These four walls. After a year of the covid19 pandemic, and
quarantine and isolation, and staying at home, I have gotten
pretty familiar with these four walls. What used to be just a
trip to the kitchen to get a drink of water has become a
field trip. For me seeing the other part of the house. If I'm
feeling especially adventuresome, I might even go
all the way to the living room, where there's a couch, and a TV
set. These four walls are part of who I am. But after a year,
after this year, I can feel these four walls starting to
close in on me. When people go to prison, we call the four
walls that they're in a cell. But this is also the word that
ancient Christian monks and even monks and contemplative
Christians today use for their room. Go to your cell, someone once
said, and it will teach you everything. There are some days
that these four walls feel like a prison cell to me. And there
are some days that they feel like the cell of a monastery, a
place that is sacred. Even though it's not very fancy or
big, a place where Jesus comes and meets me where I am. And
over the past year, I've been surprised almost every day about
how that's happened. Here in these four walls. Sometimes I
meet Jesus Christ, when I look out the window and I see the
giant cedar tree and my neighbor's yard, and two or
three crows fighting it out for the top, top most branch.
Sometimes, Jesus makes his way into these four walls through
the screen of my computer. And the faces of all of the people
that I'm doing good work important work with, even though
they're really far away. And I really miss them.
Sometimes Jesus breaks into these four walls in the form of
a text message from someone I haven't heard from in a long
time. It says I was thinking of you today and wondering how you
were doing. Jesus breaks into the four walls of my cell.
In all of these ways, and so many more. For although these walls
are impenetrable boundaries to be boundaries that keep me safe
from getting sick. There is no wall or height, or depth that
can separate me or any of us
from the love
of God in Jesus Christ our Lord. In the scripture you heard Mark
read today the disciples are gathered together in a locked
room. It's shortly after the events of the crucifixion of
that early first Easter morning, and no one is quite sure what's
going to happen. All we know from the Scripture is that
they're afraid. They're afraid in particular of the
authorities. If that's what happened to Jesus, I think they
might be considering, if that's what happened to Jesus, what
might happen to us? And so the disciples too are gathered afraid
in their four walls when all of a sudden in their midst they
see Jesus. Scripture says he breathed His peace onto them. He
breathed His peace isn't that lovely? He shows them his wounds
in his hands and feet and side. Ones from the cross, that are
now transformed into something that's filled with new life.
Wounds that in some way that they still don't understand,
have been healed. Jesus breathed His peace, he shows them his
wounds, and he gives them the gift of the Holy Spirit. And he
tells them that they too, have the power to forgive the power
to set one another, free. And if they use this power, that the
world will change. The disciples were all gathered together in
their four walls, but their friend Thomas wasn't there. You
know, Thomas, there's another adjective that usually comes
before his name, Doubting Thomas.
That's not what he's called in
Scripture. But he's called that because he tells them unless I
see his side and the marks and his hands, and his feet, I won't
believe And so Jesus does what Jesus always does.
He comes back.
Jesus comes back through the walls, those four walls into the
room, where the disciples are with Thomas, and he breathes his
peace. And he shows his hands and his side. And Thomas
proclaims, my Lord,
and my God.
Prince Jesus meets us where we are. Even when we're in
quarantine, even when we're staying at home, even when we
are afraid, like those early disciples, afraid to move,
afraid to risk, afraid that what has just happened to other
people might happen to us next. Our fear is no obstacle for
Jesus Christ. Jesus walks through the my four walls, he
walked through walls for the disciples, even for Thomas. And
he walks through walls for all of us, thanks be to God. We are
at a moment, a year into this pandemic, where some of the
walls that were keeping us safe are starting to come tumbling
down. There are vaccines, there is a sense that things are
getting better. That we're moving into the next phase of
who we are called to be and how we are called to live. And that
people like me and my family, who have stayed inside these
four walls for so many weeks, will finally get to reconnect
with all of the wonder and beauty that we know is waiting
for us still outside this place. At this point in history, the
walls are coming tumbling down. Thanks be to God. But I would
invite you, as disciples of Jesus to remember that Jesus not
only breathed His peace on us, Jesus not only shows us that
wounds can be healed. But Jesus gives us the power gives us the
responsibility and the constant reminder that we are to set
other people free as we ourselves have been set free.
And if the pandemic has taught us anything, it has taught us
that even after the vaccine has made the virus an artifact of
history, and that great and glorious day cannot come soon
enough. Even then there are those among us who are still
imprisoned by invisible walls. There are neighbors that we know
who are struggling with the walls of their addiction. There
are people who have spent the past year living in homes that
are violent and they're not sure they see a way out. There are
people who are told everyday by voices in this society, that
because of their culture. because of their race because of
who they were made to be by God, that they are less than that
their lives do not matter and are not sacred. And friends, it
is lies like these that build up invisible walls around people in
this world.
What walls
have been holding you in? Where has Jesus set you free? And who
is it in your life? For whom you would be willing to walk through
walls, and say there is a better way. And if you come with me, we
can follow it together. Who is that person who set you free
with the love of Jesus? And who is that person whose walls might
be closing in on them a little too closely right now. Jesus
walked through walls for the disciples, even for Thomas, who
somehow missed it the first time Jesus comes back. And he walks
through walls for all of us still today. So my prayer for
you is this. May you feel Jesus breathing, deep peace
into your life.
May you trust even after you've seen the horror of something
like the cross. May you trust that with God, all wounds can be
healed. And may you accept the freedom and power that God gives
you to set others free. Knowing that as you do, there is a love
that travels with you every step of the way. A love that is so
powerful
that it will help you walk through walls
Amen