Luke 24:33-48
April
18, 2021
You may have heard of the movie, Ghost,
with Patrick Swayze, Demi Moore, and Whoopi Goldberg, but have you ever heard
of the movie, Truly, Madly, Deeply? If you have not, you’re probably not
alone. It is a British film, made back in 1990, and it was never widely
circulated in the States as far as I know. It is the kind of arthouse film that
would play at the Belcourt Theater in Nashville, but probably would not have
made it into big movie theater chains. The critic Roger Ebert called it, “The
thinking man’s Ghost.” I loved the move, Ghost, so I was eager to
see this other ghost story.
Truly, Madly, Deeply
stars Alan Rickman and Juliette Stevenson as the two main characters: Jamie and
Nina. Nina is overwhelmed with grief after her boyfriend, Jamie, dies suddenly.
She is mired in her grief and can’t seem to move forward even a small step. To
her disbelieving joy, Jamie returns to her as a ghost, and it would seem that
they would be able to be in relationship with each other once more … other than
she was still alive and he was a ghost.
But Nina quickly realizes that life
with her ghost boyfriend is not the joyful reunion that she thought it would
be. Jamie seems to have a lot of annoying quirks as a ghost, and Nina wonders
if he was always like that. As a ghost, he is cold all the time, so he turns up
the heat to Sahara Desert like levels. He invites his ghost friends over to her
house to watch television all the time at all hours. Jamie, in subtle and not
so subtle ways begins to remind Nina that she is alive and he isn’t; something
that she could not accept on her own.
Nina meets someone, a man named
Mark. She likes him – a lot – but moving forward with him would mean she would
have to let go of Jamie. And this is a wrenching proposition. But Jamie’s
annoying ghostly habits finally push her into letting go. She lets go. She
moves forward. And in the last minutes of the movie, as Nina walks away, Jamie
watches her go and another ghost appears beside him and asks,
“Well?”
And Jamie’s only response is, “Yes.”
You realize that Jamie came back,
not so that he could cling to Nina, but that Nina could finally let him go.
Now, you may be asking, what does
this little story about a movie no one has heard of, have to do with our story
from the gospel of Luke? What does it have to do with our big story from the
whole gospel, from all of scripture? Maybe it doesn’t have much to do with it
at all, other than the disciples think Jesus is a ghost.
We know Jesus is not a ghost. We
know it, but the sudden appearance in their midst seems a little ghostly, at
least according to what popular culture tells us is ghostly. Was Jesus, post
resurrection, able to walk through walls and doors, solid boundaries that no
living human could breach without causing destruction to the door or to the
human? It certainly seems so. One minute he was not there; the next he was
standing in their midst, asking them why they are frightened, and why they have
doubts lurking in their hearts?
Our
story follows on the heels of probably the best known of Luke’s accounts of
post resurrection appearances – the story of Jesus on the road to Emmaus. In
that story, two disciples are making their way from Jerusalem to a village called
Emmaus. Jesus joins them on the road, but they don’t recognize him. The
disciples have been speaking about everything that had happened: the
crucifixion of Jesus, and the women’s supposedly idle tale that the tomb was
empty, and they had received a message from the angels that Jesus was indeed
risen.
When
Jesus questions them about what they have been talking about, they look sad and
relate all this to him. Then he begins to interpret the scriptures for them in
light of what they’ve seen and heard.
They encourage him to stay with them
because it is getting late in the day. He does and when they sit down to eat,
when he breaks bread with them, their eyes are opened, and they recognize him.
Immediately upon recognition he vanishes from their sight. So, they hightail it
back to Jerusalem to tell the other disciples. And while they’re sharing with
the disciples what they’ve just seen and heard and witnessed, Jesus appears in
their midst.
Now they all witness the resurrected
Christ. But even with everything they’ve heard and what they now see, they are
still terrified. They think Jesus is a ghost. Jesus dismisses that idea. Look at me, he tells them. Touch my hands and
feet. Does a ghost have flesh and bones?
And while he tells them this, he shows them his hands and feet. He willingly
offers them proof that he was indeed crucified, dead, buried and now he’s
raised again – not just as a spirit, but as a real physical being.
But their doubts persist. Luke
writes that,
“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.”
I remember a professor in seminary
talking about this particular moment in this particular passage and relating to
us that the Greek does not say that Jesus merely ate that fish. He gnawed at
it. He devoured it, just as any human would who had not eaten in several days. Jesus
is not just a spirit before them. He has flesh and bones and hunger. The
disciples are overjoyed, but still disbelieving. They don’t trust their senses.
Then Jesus did for them what he did for the other disciples on the road to
Emmaus. He opened their minds to understand the scriptures.
It
seems that an open, enlightened mind is the final, necessary ingredient to
belief. When he finishes interpreting the scriptures in light of all that has
happened, with his physical presence before them, the complete and unequivocal
proof that what he told them before his death has indeed come to pass, he
declares to them all,
“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.”
You are witnesses of these things.
That’s not just a statement of fact, is it?
There is an implied imperative here as well. You are witnesses of these
things and therefore you must witness. Starting in
Jerusalem, this story has to be told. God’s word of repentance and forgiveness
must be preached. And as witnesses of these things, it starts with you.
You are witnesses of these things.
It seems natural that I should wind up this sermon with those words. You are
witnesses of these things. We are witnesses of these things. So, let’s go out
and witness. Alleluia. Amen.
But the truth of the matter is that
I’m not sure of where or how to draw this sermon to a close. Is it the
importance of witness to the gospel? Is it the fact that Jesus did not return
as a ghost but as resurrected flesh and blood, the incarnate God once more
incarnate? Or is it recapturing the wonder of this story, the disbelieving joy
that the disciples felt at seeing their beloved rabbi once more?
Maybe it is all of this and more. I
know that you can never plumb the depths of any passage in one sermon, and
maybe I am taking the easy way out by not trying to draw a final conclusion.
But the truth of it for me is that all of this matters. It matters more than I
can express. It matters that Jesus returned to the disciples as a hungry man of
blood and sinew. It matters because our bodies matter. Our flesh and blood
matters. All flesh and blood matters. God taking on earthly form
was not just a way to get our attention, to be unique amidst the other false gods
the people worshipped. It was because the Creator cared about the physical
being of the creature, as well as the heart and the soul and the mind. God
cares about our whole selves. Our minds matter, our hearts matter, our souls
matter, and our bodies matter.
And we are called to
be witnesses to these things. We are called to go out into the world
proclaiming the good news of the gospel, proclaiming the good news of the
resurrected Christ. We are sent beyond these doors to share the gospel. But how
can we do that effectively if we have lost our disbelieving joy? How can we do
that if we are mired in grief or captured by cynicism or if we have forgotten
what it means to wonder at this story, at all the stories, at the story of our
God in relationship – the relationship of the trinity, the relationship with
all of creation, relationship with us. Maybe what we need is to recapture some
disbelieving joy, some wonder. I have a good friend and colleague who once told
me that it never surprised him that God resurrected Jesus for Jesus’ sake, but
the fact that God resurrected Jesus for our sake?! That is a wonder!
Allow yourself to be caught up in
the wonder. Allow yourself to be caught up in some time of disbelieving joy.
Allow yourself to be amazed that Jesus was died and Jesus is risen. Say the
words, “The Lord is risen. He is risen indeed,” and be amazed that it is true!
I mean it’s true. Jesus Christ is risen! Resurrected! His flesh was restored.
He was so hungry, he gnawed at fish. He came back embodied so that we could be
emboldened. How can we feel anything but disbelieving joy at the wonder of this?!
How can we not leave this place proclaiming that Jesus Christ is risen! He is
risen indeed! And we are witnesses of these amazing and glorious things. We are
witnesses of God’s good news. Jesus the Christ is risen. He is risen indeed!
Alleluia! Amen.
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