Tuesday, April 21, 2009

Tuesday, April 21, 2009

Today’s text

Luke 24:36-40

They were still talking about all this when [Jesus] himself stood among them and said to them, 'Peace be with you!' In a state of alarm and fright, they thought they were seeing a ghost. But he said, 'Why are you so agitated, and why are these doubts stirring in your hearts? See by my hands and my feet that it is I myself. Touch me and see for yourselves; a ghost has no flesh and bones as you can see I have. And as he said this he showed them his hands and his feet.

Reflection

You are as wonderfully and tangibly as real as ever, Jesus. Amid the fears of human souls, you come with words of peace in flesh and bone.

Touch for yourselves, you say. And touch we must. For we need to see and know you alive and real and loving us. Failing this, we can barely believe.

But with the touch of risen flesh in eyes of faith we can and know that you live and live here among us, in the flesh and bone of the gathered community of those who love and long for you.

Leading us to constantly question: where do we see your hands and feet? What hands become for us the blessed hands of your blessing for us? Where do we see the suffering love, wounded in faithfulness to the great love of the One whose grace is unending?

What feet carry to us the word or your reality, bearing it into the midst of common days we had imagined forsaken and empty of divine presence?

Surprising is how you sometimes come to us. You come in the guise of those we were ready to reject, those we were prepared to defend ourselves against.

Where we least expect, where we expect condemnation or trouble or rejection, even there you have come to me in flesh and bone and words of peace. And I did not fear. No, my fearing soul instantly was transformed into a singing soul.

I felt alive, truly alive, as alive as you who come in flesh and bone. It is good feel this alive. Very good.

Pr. David L. Miller