Let us pray: Dear Savior, how wonderful it is to know that you are just a hair’s breath away from us at any moment in time. How comforting it is to know that you literally hear our prayers, know our thoughts and longings, and in pure love You fulfill our deepest needs. May we never doubt Your goodness or compassion when it comes to healing our souls. Amen
GRACE MERCY AND PEACE ARE YOURS FROM CHRIST, OUR RISEN SAVIOR!
TEXT: John 24: 36-49
Dearly Beloved By Christ:
For quite a while I’ve been mulling mind-expanding thoughts in the little gray cells of my brain. It all has to deal with the world of quantum physics. Before you glaze over, focus for just a bit. Everything in the universe is made of energy. The pew you’re sitting in is actually energy held together by molecular bonds to create wood. The air you breath is energy in its own unique form. The colors you see, the animals roaming in the woods, even your body is energy—if you break it all down to the base components. Light is energy, too. Sound waves are energy which strike our ears and we de-cipher at certain levels. Energy is everything. We’ll call this the “quantum,” or quantity (totality) of matter.
Energy moves at the speed or light or instantaneously to our understanding. Energy isn’t bound to the limitations of time or space. It passes through seemingly solid or immoveable objects. Why? Because they are all energy, too.
My father, the mathematician, once told me that the amazing thing about God is that He uses what he termed: “natural means” to engage in supernatural things. He never spoke of quantum physics, but he was trained in it, and I believe that was his way of explaining it in his mind. I want you to keep this all in your mind as we look at today’s lesson.
I
It’s Easter evening, well into the night. St. Luke, along with Cleopas, Christ’s uncle since he was married to Mary’s sister, have just spent the afternoon with Christ along the road to Emmaus. They failed to recognize Him until they sat down to eat supper. Then Jesus pulled aside the veil of obscuring His visage and they recognized Him while He prayed over their meal. Just as suddenly, He vanished from their sight. Poof! He was gone. They were shocked and amazed and hurried off to Jerusalem a few miles away to tell the other disciples their news. We’re told: “There they found the Eleven and those with them, assembled together and saying, ‘It is true! The Lord has risen and has appeared to Simon (Peter).’ Then the two told what had happened on the way, and how Jesus was recognized by them when he broke the bread.” (Prayed) “While they were still talking about this, Jesus himself stood among them and said to them, ‘Peace be with you!’”
Before Einstein and Max Planck walked this planet, people didn’t really understand much about quantum physics. Quite frankly, they still don’t. It’s all just so “other-worldly” isn’t it? And when it came to this passage and others like it, Christians simply said: “God can do anything He wants since He’s the creator of all things.” So, if He chooses to suddenly appear in a locked room, He can easily displace the molecules of the wall and pass right through it all. I believe quantum physics helps us grasp all this a bit better, however. Christ is pure energy, total goodness. Energy makes up all creation, recall the passage: “God fills all things.” So, if you accept quantum physics, these appearances of Christ are more easily conceptualized—and so is His sudden vanishing act back in Emmaus.
II
All this is very humbling to me. It reveals that God is far, far beyond our understanding and grasp. He’s “in the world, but not of the world.” He’s not bound to time and space like we are—unless He chooses to be—such as during His 33 year ministry on this earth. But He’s totally real. More real than anything we can imagine or that our senses can grasp. The disciples don’t grasp the complex simplicity of God, however. Instead, they immediately are fearful and think Jesus is a ghost. To allay their fears, He bids them to “touch him and see.” “A ghost does not have flesh and bones, as you see I have.” Then to further calm their fears He says: “Do you have anything to eat?” They gave Him some fish and He ate it in their presence.” Yes, Christ had truly risen in bodily form! The molecules of His body were real. He really had fulfilled all Scripture and saved His people from sin and death. The entire OT bore witness to Him and now that fulfillment was standing before them, talking to them, and comforting them.
It’s easy to simply conclude: “God can do anything and here we have an example of His supernatural (beyond the natural) ways.” However, if you accept the theory of quantum physics, it helps explain the “how” of it all. God’s pure energy of pure goodness, the Gospel, can literally do anything, and no physical constraints of creation can ever stand in its way or contain it!
III
What a joy it is to know that we are totally connected to Him through faith! What a solace of soul it is to know that nothing can separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord! The disciples were just beginning to grasp these truths. Their expanding faith was in its infancy, but it would grow and flourish because God’s power cannot be contained. And that power was to be found in the spoken and written words of the Bible, the Gospel, which conveyed it all to them.
“Then he opened their minds so they could understand the Scriptures. He told them, ‘That is what is written: The Christ will suffer and rise from the dead on the third day, and repentance and forgiveness of sins will be preached in his name to all nations, beginning at Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things. I am going to send you what my Father has promised; but stay in the city until you have been clothed with power from on high.”—Of course that’s an allusion to Pentecost and the further outpouring of the Spirit’s energetic power.
Folks, we possess all this, all this power and assistance and comfort, right now! This is our risen Savior’s legacy of pure love to you. It’s not distant. It’s not far off. It’s right here right now. Christ is right here right now. So you and I really have nothing to fear about anything. Pull off the blinders of unbelief! Like Luke and Cleopas, listen and ponder the truth of God declaring your rightness with Him because of Christ’s sacrifice on the cross. And then, like them, ceaselessly go and tell, for Christ is your singular connection with the essence of God’s total creation. Amen