To this we are witnesses.

In today’s Gospel, we find ourselves right back where we were last week, with the disciples gathered that first Easter evening. Last week we heard John’s account, this time coming from Luke. The disciples are trying to process the wild testimony from Mary, Peter and John that morning. They are trying to process the witness of the two disciples who just returned from Emmaus. They want to hope – but this news is unbelievable, literally incredible. 

Then, Jesus comes. Luke describes a mix of astonishment and fear when suddenly he is there. Of course they were shocked. They knew death, certainly better that most people today would. In their time, when someone died, they didn’t call Marion-Nelson to deal with the body. They took the deceased to his or her own home and all the family and friends saw them. And they buried them in the ground or a tomb quickly. They didn’t expect people to get up any more than we do. And Jesus’ body had gone straight and quickly into a tomb because of the Passover and Sabbath.

But now, Jesus is standing right there in front of them. Let’s be very clear. If the disciples wanted to say they “really felt his presence” or “he lived on in their hearts,” or that they were taking up his mantle and ministry as Elisha took up Elijah’s, they could have said so and would have said so. That is not what they said. Their witness is that he came and stood among them.

To be clear, the scriptures never suggest that Jewish people believed in ghosts, any more than our church or science would suggest it. But people did harbor such superstitions back then as they do today.  Jesus assures them that he is no ghost.

He spoke. “See my feet and my hands.  Touch me and see, for a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have. Have any food?” Then he ate some broiled fish. Apparitions or collective memories or enduring ideas don’t do that. 

This is the moment of real conversion, just as Mary’s encounter was hers that first Easter morning. The disciples had been following Jesus.  They had heard his teachings, seen his miracles, and embraced his example. He was dead, now he is risen. He is here. My Lord and my God. Jesus alive and with them changes everything. Everything they had ever known about, well, about everything has to be rethought, reconsidered, re-understood because he is here. This knowledge cannot, should not and by his command must not be contained.

Jesus then says, “And you are witnesses to these things.” That is when the disciples become Apostles. A disciple is one who follows the disciplines of a leader. An apostle is literally “a sent one,” a witness.

We are both.  We each have disciplines that, to the extent we follow them, feed our faith and shape our lives. We are the direct heirs of this Apostolic witness. Witness is at the very core of who we are as Christians, and it goes way, way back.

Life is an adventure of discovery. We process what we take in through our senses, we reason with our minds and we shape those inputs to make sense of our world, our lives and our purpose. We apply this method of inquiry into everything we do at some level.

All of humanity, every culture, has pondered and approached the great questions of the universe in the same way. In this way we can well understand myths about the sun being a chariot driven across the sky, or the moon, the stars, the sea, storms and on and on. It was speculation based on the available information. We see it, we think about it and we come up with an idea.

Our faith is fundamentally different, from the beginning and certainly as it comes into shape in Abraham and even before him Melchizedek. We are a faith of Revelation – the ongoing revelation of God to his creation. The witness handed down across the centuries through Israel is that there is one true God who created everything and has been speaking and acting in history.

And once we encounter God, we participate in his revelation. For example, say God is making his presence known on the top of Mount Sinai. The herdsmen at the foot of the mountain look up in wonder and speculate about the phenomenon. Then Moses goes up to have a look, encounters the burning bush, gets his marching orders and we hear God identify himself as “I AM” for the first time

Immediately with that revelation, God involves Moses in bearing witness to him. That’s why we call it the Old and New Testament, because the Bible is our enduring testimony to the One God, his son Jesus Christ and the power of the Holy Spirit moving in and through his Church.

Jesus gives his disciples their marching orders, “And you are witnesses to these things.” Their witness to him has been so strong that the resurrection of Jesus Christ is the most documented event in the ancient world. And the witness doesn’t stop with that event. It is living and growing.

Just before our passage from Acts, God healed a lame beggar through Peter and John.  Everyone was astounded, amazed. There was a terrific buzz in the street.  Then Peter witnessed to them, just as Jesus commanded. “What are you looking at? Why are you amazed? This is the power of the risen Jesus Christ whom you crucified.” “To this we are witnesses,” they said. And immediately, all the people gathered became all witnesses.

Which brings us back to us.  Many, if not most or even all of us, tend to come to church as disciples, out of desire or need. Like Moses ascending Mount Sinai, like the lame beggar approaching Peter and John, we want to approach, acknowledge and worship God, to learn more about Him and ourselves. We need to be fortified and we value the formation we and our children gain. We are disciples.

But when we come to know he is truly alive, that he is risen, that he is active and we’ve seen him act in our own lives or the lives of those around us, we become, or should become, apostles, “To this we are witnesses.”

That’s one reason I love the healing ministry so much. It creates witness. About 25 years ago, before I went to seminary, I helped lead and participated in the Alpha program at my home church.  (Alpha is a wonderful evangelism program – easily the best one the Anglican tradition has developed in a long, long time – and it will return to Good Shepherd this fall.)

We had a healing service. There was a woman named Nancy there who had cancer in her spine. I had never seen her before; someone from the church had brought her just for that service. She was using a walker, each step very purposeful. She wore big dark sunglasses; I think to hide the pain in her eyes.

At the appropriate time they brought her forward and sat her in a chair. Our priest told us about her cancer and we could all see she was suffering.

We all laid hands on Nancy. Our priest prayed over her while others muttered additional prayers quietly. I don’t know how long we prayed – 5 or 10 minutes, I guess. I don’t think it mattered how long.  I don’t think it mattered how many of us prayed. But we knew God was present. I could feel this warmth among us that was not just our collective bodies.

When we were done, we pulled our hands away. Nancy raised her head and removed her sunglasses. Tears were streaming down her face. Someone gave her a tissue or handkerchief. She looked around at us and said, “My pain is gone.”

Nancy died 7 months later. Her friends reported that the pain never returned. Her cancer wasn’t cured, but she didn’t suffer. God did a beautiful thing for Nancy.  Do you see how he pulled me, and now you, into his saving work?

This church has a long and blessed history of witness to the power of God working through his Holy Spirit.  That is who we are. We serve a Lord who our hard times and turns them into further witness to Him. There is more to come. John reminds us that, “what we will be has not yet been revealed,” (1 John 3:1-7) but what has been revealed, the love that God has given us and continues to give us, has been revealed. We are his witnesses.

AMEN!