(Acts 4,13-15.15-19; 1 John 2, 1-5; Luke 24, 35-48: 3rd Sunday of Easter: Year B)
The first reading of today is Peter’s speech after the cure of the lame man at the Beautiful Gate of the temple. His speech has two diverse themes. In the first part, Peter was hard on the people of Jerusalem, whom he accused of handing Jesus over to Pilate, accused the Holy and Just One falsely, preferred the release of a criminal to him and had him killed. In the second part he was reconciliatory, almost excusing the people of Israel and their leaders when he said: Now I know brothers, that neither you, nor your leaders had idea what you were really doing. Peter did not indicate whether the ignorance of the people was culpable or not, nor if the leaders or the people were to be blamed more. Whatever the case could have been, Peter went on to show how God used the bad situation for good. God, however, raised him from the dead. This goes to demonstrate that God knows how to make good out of bad situations and that the love of God cannot be caged in by any human wickedness. This should be a lot of consolation to us, as it gives us hope that, out of our misery and unfaithfulness God can generate something good. Another aspect of this consolation, is that no human wickedness will ever impede what the merciful plans of God wish to accomplish.
At the end of his speech at the Beautiful Gate, Peter enunciated a logical conclusion: Now, you must repent and turn to God, so that your sins may be wiped out. Peter was emphasizing what was announced by the Scriptures and what Jesus made clear to his disciples, which was, that Christ would suffer and rise from the dead on the third day and that through his name repentance and forgiveness of sins will be preached to sinners (See John 24,46-47). This is the substance of the message entrusted to the Church: to proclaim to all nations of all times and places that in Jesus, who died and rose from the dead, we have the certainty to be purified from our sins in virtue of his sacrifice on the cross. This is the message that the Church transmits to us up till now.
But did Christ truly rise from the dead? Rise how? Did he rise with his body or exist only in Spirit? If he rose with his body what is the relationship between the crucified body of Christ and the risen body of Christ? These questions were what Luke, the Evangelist, was attempting to answer in today’s gospel message. He was writing to Christians who were living in an ambient dominated by Greek culture that held that after death, the spirit lives separately from the body. According to Luke, Jesus rose in his corporality, in his physical reality (even if his glorified body has the particular quality of entering into a locked room, appearing in several places at the same time and appearing in a place unrecognized). The risen Jesus is not an immortal spirit (ghost). He invited his disciples saying: Touch me and see for yourselves; a ghost has no flesh and bones as you can see I have. To still alleviate their doubt, he took from them a piece of grilled fish and ate before them. The risen Jesus is the same Jesus who was crucified. He carries in his body the signs of his passion and says: Look at my hands and feet; yes, it is I indeed. Thus, Christ’s crucifixion was not just a historical fact, knowledge of which was concentrated in a locality and for a brief time, rather it is a permanent event that is always operational because the oblation, Christ himself, perdures/lives for ever. It is for that reason that John could write in today’s second reading:we have our advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ, who is just, he is the sacrifice that takes our sins away, and not only ours, but the whole world’s. The letter to the Hebrews affirms that Jesus lives for ever interceding on our behalf (Hebrew 7,25).
The risen Jesus shows that his passion and death were not unforeseen events. With his resurrection that function as conclusion or better still, as the culminating point of the plan of salvation conceived by God, the Father. Jesus Christ is the key to the interpretation of the whole Scriptures. Jesus reminds his apostles in the gospel reading of today of this fact when he hinted: This is what I meant when I said, while I was still with you, that everything written about me in the Law of Moses, in the Prophets and in the Psalms, has to be fulfilled. Even though, Jesus anticipated giving his disciples all the information about himself before his passion, yet after his passion he deemed it wise to open their minds to understand the scriptures. We, the Christians of today and the disciples of the Risen Christ, should beg Jesus to open our minds so as to understand that the entire history of Israel is meaningful only when read from the point of view of his passion, death and resurrection; and secondly and more importantly, to perceive that the history of the Church or the life story/history of every one of us, as well as the history and destiny of humanity have Him (Christ) as their centre, and reflect the fullness of their meaning, only and only when they are connected with Him, as it is God’s plan to recapture all things in Christ(Ephesians 1,10).
Before Jesus left the scene, where he met with his disciples, he indicated that the disciples were the witnesses of his resurrection. Peter had already in the first reading of today confirmed that, in his speech at the Beautiful Gate. Christianity is not just a religion that has elaborate dogmatic and moral exposition, it is also and more-so a religion that proclaims/announces the fact, the event of the death and resurrection of Jesus. Proclaiming and witnessing this event fall within the competence of every Christian. It is not the privileged duty of the Pope, the bishops, the priests, or the consecrated men and women religious alone, but also that of all the Christian Faithful. This is the teaching of the second Vatican Council which holds: Every lay person should be in the world as witness to the resurrection and life of the Lord Jesus Christ and a living sign of the Living God (Lumen Gentium, 38). It is to be borne in mind, that to be a veritable witness one must have had a personal experience with the Risen Christ. May we, therefore, earnestly pray for the grace to be able to have a memorable experience with Christ who rose from the dead and is operating in us through his Spirit. At the same time, may we also request from God, for the grace to have the courage to remove from us those obstacles that impede the Risen Lord revealing himself fully to us. Happy Sunday!
+John I. Okoye.
