The Third Sunday of Easter (Luke 24:36-48)  4/22/2012

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Several months ago the Global Missions Committee began planning a trip to visit our companion church in Cuba. As the planning continued over the course of several weeks we learned more about the travel arrangements, the needs of the church in Santa Cruz del Norte, and we learned more about the Cuban people of our companion parish. Two weeks ago today, on Easter Sunday, we packed our cars full of eight bags of needed supplies and readied ourselves for an early Monday morning, arriving at the airport before sunrise. Our journey continued and with each moment we moved closer and closer to the community of Santa Cruz: we navigated through security lines, encountered long bag check lines, we lost our luggage, we found our luggage, and we finally arrived in Havana. We soon met Father Frank, members of the Cathedral staff, and when we arrived in Santa Cruz del Norte on Wednesday we met the eagerly waiting members of our companion church – all in the flesh. We can learn many important pieces of information via email and over the phone, but experiencing people up close and in the flesh is an experience that cannot be matched by any form of long distance communication. Throughout our week long visit to Cuba, our personal interactions with our Cuban friends profoundly shaped our experience and were the source of our lasting impression of their hospitality and grace.

In our Gospel lesson this morning, we hear of the disciples’ direct experience of meeting the risen Christ. The disciples had spent several months listening to Jesus teach them of the coming events of his death and resurrection, but there was something in Jesus’ teaching that was beyond their grasp. Jesus appeared among them and tried to reassure them with his greeting, “Peace be with you.” (Luke 24:36) His warm greeting was not enough for them, for they were “startled and terrified.” Jesus again attempted to reassure them, “Why are you frightened, and why do doubts arise in your hearts?” (Luke 24:38) What were the disciples expecting as their teacher returned to them, a spirit? In many ways, I imagine a spirit would be easier to accept, easier to comprehend; God as a distant and powerful force that breaks in to our world for moments of grace, moments of powerful presence – only to slip back in to the heavens and leave us to the daily routine of earthly things. Jesus said to his friends, “No – touch me and see; for a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have.” (Luke 24:39) God, in Jesus Christ, is incarnate, is embodied in the world in which we live and move and have our being (as the Prayer Book says). God is present among us!

Is it possible for us to be satisfied with the knowledge that God is incarnate among us…or do we need something more? “Jesus showed them his hands and his feet…and in their joy they were disbelieving and still wondering…” (Luke 24:40-41) For the disciples mere knowledge was apparently not enough; and I imagine the mere knowledge of something may often not be enough for us. Jesus asked them for something to eat and he took the piece of fish and ate it as he was among them. Throughout the stories of the Bible, sharing food has great significance for fellowship and the development of trust among people. After sharing food with them Jesus opened their minds to understand the Scriptures. After sharing fellowship together, the disciples were ready to trust their new relationship with Jesus and understand the significance of their risen Lord. Is it enough to simply know that God is incarnate among us? No, we must be in fellowship with God and with each other if we are to develop and grow in trusting relationships; relationships that lead us to experience God, to experience God in our very presence and to allow our minds to be open to the understanding that God is incarnate in this world.

As the mission group returned from Cuba and began telling the stories of our amazing week among the people of Santa Cruz del Norte, Sarah Keiffer reminded us that the mission trip was only the first step of an ongoing journey – the next steps of that journey are to share the experience and encourage others to mission and ministry. As followers of Christ, we grow and develop our understanding of God through relationships and ministry with others, where ever those others might be found. Charles Andrews, a 20^th century British missionary, when asked how his mission work shaped his understanding of the Christian Gospel, responded with these words: “I now look at all human life and human history more from the central standpoint of the Incarnation. I think more of the extension of the incarnate life in wider and wider reaches of humanity, till all is summed up in Christ himself.”[i]As Andrews insightfully points out, our lives are summed up in the incarnate and risen Christ. And our experience of the incarnation of God among us is opened to us through relationship with God and with others. The Global Missions Committee will be presenting a wonderful overview of the Cuban mission trip next Sunday morning and I invite you to come and experience the joyful and gracious people of Cuba. I invite and encourage you to consider how to reach out to others in relationship so that you may experience the incarnate God among you: reach out across the world, reach out across the community, or reach out to your neighbor, but reach out and seek God as God is found in the Body of Christ. The incarnate and risen Christ is not some theory, not some spirit that intercedes for us; the incarnate and risen Christ is the One and true embodiment of God among us. In this Easter season and the days beyond, may you reach out in relationship and participate in the presence and power of the Body of Christ. AMEN.