356 Why the Bible

   (Note: This blog entry is based on the text for “Why the Bible”, originally shared on April 23, 2025. It was the 356^th  video for our YouTube Channel, Streams of Living Water (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCB7KnYS1bpHKaL2OseQWCnw), co-produced with my wife, Rev. Sally Welch.) 

   This coming Sunday, most churches will experience both the biggest disappointment and the most important message of the year. Today, we’re going to find out what they are.

   This coming Sunday is known as the Second Sunday of Easter, sometimes called “Low Sunday”, or what I call the Sunday of Disappointment!

   It’s the Sunday when we all look around and ask, “Where is everybody?” In Western Christianity it’s also known as Divine Mercy Sunday, the Octave Day of Easter, White Sunday, and Quasimodo Sunday.

   Yes, that’s right, “Quasimodo” Sunday, the name of The Hunchback of Notre Dame, so named because he was found at the cathedral as a hunchbacked infant on “Quasimodo Sunday”, which is named after the first words of the antiphon of the Latin introit in the Mass for this day, 1 Peter 2:2, “quasi modo geniti infantes…” or “Like newborn infants…” It’s also the name of a surfing position. But I digress. 😊

   Last Sunday, The Sunday of the Resurrection of Our Lord, aka Easter Sunday, or to some the Last Sunday after Coachella, our churches were as full as they get.

   Christ is Risen! He is Risen, Indeed! We celebrated that in full churches, and this coming Sunday it will be like it never happened.

   There are some people who don’t keep the sabbath holy every Sunday. But if there is one when they do, it is Easter. Others are dragged or guilted-in by insistent friends and relatives. Some are bribed with the promise of candy and, for adults, food afterwards. Some come just because it is what they and/or their family have always done and has become part of their identity. They, as Steely Dan said, “suit up for a game they no longer play”.

   Our churches will have put out their best of everything in the hope that some visitors will come back. And maybe some will but, if you had never been to a church and you were there last Sunday, you’re probably going to be just as flummoxed as everybody else if you come next Sunday.

   Our Gospel text for next Sunday, however, is even more disappointing!

   How do you witness the resurrected body of Jesus after he had told you that he was going to rise from the dead, and not know what to do? The disciples of Jesus were that confused.

   The disciples are gathered on the evening of the Resurrection. They were still processing what had happened in the morning. Then this happens in John 20:19-23,

¹⁹ When it was evening on that day, the first day of the week, and the doors of the house where the disciples had met were locked for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you.” ²⁰ After he said this, he showed them his hands and his side. Then the disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord. ²¹ Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.” ²² When he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit. ²³ If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.”

   The disciples were all Jews. They were afraid of the Jewish leaders. They were afraid that what had happened to Jesus could happen to them.

   Yet, it’s been said that the Bible says “fear not” or “don’t be afraid” or something like that 366 times, one for every day of the year plus one for a leap year, for a reason! Jesus said these or similar words himself many times.

   So, when Jesus suddenly appears, in a locked room with them, the very first words out of his mouth are “Peace be with you”, sholom aleichem, a common, even casual greeting. Don’t be afraid!

   Then things get weirder. He shows them his wounds, the crucifixion wounds in his hands and on his side. He commissions them with a mini-Pentecost, just for them. He breathes on them.

   What else in the Bible begins with a breath?

   How were human beings created? We see in Genesis 2:7,

⁷ then the Lord God formed man from the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and the man became a living being.

   What is the authority of the Bible? We see in 2 Timothy 3:16-17,

¹⁶ All scripture is inspired by God and is useful for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, ¹⁷ so that everyone who belongs to God may be proficient, equipped for every good work.

   Other translations replace “inspired” (a word with the same root as words like “respire”) with “God-breathed”. In the Bible, our life comes from God’s breath and God’s breath is the means by which God comes alive for us.

   Put these two together, and you get the last verses of this week’s Gospel reading, the most important message of this or any year. We’ll see how that works in a minute. 😊

   But one disciple, who had ventured out, was not present when Jesus breathed life and power on the disciples. We see who in John 20:24-25,

²⁴ But Thomas (who was called the Twin), one of the twelve, was not with them when Jesus came. ²⁵ So the other disciples told him, “We have seen the Lord.” But he said to them, “Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands, and put my finger in the mark of the nails and my hand in his side, I will not believe.”

   Then, a week went by, a week from Easter Sunday, like this coming Sunday will be, as our Gospel reading continues in John 20:26-29,

²⁶ A week later his disciples were again in the house, and Thomas was with them. Although the doors were shut, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you.” ²⁷ Then he said to Thomas, “Put your finger here and see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it in my side. Do not doubt but believe.” ²⁸ Thomas answered him, “My Lord and my God!” ²⁹ Jesus said to him, “Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.”

   So, there’s a doubter? There will be more. Jesus will send people out anyway.

   Remember how the Great Commission at the end of the Gospel Matthew is given, in Matthew 28:16-20,

¹⁶ Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them. ¹⁷ When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted. ¹⁸ And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. ¹⁹ Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, ²⁰ and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

   These are his disciples! “When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted.” Jesus sends them out to baptize and to teach anyway. What’s new? What matters is that Jesus is with us. Together. That’s all that matters.

   We live in an increasingly secular age. We live in a time when people are skeptical and isolated and estranged and, I believe, are hungry for the real community that God gives.

   Pastor Will Willimon is a Methodist pastor who has also been a seminary professor, university chaplain, the Methodist equivalent of a bishop and is a fine preacher. He tells the story of a young woman who was a member of a congregation he served who made an appointment to see him during the week. She came by his office and said, “Pastor Willimon, I just wanted to say that I won’t be coming to church anymore. I’ve been struggling with my faith for a while, and I just realized that I can’t do it anymore. I appreciate everything that you and the church members have done for me, and I didn’t want to just drift away. I just came to say goodbye.”

   Pastor Willimon tried to address her struggles and encourage her to continue, but she was having none of it. And the next Sunday she was back at worship. And the Sunday after that. And the Sunday after that.

   Finally, Pastor Willimon asked if she could stop by his office again, and she agreed. Pastor Willimon said, “Aren’t you the same person who came by and said that she no longer had faith and wouldn’t be coming to worship anymore?” She smiled and said, “Yes.” “Well then, I’m happy to see you, but could you tell me what happened?” he said.

   “Well,” she answered, “It came to me that sometimes, if you can’t believe for yourself, you have to be with people who will believe for you.”

   So, when people tell me that they are having doubts, I ask them to be consistent in their doubting and to question their doubts as well. Doubt their doubts. And I ask them to continue to be a living part of their Christian Community.

   Thomas came to belief because he saw the risen Christ and put his hand in his wounds. That’s not something that happened to us. “Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe,” Jesus said. That’s us, all of us are a part of a Christians community of faith.

   How do people come to believe today?

   According to The Barna Group, 94% of people who come to Christ do so before their 18^th birthday. Study after study has shown that 80-85% of all people who come to Christ do so because of the influence of a friend or a relative. They come to Christ because we share our stories, and they believe that we are believable.

   Each of us has a story to tell of how we became a Christian or why we remain a Christian. Why our consciences are captive to the Word of God.

   Why the Bible?

   This passage from John for next Sunday ends by describing the purpose of the whole Gospel of John with the most important message of this year or of any other year, what I think are two of the most important verses in the Bible. They tell us about what the Bible is, and why it was written, in John 20:30-31,

³⁰ Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book. ³¹ But these are written so that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name.

   This is the key to understanding the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

   Before pop-tops, beer and soda cans had rims on both ends of the can and had to be opened with a special pry-tool that made a triangular hole on one side of the can to drink from and another hole on the other side to allow air to flow in in order to let a person drink from the can.

   When pop-tops made their appearance, my grandfather on my father’s side didn’t like them. He said they made the beer taste funny. So, he would drive all over town looking for the places that still sold beer in the plain old cans. One day, my dad said to his dad, “Why don’t you just turn the can upside down?”  😊

   Do you remember, or know, what people called the tool used to open soda and beer cans before pop-tops? A church key.  😊

   What’s the key to understanding the resurrection? Turn it upside down. It’s the cross!

   Without the meaning of the cross, the resurrection is just a happy ending for Jesus. But the cross means that Jesus gave his life for us, and then he took it back again! Therefore, because he lives, we shall live also.

   The cross was the death of death. We who were baptized into Christ have already died in him. Death is a past-tense experience. We only await the continuation of life in Jesus Christ.

   We are a new creation, transformed by the living reality, the name, of Jesus!

   Two little boys were eating the pancakes that their mother had made for them for breakfast one day.

   When the mother stepped out for a few minutes and came back again, she found them fighting over the last pancake. “Boy, boys”, she said. “What would Jesus do?”

   The older brother said, “She’s right, Billy. You be Jesus.”

   Everybody wants to be like Jesus, until it’s time to be like Jesus.

   The plain fact is that all human beings are a mess. We have always been a mess. We sin, we separate ourselves from God. We can make no claim to righteousness of our own.

   Our only witness to ourselves and to the world is the cross, that Jesus gave his life for we sinners, and then he took it back again in the Resurrection to validate the power of the cross. We live to proclaim our gratitude and to live lives that praise God because Jesus has reconciled us to God!

   Life, forgiveness, and salvation are gifts that come from God and that can only come from God. It is the faith in Jesus Christ that is from God alone that saves us forever.

   The purpose of the Bible is to proclaim Christ, and Christ crucified, as proclaimed in John 20:31,

³¹ But these are written so that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name.

   Christ has overcome sin, death, and all the forces that defy God. He is Risen. He is Risen, Indeed. We are not disappointed, we have been redeemed.