(Note: This blog entry is based on the text for “From “Rise!” to
Risen!”, originally shared on April 8, 2026. It was the 408th video for our YouTube Channel, Streams
of Living Water (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCB7KnYS1bpHKaL2OseQWCnw), co-produced with my
wife, Rev. Sally Welch.)
Do you like stories? How about stories about yourself? Today, we’re
going to hear one.
The Artemis II rocket lifted off a week ago last Wednesday on a 10-day
manned trip around the moon, taking human beings to the deepest spot in space
that we have ever been. It will return this coming Friday.
It’s pretty exciting to see the pictures and hear the reports. It was
our first trip back to the moon’s neighborhood in over 53 years!
And, the pilot of the mission, Victor Glover, was born right here in
Pomona and graduated from high school right here in Ontario.
They took photos of the back side of the moon, which no human beings
have ever seen from the earth. Someone posted a photo of a flower tortilla
against a black background online and claimed it was a picture of the back side
of the moon, but I wasn’t fooled! 😊
An unmanned Soviet probe took blurry, low-resolution photos in 1959, but
the back side (it’s not “dark”, BTW) has only been seen live and in person in
part by the 24 American astronauts in the Apollo missions.
Now the Artemis II crew has seen it in full, and transmitted photos. Before
that, it had been a mystery to humanity. What could we believe about something
we hadn’t seen?
What they also saw was the vastness of space.
One of the first photos NASA released was a photo of the earth in that vast
black background. They had seen photos of the earth in space taken by others
during previous missions, but I read that the Artemis II mission crew members
were all stunned when they were far enough away to see it for
themselves.
You might remember that the actor William Schatner, probably known best
for his role as Captain Kirk in the original Star Trek TV series, rode on one
of those brief flights into space for paying civilians sponsored by
billionaires. When he came back to earth, he said that he was deeply shaken.
He said that he wept at how small and fragile our planet looked in the
midst of that vast, mostly empty, space.
For all but a very of few of us, space beyond the earth has been a
mystery. And it isn’t much more than that even now.
That’s not what we mean by mystery in the Christian faith, though.
A mystery in the Christian faith is not like a mystery that we can figure out,
like in a novel or a TV series.
It’s a mystery in the sense that we can’t understand it unless it is
revealed to us from outside of ourselves. Like the mystery of salvation. The
gift of God that we celebrated on Easter Sunday.
The first Easter weekend began with Jesus’ death and ended with his
resurrection. He had given his life, and he had taken it back again.
This coming Sunday will be the Second Sunday of the Easter season.
Christians have celebrated it since the Resurrection.
The Second Sunday of our Easter season is the time by which Easter
Eggs have been turned into egg salad sandwiches, the candy has been wolfed
down, the decorations have been put away, and the kids have gone back to
school. “Spring” break is over.
And, the Second Sunday of Easter is also known by some as the First Sunday
in the Coachella Music Festival. 😊
In churches, the Second Sunday of Easter is
sometimes called “Low Sunday”, or what could be called the Sunday of
Disappointment! It’s the Sunday when we all look around and ask, “Where is
everybody?”
In Western Christianity, however, the Second Sunday of the Easter season
is also known as Divine Mercy Sunday, the Octave Day of Easter, White Sunday,
and even Quasimodo Sunday.
Yes, that’s right, “Quasimodo” Sunday, the name of The Hunchback of
Notre Dame, so named after that Sunday in the Church calendar because he
was found at the cathedral as a hunchbacked infant on “Quasimodo Sunday”. It
was named after the first words of the antiphon of the Latin introit in the
Mass for that day, found in 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, our churches were as full as they get. “Christ is Risen! He is Risen,
Indeed!” We celebrated that then, and this coming Sunday, it will be almost
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 will be Easter Sunday. Others are
dragged or guilted-in by insistent friends and relatives. Some are bribed with
the promise of candy and colored Easter eggs and, for adults, food afterwards.
Some come just because it’s what they and/or their family have always done, and
it has become part of their identity. They, as the Steely Dan song 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 will be impressed and come back. And maybe some will but, if you had never
been to a church and you were there last Sunday, Easter Sunday, and you come
back to that church this coming Sunday, you will probably be just as flummoxed
as everybody else.
The Gospel reading that will be read this coming Sunday in the vast
majority of churches throughout the world, John 20:19-31, is even more
disappointing!
How do you see the resurrected body of Jesus, after he had told
you he was going to rise from the dead, and not know what to do next?
That happens, when the disciples are gathered on the evening of the
Resurrection.
They are still processing what had happened in the morning. They had
heard from some women that Jesus had risen, but they knew that he was dead.
John had seen him die. 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 afraid of the Jewish leaders. The Jewish leaders.
Remember that all of the disciples, and Jesus, were Jewish. 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! Jesus said these
or similar words many times, including in today’s Gospel reading when he
suddenly appears inside a locked room.
The first words out of his mouth are “Peace be with you”, sholom
aleichem, a common, even casual greeting.
Was it weird to them that he was dead and now he appeared among them in
a locked room? Was that why his first words were to calm them down? Did they
know that they were out of debt? That he had paid their debt of sin on the
cross?
H.L. Menken, the journalist, essayist, and cultural critic, once said, "Explanations
exist; they have existed for all time; there is always a well-known solution to
every human problem—neat, plausible, and wrong."
I thought of that when I heard that Warren Buffet, the wildly successful
investor, philanthropist, and former CEO of Berkshire Hathaway, made a, I
think, serious proposal for stopping our increasing national debt. His solution
ws to pass a law making all sitting members of Congress ineligible for
reelection if the federal deficit exceeds 3% of annual GDP (Gross Domestic
Product). He said that this would take care of it in "five
minutes".
Well, it is simple. Jesus had a more difficult solution to get us out of
our sin debt.
He gave his life, he took it back again, and then he appeared to his
disciples in a locked room.
Then things get even weirder.
He shows them his wounds on his hands and on his side. He commissions
them with a mini-Pentecost, just for them. The words “ruach” in Hebrew, the
primary language of the Old Testament and “pneuma” in Greek, the primary
language of the New Testament, both have the same three meanings: wind, breath,
and spirit. They can all mean the same thing.
Breath. He breathes on them. They receive the Holy Spirit. Does
that seem strange?
What else began with a breath?
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.
This is revealed to us in the Bible, which is filled with the power of
God in the Holy Spirit.
Where does the authority of the Bible come from?
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” with “God-breathed”. The word
“respiration” has the same root. The Bible’s authority comes from God. It is
the primary means by which God comes
alive for us.
But one disciple, who had ventured out, was not present when Jesus
breathed life and power on the disciples. We see it in John 20:24-29,
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.”
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? Jesus moves forward to send the disciples out
anyway.
We live in an increasingly secular age. We live in a time when people are hungry for the real community that God
gives.
But more importantly, people need churches whose community is not built
on human traditions but is built on a living relationship with Jesus Christ.
Christ: crucified, risen, and coming again. How do we convey that to this
generation?
I was stationed in the Marine Corps Barracks at the Norfolk Naval Base
for a time when I was in the Marine Corps.
At some point, we got a new sergeant. He had been a drill instructor at
the Parris Island Marine Corps Recruit Depot, but he had been convicted on around
27 counts of maltreatment of recruits.
That’s right, he was too mean to be a Marine Corps drill instructor, so
they sent him to us.
He was a drinker and would sometime come in after having been out all
night. It was time to get up when he turned the lights on, normally at 5:30 or
6:30 a.m., and he would go around to each of the cots. If anybody didn’t have
their feet on the floor by the time he got to their cot, he would stand at the
end of it, extend one palm out, facing up, and say in a deep voice, “Rise!”
There was something about the way he said it that cut through the
deepest sleep.
But if anyone was still asleep the next time he came around, he would say
“Rise!” a second time.
And if they still hadn’t woken up, he flipped the cot, and you,
upside down. Which usually got a person’s attention.
How many people would catch that reference to Jesus’ power over death
shown in the raising of Lazarus, and in his ability to take his life back again
after he was crucified, today?
Thomas didn’t, and he was one of Jesus’ closest disciples!
Thomas came to belief because he saw the risen Christ and put his
hand in his wounds. That’s not something that happens to us. “Blessed are those
who have not seen and yet have come to believe,” Jesus said.
Our identity as the people of the Christian Church comes from all those
faithful people who have passed their faith from generation to generation, and
on to us.
I was looking for a cologne that I could put in my gym bag, once, when I
worked out at a fitness center in Clairmont. I wanted something that smelled
good, was not expensive, and didn’t come in a glass bottle that could break in
my gym bag.
Old Spice cologne checked all the boxes, but what really sold me was the
marketing slogan on the box: “If your grandfather hadn’t worn it, you wouldn’t
exist.” 😊 That’s how legacies are passed
on.
Will we pass on the living existence of the Christian faith to those who
come after us? That is the purpose of the gospel of St. John from which we are
reading today.
This week’s passage ends by describing the purpose of the whole Gospel
of John with what I think are two of the most important verses in the Bible, 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.
Some of those who were at worship in Christian churches on Easter Sunday
were not doubters. They weren’t even interested. They were (is it too harsh to
say it?) spiritual tourists.
But, at least they were there. You may have noticed that the NCAA
Women’s Basketball Tournament, part of what is also known as March Madness, has
just wrapped-up. You may also have noticed that the two games between the women’s
final four teams, one of which was the UCLA Women’s Basketball team, were
played on Good Friday. The championship game, the end of the madness,
was played on Easter Sunday! This says everything you need to know about
the status of Christianity in the United States today.
The news has been reporting an increase in religiosity among Gen Z
youth, though, those born between 1997 and 2012, who would be between about 14
and 29 today. But it is a self-defined, more private form of religion.
We offer something else. Something true. Something that endures.
It is neither religion nor self-affirmation. We proclaim Jesus,
crucified, risen, and coming again. We proclaim that belief is a gift from God
and leads people to life that truly is life in the living relationship with the
one true living God for which we were created. It is assured to us by the cross
of Jesus Christ, and the resurrection that validates it.
There are many good reasons to believe in the physical resurrection of
Jesus Christ:
1. The evidence of death.
2. The sixteen Roman guards stationed
to prevent any trickery.
3. The seal of the punitive authority
of the Roman Empire set upon the stone.
4. The disciples were in shock.
5. There was no body and no benefit
to steal the body.
6. The witness of women at the center
of events in a time of Patriarchy.
7. The martyrdom of the eyewitness.
8. The martyrdom of the early
Christians.
9. The experience of Christians of
the risen Christ to this day.
10. The change in the sabbath from the
seventh day to the day of the Resurrection as the day of worship for the Church
now begun, a radical change.
11. The lack of details
12. The testimony of hostile witnesses
who became Christians, i.e., St. Paul.
And yet, over the years, people have not come to believe because of
reasons. It is because they have experienced the gift of a living relationship
with the one true living God in Jesus Christ.
Sally and I didn’t know what retirement would look like. I just knew
that I was 70 and it was time. And as it happened, I began having a number of
health challenges right after my retirement, so it was the right time to retire
from regular parish ministry.
Shortly before I retired, however, I had a dream.
Small, local, craft breweries were getting really popular, and I dreamt
that I was pitching an idea for investors. A small group had gathered to
listen, and I was explaining that craft breweries were popular right then, but
that those drinkers would get older, and their tastes would change, and they
would be able to afford more, but that they would still want something that
seemed exclusive, known only to a few. More people were coming over to listen.
I proposed that whisky would be the next big thing. More people came,
and they were getting excited.
I said that the next big thing would be small batch, local, craft whisky
distilleries. And by now there was a huge crown in front of me and they were
shouting, “Take-my-money!”
Suddenly, I woke up and I woke Sally up and I said, “Sally, I know what we’re
going to do in retirement!”
“What?”, she said, half-awake.
“We’re going to be bootleggers!”
Well, that didn’t happen. 😊
Our lives are centered instead in true joy that endures.
Those are the difference between “Rise!” and “He is Risen!”
How do we convey the most important news in history to our generation
when it has no felt need? A start would be to tell the world that it needs
Jesus more than it needs whiskey, or anything else that the world tries to put
in the place of God.
What Jesus has done for us in his death and resurrection is not mystery.
It is revealed in our Gospel reading for today, in John 20. We have been
reconciled to God. We have been given life in Jesus’ name, his true self. Life
that really is life.
Jesus gave his life for us when we were still sinners, separated
from God, to reconcile us to God. He proved that his death could do that,
because he is God; he validated his work on the cross, when he took
his life back again at his resurrection.
That is our story, too. Our story, the one we have to tell, is a
story about God’s love for us.
Blessed are those who know their need of a savior.
And blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.
They will rise, as Jesus is risen!
The vast emptiness of space is filled with the glory of God!
Christ is Risen! He is Risen, Indeed! Alleluia!
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