This Sunday I will be preaching at Mt. Zion United Methodist Church in Belton. I will be using the lectionary text for the second Sunday of Easter, John 20:19-30. As I reflected on the passage, my mind drifted back to an illustration used by Rev. Michael Green, the great British pastor and scholar.
In 1499 A.D. the European view of the world changed dramatically. For years European traders had been looking for a sea route to India. They had been searching for a way to the land rich with spices and perfumes around the southern tip of Africa. “All attempts at rounding the Cape had failed. So much so that this treacherous headland was known as the Cape of Storms and it was the scene of many wrecks. However, one determined sailor determined to try again. He succeeded in rounding the Cape and reaching the East. Indeed, there is still a monument to this famous mariner, Vasco da Gama, in China today. Ever since he sailed back to Lisbon [arriving home in 1499 A.D.] it has been impossible to doubt that a way to the Orient exists round the bottom of Africa. The very name of that perilous Cape was changed to its present title, the Cape of Good Hope” (Michael Green, The Empty Cross of Jesus, p. 131).
I think we often live at the juncture of the Cape of Storms. This week I watched news of the trial of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, the Boston Marathon bomber. I’ve continued my ongoing prayers for the young girls kidnapped by Boko Haram in Nigeria, the victims of the Garissa killing spree in Kenya, and for the safety of US soldiers serving in the Middle East (all a part of my regular prayer life). I have read my morning paper with stories of crimes, struggles, and storms right here in Texas. I had my fill and then some of the senseless and often fruitless political wrangling of both parties. I have wrestled with and prayed about storms battering my work as a bishop and life as a husband, son, and brother. My strong hunch is so have you. Metaphorically speaking, we sail on seas that traverse the Cape of Storms.
When I read the Bible story of those disciples gathered behind locked doors on Easter evening, I think the Lord through Holy Spirit is speaking again to me, to us. He is reminding me that we also sail past the Cape of Good Hope because Christ is risen and the ultimate destination the Savior offers is life lived with God.
I am forcefully struck by a cardinal truth in this passage (one of many!). The Cape of Storms becomes the Cape of Good Hope in community that is Christ centered – Christ focused! Thomas only experienced the presence of the risen Christ when he was a part of the transforming community of Christ! Cut off and alone there was no experience of the resurrection in his life. In the transforming community, he experiences the risen Christ!
We live the resurrection only as a part of the transforming community of Christ. The Christian faith is not an isolationist movement. Thomas overcomes doubt through others. Thomas’ Cape of Storms becomes the Cape of Good Hope when he is with others in the transforming community. It is here and only here that he experiences the resurrected Christ.
It is our relationship with the risen living Jesus in community (!) that transforms our life. Walking with God, receiving the Spirit, living through doubt – these are all ways in which we live the resurrection in a transforming relationship.
In his book What’s Right with the Church, Bishop Will Willimon writes: “The church [the transforming community] is a post-Easter phenomenon. It was the astounding, unexpected presence of the risen Christ that formed a believing community. Without that presence, the church might have been described as a memorial society or a reunion for old veterans of the Jesus campaign, laboring to keep alive the fading memory of a dead hero.” (William Willimon, What’s Right with the Church, p. 45).
In the transforming community, Thomas experienced the living Christ. Doubt was overcome in his triumphant affirmation and commitment. “My Lord and my God!” Doubt always is overcome by commitment. Research has long taught us that we often act ourselves into a new way of believing and thinking.
So on this weekend after Easter, how will it be for you? Is Easter a pleasant interlude of appreciation and remembrance or cause for a higher level of renewed faith and commitment which comes in living through doubt? Do you wish to live the resurrection? Do you want to transform the Cape of Storms into a Cape of Good Hope for your life? We do so by being a part of the transforming community that overcomes doubt and affirms by word and deed. “My Lord and my God!” (John 20:28). “Blessed are those who have not seen and yet believe” (John 20:29).
I hope to start a new series of blogs soon on the transformed church that is coming into being through the power of the Holy Spirit. Amid the declines of Christendom and struggles of early 21st century Christians that many of us know full well, I think God in Christ through the presence of Holy Spirit is doing something amazing. A transformed Christian community is slowly taking place. With timidity, prayer and wonder, I hope to write on this Spirit led transformation, which is calling into being a new church.
In this Easter season, may you sail the seas of the Cape of Good Hope!