Read: John 20:19-23
When we were children, we could not sleep for excitement before going away on holiday. Now I am not a child I still sleep fitfully if I am looking forward to a special day, and important event or, yes, going on holiday.
In July 2020 as the first Covid restrictions eased we went on holiday to the same place I first visited as a teenager in 1974. We knew it was safe and familiar but I would not like to be drawn on which of the two trips was the more exciting! Summer holidays after the busy school year or release (temporarily it transpired) from lockdown.
In today’s reading the disciples were together. They were locked in for fear of the Jewish leaders. Jesus had been crucified, some thought he had risen from the dead and the religious authorities needed to keep control of the situation.
Jesus turned up in the midst of the nervous group. Then he gave them the Holy Spirit. He told them they could forgive sins. He told them they could withhold forgiveness. He showed them his wounds. They were his emissaries now.
Can you imagine how exciting, unnerving and sleep depriving this must all have been for the disciples? Jesus must have known too because he also used the Hebrew greeting, ‘Peace be with you.’ He used it twice as if to make the point that he meant it for what it said, not merely as a form of words.
The excitement we feel before we do something we are looking forward to is nothing to the deep turmoil that boils inside a person facing a huge ordeal. The God given blessing of peace is much, much more than the simple ‘calm down’ we may direct at an overexcited youngster. People at the most daunting, life changing moments may witness to the amazing peace of God that is all enveloping.
A Prayer:
Calming balanced, rational God, when I am all over the place with excitement, trepidation or fear, may I know your peace deep within me. I pray for all who know the need for peace but have never discovered it for themselves. In your grace, appear to them in their safe places and breathe calm over them. Come, Spirit of peace, descend like a dove. Amen.