Praying Together 14th April 2024

“Ghosts don’t eat fish.”

Luke describes three events when the disciples hear about Jesus’ resurrection. Once when the women – Mary of Magdala, Joanna and Mary the mother of James report what they have seen – but the disciples consider them to be talking nonsense. Next, they hear about His appearance to Simon, and then the two disciples who had met Him on the road to Emmaus describe their own realisation of His accompanying presence in the breaking of the bread. The disciples are talking about these events when He comes to stand among them – but in their confusion, the only thing they can imagine is that they are seeing His ghost. – they long for Him to be real, but still they can’t believe – this is something that goes against everything they have experienced. So Jesus once and for all establishes the reality of His bodily resurrection – he asks for, and is given, a fish supper. And He eats it. Which ghosts can’t do.

They can’t now deny it – and so, to them, He proclaims the fulfilment of the scriptural prophesy of the coming of the Messiah, and the challenge that presents to those who have seen Him.

It is easy, with hindsight, to criticise the disciples for their incredulity. But we have to ask ourselves what we would do in their place. I suspect that our reaction would be pretty much the same; and given that we weren’t there to see what happened for ourselves, it is actually more difficult for us to believe. We need evidence – but if we look, it is there in so many ways. The disciples changed from fearful into fearlessness. How? The evidence of changed lives throughout scripture. What? The amazing acts and subsequent history of a people worldwide who have been convicted of the truth in the power of the Spirit. Why? And most of all, our own experience of the times when we have acted in ways that the world would consider as nonsense, but in following His challenge and commission, have seen Him at work in ourselves. Here and Now. And we must respond – we have no choice. So what is our missionary task?

In a time when the world appears to be on the threshold of widening conflict and increased violence, we need to be mindful of those places where people are at war, where people are living with daily injustice, where children are starving and families destroyed, where leaders of Nations and Communities are self-serving rather than serving those they lead, we are conscious that are hope lies only in You. And when we see the need, we do whatever we can, be it large or small.

Dear Father, we pray that you bring peace on earth – and let it begin in each and every one of us, trusting in Your promise.