Pastor Hugh's Monthly Meditation
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Easter Faith and Human Doubt
The Gospel reading for the 3rd Sunday of Easter is from Luke 24, and includes a post-resurrection appearance of Jesus to his disciples. Prior to this reading, Jesus has appeared to the women (whose account of his appearance was considered an "idle tale"), to two disciples (one named Cleopas) in the town of Emmaus, and to Simon Peter. In this reading Jesus appears to the remaining disciples with a mixed reception.
Click on image to see a larger view of Caravaggio's, Supper at Emmaus, in a separate window.
I don't know why I'm drawn to the description of the disciples' response, for Luke says that when they saw Jesus, "in their joy they were disbelieving and still wondering." In their joy they were disbelieving.
Why the disbelief? Was it that they had yet to fully grow into their faith? Was it that they didn't trust their senses or the evidence before them? Was Jesus' appearing (and thus his resurrection) just too good to be true? Or is this a reflection of something even more basic to real faith: that it often exists side by side with doubt?
I am reminded of that passage in Mark's Gospel (9:14ff) when Jesus is confronted by a distraught father who wants him to cure his possessed son. The father cries out, "if you are able to do anything, have pity on us and help us." Jesus responds as if he is offended by the "if" of this request. "If you are able! — All things can be done for the one who believes," Jesus states. The father then pleads, "I believe; help my unbelief!" Total human honesty.
Faith is a bit like a wet bar of soap, the harder you try to grasp its meaning, the more likely it is to slip from your fingers. Faith is never supported by proof. By it's very nature it exists in the vacuum created by the absence of, and at times the impossibility of any proof. It clings not to objects we can see, touch and measure. Rather it clings to a promise given. And its grip belongs not to our hands but to our hearts.
The picture shown here is a detail from Caravaggio's "Supper at Emmaus." Born Michelangelo Merisi, this Italian Baroque painter preferred the realistic to the stylized and tried to give his subjects an everyday look. What is depicted here is that moment when the two anonymous disciples (only one is shown in this detail) realize that it is the risen Lord that has just broken bread with them. The man standing (top left) is the host who is observing the scene with some curiosity. Jesus (beardless) has his hand outstretched as he blesses the food. The disciple seated, is gripping his chair in amazement. His forward-leaning stare is a mixture of revelation and disbelief—a spiritual kind of "shock and awe."
As Christians, our lives, too, are a mix of faith and doubt. Like the disciples in Luke's Gospel, there is often a tinge of disbelief in our Easter-inspired joy. To be honest, I often wish I could see Jesus in the flesh. I wish I could touch the scarred hands and wounded side. I want something tangible in which to anchor my faith, yet am forced to live by a promise—one that has been passed from one generation to the next for nearly two thousand years.
And what is this promise? That in Jesus, God's love for us is stronger than death. That through the eyes of faith, we, too, can witness the risen Lord in the simple breaking of bread. And that even in the depth of the deepest doubt, we can experience the transcendent heights of joy.
Hugh R. B. Haffenreffer
Pastor
May 2006
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