Low Sunday 28.4.19 Faith
The Gospels record several post-Resurrection appearances of Our
Lord. As well as these there were many others, over the forty days between His
Resurrection and Ascension.
In the Gospel accounts, He is embarrassing the apostles for
their lack of belief.
He had told them this would happen. Why did they not believe
it? Even being told, and then having Him in front of them - they still doubted.
He was exposing the fragility of faith in the average
disciple. It seemed like a dream to them. Things just do not normally go that
well. We come to expect trouble just about all the time. Here is something that
breaks right out of that and takes us to another dimension.
What about our position? We come so much later on the scene
and have so much more evidence, miracles, wisdom… yet we still doubt.
It seems that it is easier to believe in the general than
the particular. In general it is easy to say that God is in control, but when
it comes down to specifics we doubt that this great God could think of ‘me’ in
the midst of such a vast universe.
When we have a particular problem which requires help we can
be consumed with doubt all over again - as though Jesus had never come, never
died, never rose.
He can attend to each one of us at the same time with full
attention. He is not limited as we are to our own little world.
If we believe in God who made the whole universe, we can
believe in all His attributes, and His power to work miracles.
If He can make the whole universe He can raise from the
dead.
He has complete authority over everything and everyone.
We bow down before him (like Thomas) - that is the way to
strong faith and strong loyalty.
We are willing to receive whatever He wants to give us, or
wants to do with us.
If we do this repeatedly, habitually, our faith should
become stronger, so that we can see reality not just physically, but in its
need for God to operate freely.
The Resurrection gives us a clearer way of seeing things.
What should the apostles have done instead?
They should have stayed with Him when arrested. They should
have stayed by the Cross while He was being crucified. And they should have
stood outside the tomb waiting for Him to come out.
They could and should have done these things.
And when He arose it should not have needed so many times to
believe it was really He.
They missed out on all those points. But because He is so merciful,
if we still don’t believe after so many chances He still loves us, and still
enables us to get on board.
In 2000 years of the Church’s life many have come and many
have gone.
This matches the vacillating nature of faith, that it can
rise and fall with circumstances.
We need to take the high point of our faith, when we
believed most strongly, and make that the reference point - that is the normal
way to be.
For all their twists and turns the apostles did come to
faith and they did grow in that faith.
This is what we must do – else the demons come back and our
bad habits return (cf Lk 11,26).
With the Risen Lord to sustain us, may we have the same
faith every day of the week, and in every circumstance.
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