people as
they come into a relationship with Jesus and begin to understand the wonderful gifts God has given us, but
I believe the disciples would have taken a more personal approach because that is what had been modeled
for them by Jesus.
I believe that they would have taken seriously the teaching of Jesus to pray to the Father to
forgive us as we have been forgiven. That is a hard task.
We had a fellow pastor from another tradition come and speak to us about forgiveness a couple of
years ago as part of the Stephen Ministry training. I remember two of the things he said because they were
so difficult.
First, in order to forgive we must decide not to take vengeance for the wrongs that are done to
us. There still may be consequences for the behavior, but not revenge or vengeance. If someone steals
something from my home and the police catch the person, he will likely lose some of his freedoms and may
even spend time in jail. But I don't get to go to his house and take the clothes away from his children in
order to teach him a lesson about stealing. That is what vengeance is about, teaching someone a lesson
that I think they need to learn.
Jesus didn't do that. He didn't go to Pilate saying, "See, I really am the Son of God and now I
want you to crucify those Jewish leaders who brought me to you." He didn't take vengeance on anyone. We
have to wonder, at this point, "How will they learn not to steal if I don't teach them a lesson?" Perhaps
that is not the lesson that we are meant to teach. Perhaps we are meant to teach forgiveness and they will
have to learn about not stealing in another way. I have to say that I think it would be easier (on me) to
teach them a lesson about stealing. But that is not my place.
The second difficult thing about forgiveness is that we have to decide to pay the price of
forgiveness. That means paying the cost of the sin rather than asking the person who has hurt us to pay
the cost. That is what we mean when we say that Jesus is the "atoning sacrifice" for our sins. There are
various words we use to translate a difficult Greek word. Atoning sacrifice, perfect offering or
propitiation are the most common. They all reach back to a Hebrew word that meant the lid of the Ark of
the Covenant.
The lid became known as the "mercy seat" because the blood of an animal was sprinkled on it as a
sign that the animal's blood would be the appropriate cost that God would accept in the forgiveness of the
sins of the people. It is signifying that someone could pay the cost for sin other than the sinner. If I
pay the cost for the sin, then I have the right to forgive the sinner. That is what God did in the death
of Jesus on the cross. He paid the price for sin, for separation from him, by Jesus being separated from
the Father in death. This kind of love and forgiveness is the kind of love and forgiveness that Jesus
teaches us is the way of God.
There is an old fable about paying the price for another. It's not about sin, but you'll get the
idea. William White, from whom I read the story, links the story to Jewish fables.
There were two brothers who farmed together. They shared equally in all the work and in all the
profits from the farm. The brothers each had their own houses and barns. One brother had a large family
and the other brother was single.
One night the brother who lived alone began thinking about his brother's family. "My brother has
so many mouths to feed and so many children to care for. He needs more of the profit from the farm than he
is getting. But he would never accept changing the way we divide things. I think that I will take one sack
of grain out of my barn tonight and sneak over to his barn when all is dark and quiet and give him an
extra sack of grain. Little by little I can do this and he won't notice much of a change."
It happened that the other brother was also thinking that night. He was thinking that his brother
was all alone without any family. "I have all these wonderful children who will take care of me as I grow
old and he has no one but me. He needs some extra security for his old age. I think that I will take one
sack of grain out of my barn tonight and sneak over to his barn when all is dark and quiet and give him an
extra sack of grain. Little by little I can do this and he won't notice much of a change."
Each night the brothers took a sack of grain to the other. They were both perplexed that their
store of grain never seemed to be reduced even though they were giving away a sack every night. This went
on for awhile, and then one night the two brothers met on a small hill between their houses. They dropped
their sacks and hugged each other and laughed at themselves.
It is said that God looked down that very night and declared that hill to be a holy place because
such incredible love had taken place there. The fable goes on to say that this hill is the place where God
told Solomon to build a temple. It was the only place holy enough for God's house.
Each of the brothers was willing to pay a dear price for the life and health of the other. That is
the kind of love God has for us. That is the kind of price Jesus was willing to pay for our lives.
We should be terrified at loving and forgiving this way. It means that we will pay a great price
to forgive others. We should be terrified at following God's call in this way – but we should be
strengthened in knowing how it turns out. By following God's call we enter into a partnership with the
creator of all things that puts us in harmony with the laws of the universe. Laws that are as immutable as
gravity. The laws that say that it is in forgiving that we are forgiven, it is in "giving that we
receive", it is in loving that we truly know what it means to be loved and it is in "dying that we are
born to eternal life."
When we make this choice to live and love as God calls us, we might wonder if it would lead us to
a life without suffering. We would do well to remember that Jesus died on a cross because he chose this
kind of life and love; but remember also the resurrection. We will pay a price when we forgive people, but
we will be given a life without the burden of carrying around the hurts done to us.
We have a choice. We can hang on to life and hang on to hurts, or we can let go and forgive.
Eugene Peterson translated Jesus' words this way. "If you forgive someone's sins, they’re gone for good.
If you don't forgive sins, what are you going to do with them?"
Jesus shows us that in the end God's love will never fail. God's love will be with us and
strengthen us even through pain and death. We are given a great opportunity to love as we have been loved
and to forgive as we have been forgiven, we have only to be willing to pay the price. +
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