Although you have not seen him, you love him, and even
though you do not see him now, you believe in him and rejoice with an
indescribable and glorious joy, for you are receiving the outcome of your
faith, the salvation of your souls. (1 Peter 1:8-9)
It’s
something of a tradition that the gospel passage we get for Easter 2 in the
Revised Common Lectionary is always this story of “Doubting Thomas (John
20:19-31).” Smart Bible scholar folks have a theory about this. Without getting
too much into the historical/literary critical weeds, let’s just say that
around the end of the first century of the Common Era there may have been a
little rivalry between the disciples of John and the disciples of Thomas.
Subsequently, when John’s disciple writes his resurrection narrative, he makes
Thomas look like a doofus for not taking his buddies’ word that Jesus really is
raised from the dead[i].
(Of
course, if the Johannine account is correct, you can hardly blame Thomas for
being a little skeptical. It’s not like people get raised from the dead every
day! But I digress.)
Yes,
poor Thomas looks like a doubting, faithless doofus in John’s gospel. He,
therefore, stands in stark contrast to Peter, who looks like a doofus in all
four gospels. I mean, how would you like it if the one thing everyone
remembered about you was the fact you shot your big pie hole off about being
faithful to Jesus even unto death, and then—the second things got a little
uneasy—you denied you even knew the guy? And not once, but three
times?
But
the Peter we meet on Easter 2 isn’t the same guy we saw on Good Friday. Somehow
a switch got flipped, and the old, cowardly, say-it-before-you-thought-about-it
Peter has given way to the bold and eloquent messenger of the Gospel we meet in
our first reading (Acts 2:14a, 22-32).
I’d
hate to have been Good Friday Peter, wouldn’t you? The guy must’ve been feeling
a boatload of emotions, and none of them were good. In a braggadocio moment the
night before he swore he’d stand by Jesus even if he had to die for him. He was
ready to draw his sword and do battle to protect his rabbi, but when the temple
police slapped the cuffs on Jesus, Peter ran away like the others. Then he
denied he was Jesus’ disciple. I don’t think this was calculated. I think fear
just oozed out of him before he knew what he was saying.
The
gospels tell us Peter wept bitterly that night. I imagine him slumped in some
dark, dirty corner of Jerusalem ally,
his head between his knees, his body heaving with sobs. What were those tears
about? Shame and self-loathing when a man sees himself as being weak and
cowardly? Disgust at his own hypocrisy? Grief for the certain death of the
friend, teacher, and leader whom he so dearly loved? Utter despair and
disillusionment for the movement which promised to be about joy and liberation,
but which has turned out to be about nothing at all?
But
then came Easter. Peter encountered the risen Jesus and something in him was
resurrected too. Peter became like an addict who has conquered addiction. Like
a woman escaping an abusive partner. Like a bankrupt starting over. Like a
hostage set free. In the power of Christ’s resurrection, he shed the demons of
fear, shame, guilt, and self-doubt and became the rock Jesus had prophesied
he’d become. He’d become a real adult—whatever his chronological age
might’ve been at that moment.
It’s
believed he eventually left Judea and Galilee to share the joy he found in
Jesus around the Mediterranean world. His journey took him to Antioch in Syria,
across the sea to Corinth in Greece, and finally to Rome.
By
the time the epistle we call 1 Peter was written (probably sometime in the late
90’s of the Common Era), Peter would be dead. It’s doubtful the Galilean
fisherman could write in such sophisticated Greek, so the letter was probably
composed by a disciple who had known Peter in Rome.
The letter would’ve been written to
that Roman church, and I’m sure that congregation could relate to Peter’s
story. Some of them may have lived through the Great Fire of 64 CE and seen
everything they owned destroyed. They may have known the terror of flaming
death all around them with no place to run, escaping only by crawling through
the sewer. They certainly knew the grief of losing beloved leaders as both
Peter and Paul would be executed by the imperial authorities. They also knew
disappointment as they waited for Jesus’ return and Jesus appeared to be taking
his good, sweet time about coming back. Worst of all, they were living under
persecution for their faith, marginalized and even criminalized for loving the
Savior they’d never met in the flesh.
But through all of this, they
received the outcome of their faith just as their leader Peter had done. Some
may have been peasants, and some were even slaves, but they loved Jesus and
knew Jesus loved them. In turn, they could love one another. They could rejoice
even in their suffering because the earthly authorities which took Peter from
them could not take away their baptism, their love, or their hope.
What is the outcome of our faith? I
like to think it’s real maturity—a maturity which leads us to be like those
early Christians who so resonated with Peter’s story. We are to be a community
of love; forgiveness for ourselves and others; courage in the face of chaos,
doubt, and uncertainty; selflessness; and, finally, peace.
May your faith bring you to that
peace, my friend. Thanks for visiting my blog this week.
[i] If
you’d like to learn more about this, I suggest you check out Elaine Pagel’s wonderful
book Beyond Belief: The Secret Gospel of Thomas (New York: Random House,
2003)
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