A Reflection for the 2nd Sunday of Easter Church of the Holy Trinity, Hertford, N.C.
May 5, 2024 Thomas E Wilson, Guest Celebrant
Acts 4:32-35 1 John 1:1-2:2 John 20:19-31 Psalm 133
“In Community, By Our Wounds We Are Healed.”
In today's Gospel lesson, the Disciple Thomas, nicknamed “Doubting”, has avoided the first meeting of the community after the Crucifixion. It is a old truth; without participation in community; it is hard to believe anything second hand. Thomas discounts the witness of the other disciples and believes that his misguided friends are just victims of a mass hallucination. After all he, like them, ran for their lives leaving Jesus in the lurch. He comes to the second meeting, filled with shame, but covering those wounds of shame with sneering condemnation of the other disciples. Jesus faces doubting Thomas and Thomas's lack of faith, by showing him Jesus' own wounds. The wounds are shown but without blame of guilt. By Jesus's wounds, Thomas's wounds are healed.
When people disappoint us and we are wounded by their action or inaction; we tend to hold on to our wounds, in the hopes that the person who let us down will suffer. There is something that seems fulfilling in holding a grudge, because holding on to the wound keeps the guilt. Mary Oliver wrote a short poem that could be about this process;
When did it happen?
“It was a
long time ago.”
Where did it happen?
“It was far
away.”
No, tell. Where did it happen?
“In
my heart.”
What is your heart doing
now?
“Remembering. Remembering!”
If it is a beautiful, grace filled memory, hold on to it in your heart, but if it is a memory full of hurt, anger, guilt or shame; then we need to ask God's help to move it from your heart to the garbage of vague memory of long ago events which you have asked Divine help in forgiving. Forgiveness is meant to heal the wounds; the wounds that were given to us; especially the wounds that that our guilt wants us to hold onto.
The 1st Lesson from the book of Acts has the Jesus community face their fears and move into a new sense of community without fear. No one denies that Jesus had wounds, but he refuses to blame the people for his wounds. He refuses to give them wounds of blame; he forgives them before they ask. Nothing gets in the way of love Their wounds are so healed that they are able to create a new community where they share what they have with each other. By Jesus' wounds the community begins to be healed into a new reality. Nothing gets in the way of Love.
They would gather and sometimes sing the psalm of Thanksgiving we said for today:
1 Oh, how good and pleasant it is,
*
when brethren live together in unity!
2 It is like fine oil upon the head
*
that runs down upon the beard,
3 Upon the beard of Aaron, *
and
runs down upon the collar of his robe.
4 It is like the dew of Hermon *
that
falls upon the hills of Zion.
5 For there the Lord has ordained the
blessing: *
life for evermore.
To live in unity with our neighbor means they we can forgive them and ourselves and let love fill the space between neighbors. There is a poem by late 16th and early 17th Century English Divine, George Herbert, called Love about the barriers we put in the way of grace:
LOVE bade me welcome; yet my soul drew
back,
Guilty
of dust and sin.
But quick-eyed Love, observing me grow
slack
From my first entrance in,
Drew
nearer to me, sweetly questioning
If
I lack’d anything.
‘A guest,’ I answer’d, ‘worthy
to be here:’
Love
said, ‘You shall be he.’
‘I, the unkind, ungrateful? Ah, my
dear,
I
cannot look on Thee.’
Love took my hand and smiling did
reply,
‘Who
made the eyes but I?’
‘Truth, Lord; but I have marr’d
them: let my shame
Go
where it doth deserve.’
‘And know you not,’ says Love, ‘Who
bore the blame?’
‘My
dear, then I will serve.’
‘You must sit down,’ says Love,
‘and taste my meat.’
So
I did sit and eat.
Pat's daughter, Gretchen, my step-daughter, sent me a message recorded I think on her daughter-in-law's phone showing her grandson, Alastair, in his bed talking with his father, Gretchen's son, about the tornado that was lashing their area in Oklahoma, The storm was frightening, but Alastair's father was sitting next to his son in bed and telling him that he was not alone. He opened the blinds so Alastair could see the storm and he calmly ministered to him to trust that they could get through this storm. There is no guilt or shame; Alistair was was not berated for his fear, but it was lovingly acknowledged, and from that love he was given strength to face the next storm, after all it is Oklahoma, and have strength to face the next one with cautious optimism and respect for nature. In Loving Community with his father, Alistair's wounds were healed to become memories of strength.
Thirty some years ago, my one year and four days older than I brother, Paul was facing a crisis. He was handsome, voted so by his Senior class in High School. He was athletic, which I was not. He was a chick magnet, which I was not.. After he got out of the Maine Corps he went to college and made much better grades than I did as an Undergraduate. I was so envious of him. He got married, and in his third marriage, they had some beautiful children. He made money in the jobs he had, but he just could not put his life together. He turned to alcohol to fix the problem, but that made it worse. I tried to help but he pushed me aside He had wounds; but he would not allow them to be healed or faced. One night he committed suicide. My mother and his wife pushed me to do his service and his boys stayed with Pat and I for the summer. Both of the boys would later go into treatment for their own addiction. They are now facing their wounds in years of recovery and thriving in life, happily married (Old Uncle Tom did their weddings). They are active in their churches, have happy children. Through their faith, they faced their wounds and with God's help were healed, but as they say, “Just for today.”
My brother's death shook me, and I volunteered to do volunteer Chaplaincy work at a Drug and Alcohol treatment center in the community in which I was a Priest. I continued to do Volunteer work sporadically in the next two parishes, even after I retired until Pat got sick and I was needed more at home. What happens in recovery is that addicts come together to participate in community of fellow addicts, some of whom are still recovering and all who face the fact that while they have done lousy things; yet they are still beloved by a power greater than themselves. Healing begins when the addict realizes that he, or she, has to take responsibility without being shamed into inaction. They have to learn that wounds are real, but so is healing. One step at a time.
One of the things that happened this last week was that I was invited to join a family at a Easter Brunch. I did not know some of the people, but we shared stories about our lives over the Brunch. We shared stories of Thanksgiving about the wounds our ancestors, in Slovenia, Slovakia, Ireland, Scotland, Pasquotank County, Ohio, or wherever, had in coming to this country or we had in coming to this community. There were so many wounds and so much healing. Easter is like that; by their, ours or His, wounds, we are healed.
I am retired now, and I do not need to go to church to put food on the table. I come to church because I have wounds and I come for healing by His, and your, wounds. That is what community is all about.
The true work of this Church of the Holy Trinity is not to prance around doing the “just right” liturgy by shaming sinners, but to bring healing and forgiveness to this community of Hertford. One of the High Points for me in every service is in announcement time, there is a need expressed, a wound in the fabric of this town that needs to be addressed and I saw you respond out of His Wounds: so the community's wounds might be healed; one day at a time, just for today, and on every blessed day. For in Him, every day is blessed.
Today we have communion for all who are invited, we urge each one of us to come as an outward and visible sign that we are tired of dragging around our wounds and we hear the invitation in George Herbert poem “Love”:
‘You must sit
down,’ says Love, ‘and taste my meat.’
So
I did sit and eat.
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