Gloria Dei Lutheran Church

Today’s texts: Acts 4:32-35; Psalm 133; I John 1:1-2:2; John 20:19-31

Dear Friends in Christ, God’s grace and peace be with you. Amen

The Book of Clarence[i] was released last year, without much fanfare. It’s a strange movie. Musician/producer Jeymes Samuel writes the story of Clarence, the forgotten twin brother of Jesus’s disciple, Thomas. It’s sort of a comedy, musical, drug-infused, biblical epic– as if Life of Brian, meets Hamilton, collide with Ben Hur, while making a social commentary on race, truth, and faith[ii].

While it wasn’t quite as satisfying as I would have liked it to be it does explore some fascinating insights into belief and discipleship, and I couldn’t help thinking about it as I read our text today.

As the movie tells it, Clarence is the doubter. Thomas, and all of Jesus’ disciples, come across as condemning, hypocritical and out of touch. Clarence, the Twin, has no faith at all. He’s convinced Jesus is a fake, performing tricks to earn fame and fortune.

But since he needs some quick cash to dig himself out of debt, Clarence decides to put on his own Messiah act, and get in on the glory. “Knowledge is stronger than belief,” he keeps preaching, but lets people believe he is just as godlike as they believe Jesus is.

According to the biblical text, Thomas is the one who might have argued for knowledge. (We know nothing about his twin.) Thomas misses the risen Jesus’s first appearance to his disciples, and he insists on proof of his own. Belief won’t come, he claims, until he has knowledge for himself. And knowledge will require him to see Jesus with his own eyes and touch his wounds with his own hands. He might have been the one to say, “knowledge is stronger than belief.”

We meet a lot of people today who tell us they aren’t believers. Perhaps they’re saying something like Thomas – they have no way of proving God exists, or that Jesus was anything more than a good rabbi. They can’t see that prayer or faithfulness make any difference in the outcome of anything. The church’s message of grace or new life feels irrelevant in the face of war-fueled atrocities, out-of-control damage to the environment, and widening gaps between the haves and have nots, especially when coupled with racial disparities.

Sometimes people say they haven’t lost their faith at all. They believe in God, just fine. It’s the church they no longer appreciate. The church looks to them like another power structure, focused on rules and finances and credal statements, but neglecting the needs of those who are hurting, and doing little to change the social balance. When the church shies away from doing little more than releasing polished social statements condemning injustice, or when scandals expose church leaders of being just as prone to deceit or abuse as in any other institution, we come across as hypocrites and cowards.

What good is a life of faith in our day and age? We sometimes pine for previous times, when faith would have been more accessible, more assumed. But faith was apparently elusive for many of Jesus’ early followers from the start. Last week’s text had the women at the tomb afraid to say anything, and today we read that the disciples still huddle in fear behind locked doors, even after they have proof of the resurrection. Thomas wasn’t alone. Fears, doubts, questions, curiosity been part of every generation of Jesus’s people from the start.

And yet despite doubts or questions, something from their era endured. Something has been worth passing along in every generation since: Maybe not conviction, certainly not proof, but something that makes life worth living, and faith worth holding.

The New Testament is a collection of messages that those first believers wanted future generations to share: not a creed, or any specific statement of doctrine, but an experience of fellowship with others, an acknowledgement that we’re all wounded and afraid, and the goodness of trusting that our actions can make a difference anyway.

Today’s readings describe communities of people who tried to form relationships with one another, who were of one heart and soul, who worked to share light and truth with those around them, and who wanted others to know the joy that infused them. Joy, not knowledge, not proof, not even faith, is at the core of what they wanted to pass along. Jesus came, not to convince us of anything, but that we might have life in God’s name. The question for that first generation didn’t seem to be, “Do we have enough proof?” but, “How can we help others? How can we live so that it’s clear life is worth living? How can we love others as we have been loved?”

I don’t want to ruin the movie for anyone who is still planning to see it, but I need to tell you this much: by the end of the story, we realize that Clarence isn’t really seeking fame, or faith, or fortune. What he longs for is self-acceptance and a peace that could pass all understanding, a peace that comes from knowing he is lovable and valued and can make a difference in the world. I’m not sure any of us want much more than that.

When Jesus meets his friends gathered on that first day of the week, he senses their fears for their future, fears for their very lives, fears that everything they had put their faith in was worthless.

Jesus greets them with peace: they aren’t abandoned, but known, and valued. The cross did not finish their story. He shows them his wounds. God’s love will meet opposition and pain, but it won’t be overcome. And he breathes on them, pouring out his spirit so that the breath which filled his life with purpose could now inspire theirs. He exhales and offers his friends the power to forgive, to make the world new with their own ability to restore and rebuild goodness. He also reminds them that they have the power to neglect to forgive, too. There will be consequences for their choices.

The church continues to have this power, to forgive or to judge, to bless or to curse, to love or to ignore, to build people up or to break them down, to liberate or to condemn[iii], to be broken and to be resurrected. Others are watching.

Whether future generations have a faith will depend on whether they see those of us who do as willing to share our wounds and our love. It will depend on whether we share joy and life with the world, not just as concepts, but as embodied experiences of community and acceptance, of something that is tasted and touched, seen and shared.

For all of us, for all of them, the skeptics, the critics, the anxious, the faithful, those who believe, and those who hold their breath unclear of what to believe, Jesus continues to come. Jesus offers peace and exhales life, and encourages us to share good news, so that others may have life and joy in his name.

I don’t know if knowledge is stronger than belief. The witness of generations of faithful implies that love is stronger than condemnation, and joy is stronger than despair. Let’s breathe that into the world.

___________________

 [i] The Book of Clarence, directed and written by Jeymes Samuel. https://www.imdb.com/title/tt22866358/?ref_=ext_shr_lnk

[ii] Religion Unplugged, Culture: “The Book of Clarence,” The Presbyterian Outlook, January 18, 2024. https://pres-outlook.org/2024/01/the-book-of-clarence/

[iii] Lodge, Rev. Sue, “Easter Two – Hands that Bless,” Companions on the Way blog, Easter 2. https://www.companionsontheway.com/post/easter-two-hands-that-bless