When we reflect on the 2,000-year history of the Christian church, a key question often comes to mind: How and why did Christianity become the dominant world religion in the early centuries?
The first-century religious leaders in Jerusalem had looked with disdain at that pesky little group of Jesus-followers who wouldn’t fade away even after their leader, Jesus of Nazareth, was executed on a Roman cross. Then in the years that followed, people began to want to be part of the Jesus community, even if it meant going through membership classes that took years to complete. People wanted to join, even if it meant harassment from the establishment, even martyrdom. The Christian faith in the early centuries expanded relentlessly, even to the point of the conversion of a fourth-century Roman emperor, Constantine.
In contrast, today we are confronted with the so-called decline of the church. Statistics Canada reported that Christian affiliation went from 77% in 2001 to 50% in 2022, a net drop of 5 million.
Let’s go back to when the church began. Let us review once again John’s account of the resurrection, that which you have already heard last Sunday from the Rev. Fr. Krawchuk. May we never tire of this truth upon which the church stands, that Christ is risen.
Mary Magdalene discovered that the tomb of Jesus had been opened. She didn’t linger. I imagine it was in panic that she ran to Peter and the other disciple and told them “They took the Lord out of the tomb, and we do not know where they have laid him.”
Peter went in and saw that the tomb was empty, the burial cloths left behind. The other disciple followed Peter inside the tomb. The text says that this disciple saw, and believed. Precisely what he believed we are not told. The text continued that they still didn’t understand the Scriptures. Then they went home. Think about the likelihood that these two would simply go back home if they believed that Jesus was up and about, risen from the dead. If that beloved disciple really believed Jesus rose from the dead, what is the likelihood that he would merely return home and remain quiet, he who had unashamedly and boldly stood by the cross during the crucifixion? I wonder if he really only believed that Mary’s report was true. We can’t rule out that possibility.
Mary went back to the gravesite and stayed there weeping even after Peter and the other disciple had left and gone home. She then looked inside the tomb and saw two angels. Mary recognised the heavenly angelic beings for who they really were. How she knew we are not told.
Then Mary turned around and saw a man she assumed was the gardener. She did not recognise who the man really was. We are not told why. This is strange, we must admit, as Mary had been in the small company who were with Jesus until he was crucified.
Then Jesus called her by her name: “Mary.”
There are significant moments in the Bible when God calls us by name. Isaiah chapter 43 comes to mind, God’s passionate words of love to us His people through the prophet Isaiah.
“Thus says the LORD, he who created you … Do not fear, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name, you are mine. When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you; when you walk through the fire you shall not be burned, and the flame shall not consume you. For I am the LORD your God, the Holy One of Israel, your Saviour.”
Isaiah 43:1-3 English Standard Version
Jesus called Mary by her name, and that was for Mary Magdalene, the turning point. The text reports in verse 16 that she turned and said to him in Aramaic: “Rabboni.”
There is something curious about these two turnings in verses 14 and 16, a detail that we must not miss. You see, in verse 13 Mary had been facing the angels inside the tomb. Then in verse 14 the text says specifically that she turned around, and turned her back against the angels. On turning around, she then saw and conversed face-to-face with the man she thought was the gardener. Then verse 16 states she turned, the same word in the original. This time, the original does not say that she turned her back on the man. What gives?
What is interesting is that in the original language, this word in verses 14 and 16 translated to English as “turn” also has a figurative meaning. It \ also communicates “change,” that is, turning to another substance. For example, this same word is used in Revelation 11:6, when the text declares that God’s two witnesses have the power to turn water into blood. A change in substance.
I suggest to you that Mary in the second instance did not turn around physically. Instead, she was changed from someone who did not understand what was happening, to a new person who finally realised the true nature of her Lord, Jesus Christ. And upon understanding, she believed that the tomb was empty because Christ is risen from the dead. She was changed from a broken, despairing woman, to one who with newfound confidence then went and announced to the disciples: “I have seen the Lord!” Paul wrote to the Romans twenty years later, “… that if you confess with your lips that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.” Mary at that point believed that her Lord Jesus Christ, he is risen. Then without reservation and without fear, she announced it to the others.
In contrast, the men, the disciples, remained in fear of the Jews, even the two who corroborated Mary’s report that the tomb was empty, Peter and the other disciple.
The men had sequestered themselves in a locked room. They were afraid. Then Jesus walked into their midst and said, “Peace be with you.”
This moment had all the critical elements of the church. This moment is when the church emerged. They were to be called Christians a few decades later, but this was when the church was first formed.
First, there was community. Yes, they huddled together in fear, but the key is that they were together. A church, no matter what tradition or lineage, always falls apart when the community is no longer held to be important. The New Testament word we know as “church” is “ekklesia” from where we derive the English word “ecclesiastic.” The Greeks originally used that word to mean a group of people called to a public assembly to discuss specific matters and to reach a common decision. The New Testament writers adopted the word to mean people called from out of the public to meet publicly in the name of Christ.
Are we people called by Christ from out of the ordinary to meet in His name?
Second, the risen Christ was present. An assembly is not a church if Christ is not present. Like Mary, the church is changed, is turned from the ordinary, and called into that special place of faith in the reality of the risen Lord. The living Christ walks among us, walks with us, and is always present with us. We are reminded of this every time we break bread together and share in the cup at the Lord’s Table.
Do we believe that Jesus is Lord and that He has risen from the dead?
Third, as God the Father sent Jesus into this world to accomplish God’s will, Jesus sends us, his community, his church, to do the same. Jesus declared this to the disciples: “As the Father has sent me, so I send you.” We are in a privileged position to have been commissioned by Christ Himself to go and continue what He had begun. At the beginning of his ministry, Jesus quoted Isaiah at the synagogue in Nazareth: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favour.” Then he claimed it for himself: “Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.”
We might protest: “How can we do all that?”
This then is how it becomes possible: Immediately after commissioning his disciples, the risen Lord said: “Receive the Holy Spirit.” It is the Holy Spirit who enables us to discern God’s forward path for his church. It is the Holy Spirit who gives the church the boldness to proclaim Christ to the world. It is the Holy Spirit who empowers everyone in the church with spiritual gifts to be the instruments of God’s purpose and God’s love towards each other and towards everyone else in the world. It is the Holy Spirit who transforms our lives from the ordinary to one of extraordinary quality marked by love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.
Without the empowering presence of the Holy Spirit, the church does not exist. Therefore, we ask: as an assembly of people, are we Spirit-filled and Spirit-led?
Finally, Jesus said: “If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.” These words have been debated for so long among so many. Does the church really have the authority to forgive or not to forgive sins? I suggest that it is best to understand this as Christ having given his church power and authority in this world. All authority in heaven and on earth belongs to the risen Saviour. Christ has commissioned us to go into the world in His name; therefore we the church do so in the power and authority of our risen Lord.
These are the five critical elements of Christ’s church: community; the presence of the risen Lord; sent into the world; empowered by the Holy Spirit; confident in the power and authority of Christ. This is how the church emerged from among the fearful disciples who in fear hid in a locked room but could not escape the reality of Christ. This is how they went out into the world revived, motivated, full of joy and excitement, a community of Christ-followers moving in the power of the risen Saviour through the Holy Spirit in obedience to the mission of God for the world God loves.
Let us not go into the particulars of Thomas’ doubts; I would rather that we rehabilitate him from that undeserved slight, “doubting Thomas.” Thomas went on to India where following the pattern of the Apostle Paul before him, he established Christian communities in that country that still exist today. I do would like to conclude with what Jesus said to him: “Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.”
We find the word “blessed” also in the Beatitudes. The original word is more nuanced than we might get from the English translation. It is a state of being, already done because it comes about only under God’s grace and mercy. Thus, we today have not seen and yet have come to believe because, under God’s grace and mercy, we are supernaturally enabled to believe and internalise the reality of the risen Christ. By God’s grace, we have confessed that Jesus is Lord and that God raised him from the dead. Therefore we are blessed.
I believe that there really is no reason why the church should decline unless we have set aside and forgotten that which began it all 2,000 years ago. Let us pray that we will rejoice greatly and be excited by the reality that we are blessed because God has called us out from the ordinary to the community of faith in Christ’s presence, who has breathed on us the Holy Spirit to go in power and authority into the world to be his ambassadors. What a privilege! What joy therein! May this excitement and joy be contagious! May Christ’s church ever thrive and flourish, as she participates in God’s mission to transform the world according to God’s design.
Now to the Ruler of all worlds, undying, invisible, the only God, be honour and glory forever and ever.
Amen.
