Peace (John 20:19)

 


Tuesday, April 22, 2025


Psalm 118

Exodus 12:21-36

John 20:19-31


Peace (John 20:19)


On the evening of that day, the first day of the week, the doors being locked where the disciples were for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said to them, “Peace be with you.”


When Jesus hung on the cross, he spoke. Seven statements of his are recorded for us in the Gospels, and they are of infinite value to the Christian pilgrim.


But what about the first words he said after his resurrection? We read yesterday what he said to Mary Magdalene: “Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you seeking?” (John 20:15). With the grieving, he is tender. He is also pastoral; he leads her from grief to joy.


Jesus shows off his pastoral skills with the disciples behind the locked door, too. Fear is the word St John uses to describe the situation in the room, and the opposite of fear, according to Jesus, is peace. And again he said to them, peace.


St Thomas, for many understandable reasons, “will never believe” in the resurrection unless he gets physical evidence. Does he perhaps have fear not only of the Jews but of the possibility his friends are mistaken? Is his fear the fear of disappointment?


Once again Jesus came, and the first word out of his mouth was peace.


For all we like to say about world peace, and it is good to speak of it, the hardest type of peace to achieve is the peace of the soul. We cannot manufacture peace between nations; what hope do we have of manufacturing peace in the human soul? Peace cannot come from within; it must come from without.


One of Christ’s greatest blessings to us is his peace. Something outside ourselves, something infinitely greater and deeper and wider and broader than the finite human spirit has to give us that peace we so desperately need. What is more peaceful than the fact that we have been reconciled to God?


What do you fear? How does your place in God’s eyes as his beloved child speak to that fear?


God of peace: guard our hearts in your peace, so that we may suffer no fear but rather hear the gentle words of Jesus.

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