Bodies forced into witnessing

Sermon on Luke 24:36B-48

It’s all about bodies. Everybody’s body. Broken bodies, risen bodies, grieving bodies. Aching bodies, hidden bodies, and one resurrected body. Bodies made by God. Bodies, so important and holy and special and precious to God that they won’t even be thrown away after death. Embodied grace basically.

They had seen him on that cross. They had seen the blood and water come out of his side. They had seen him breathe that last breath. They had held his mother tight as she sobbed. Jesus was dead. Dead people don’t just come into rooms unless…

“A ghost!” one of the disciples said. It must be his spirit. Was he here to haunt them, was he disappointed in them, locked away in this room in fear instead of continuing the revolution he had died for?

He gave them this look and then said, “It’s me,” just like God had always been saying. And he reached out his hand. It looked different and the wound was there, but it wasn’t transparent or anything. One of the younger disciples touched him gingerly, as if he might * poof * and disappear at any minute, and he said, “Yeah, see? How many ghosts do you know with flesh and bones like this?”

They didn’t know any ghosts, actually. So, they didn’t really know. But they knew about Ghost tests. Those were quite popular. One had to check whether a person’s feet were touching the ground. They did. They were firm on the ground, not floating. In his sandals, dusty. Normal. Except for those wounds. Check.

Still, they were startled. And he asked for something to eat. The ultimate Ghost test, that they knew. If a person had teeth and could eat real food, they couldn’t be a ghost. Check. It had been a few days since that last supper. He was so familiar and yet changed. He was healed and alive and yet marked with those fatal wounds.

Someone handed him some broiled fish, the quick dinner they had just shared. They all stared at him as he ate it. Mouth still opened like before, teeth still chomped, throat still swallowed. No Ghost after all they could tell.

A miracle. He had done miracles before but this…

He explained everything to them, he connected all the dots. He reminded them of the stories of their ancestors of Miriam and Moses and the Psalms and prophets. He told them that these stories were not just something long ago and far away but that they could be true for them, then. For us, here, now. That’s why he was back.

Cleopas and Mary and the rest of the other women didn’t even say, “Told you so.” A story like this…maybe they needed to see him again, too, to be completely sure.

He looked at them. So seriously. And told them, “You. You are the witnesses now to these things.”

Called into witnessing they were. There was no escape. They had to do it from now on. They didn’t ask for it, they didn’t ask for the fame and the pain that would necessarily come with it. A call is a call.

Called into witnessing to the life and death of their beloved son, friend, nephew, teacher. At least one of them was experienced in that grieving witness already. Elizabeth, Mary’s cousin, Jesus’ great-cousin, who had lost her son John the Baptist, Jesus’ great-great-cousin a couple of years earlier. To the same murderous hands just in a modified way.

Somehow, evil keeps happening when authorities meet young black and brown men. And so many of these men are connected because too many of them keep being killed. John and Jesus, 2 men from the same family. George Floyd and Daunte Wright, connected through George’s girlfriend Courtney who was one of Daunte’s former teachers. Courtney Ross had just delivered a heart-breaking testimony earlier this month in the trial of Derek Chauvin. Now, she has to grieve yet another young black man from her community. 

During the press conference with Daunte’s family, there were family members of at least six other Black men killed at the hands of the police. There also was a relative of Emmett Till. Because time is not a great healer. Not even the resurrection. Wounds stay, scars stay, wounded bodies witnessing to the cruelty that has been done to them. That’s how Jesus’ friends knew it was him. They recognized him by what had been done to him.

So, all of those grieving families came. Witnessing, holding space, sharing pain. Accusing the world, us, of not caring. Finding us guilty of not caring enough. Because it’s still not safe to be a Black or Brown man in this country.

In that press conference on Wednesday, Daunte’s mom Katie said: “Justice isn’t even a word for us. But unfortunately, there is never gonna be justice for us. The justice would bring our son home to us. Knocking on the door with his big smile. Coming in the house. Sitting down, eating dinner with us.” Katie doesn’t just want justice to be served in what officials call an accident. Yes, accountability will be important. But what she really longs for is for her son to bodily resurrect. Like Jesus. To see him walk in and eat with them. To touch his body, his wounds, to hear him talk again. Not to a Ghost. To a real, resurrected body. That’s what she wants more than anything.

Jesus’ mother and friends knew it would be tough to witness. They hadn’t believed the first witnesses, when they had told them about Jesus’ resurrection. They barely believed themselves that this was happening. 

But nobody asked them whether they were ready to be witnesses. The authorities forced them by killing Jesus. Jesus called them. His resurrection meant that what he had always said was actually true. He wasn’t bluffing about his resurrection. So, he probably wasn’t bluffing about anything else either. 

People usually don’t choose to be witnesses. Most moms would probably prefer not having to be activists. I would absolutely prefer just talking nice stuff, cozy chocolaty stuff on a Sunday morning. God would prefer that, too. But the world doesn’t care and didn’t care. And so, Jesus had to do quite some straight talking. He had to be killed by the system he challenged. He had to resurrect and even send the Holy Spirit to make sure the work doesn’t get buried under our understandable wish for unity and silence and peace and cake and feel-good music. 

That’s definitely the space where I would want to be. It’s not the space we see when watching the news and the pain in our country. And so, moms and dads and siblings and friends, people of faith and people of hope become activists, by call not by choice. Witnessing to the world what it means to lose yet another child to accidental killings. If that’s even a thing.

So. Here I am. Witnessing. To you. About the time that we were numb with shock and grief and Jesus came to us and reminded us who we are by showing us who God is.
I’m here, witnessing, to remind you too, that these stories from long ago aren’t just for 1st century Palestine. They are true for you, here, now.

Because it’s all about bodies. Everybody’s body. Broken bodies, risen bodies, grieving bodies. Aching bodies, hidden bodies, and one resurrected body. Bodies made by God. Bodies, so important and holy and special and precious to God that they won’t even be thrown away after death. Embodied pain and embodied grace. Going hand in hand. 

No, we don’t believe in a God that just cares about our souls. God made human bodies. God loves human bodies. There is no body for us to throw away, to simply shoot, to just get out of the way out of whatever fear. Of course, it still happens, every day. It’s hard to even keep up with the news of shootings these days. It’s sickening to the stomach. It’s an open wound in our nation. A wound that hardly ever has the time to become a scar before it’s being opened again.

Our nation’s body carries the wounds of all the dead bodies killed by police and by mass shootings. We carry the wounds in the hands and feet and the side of this nation. We will always be recognized by those stories of loss and pain. Even if we ever find the courage to resurrect from this reality to a new one, a loving and just one. Jesus’ wounds weren’t gone after his resurrection. They were how his friends new it was him. The wounds still reminded his friends of the pain done to him. And they knew that from now on no new wounds were to come. A resurrected body can’t be hurt anymore. A resurrected nation would still carry the wounds of the past but commit to hurting no more of its children. 

But remember, in order to resurrect, Jesus had to die. There is no other way from life to resurrection.

And so I’m here to ask you to believe the crucified ones in your midst, too. The ones who were killed by the cops, by the Empire, the ones that didn’t come back. The ones who have been showing you their wounds on body cams and cellphone footage, on your nightly news, on your Facebook page. The ones with stomachs rumbling, hungry for fish or daily bread, hungry for justice.

I am here witnessing to you. Because if you can’t recognize Jesus in them? If you can’t recognize Jesus in Daunte? In Breonna? In George? Renisha? Michael? Freddie? Terence? Philando? Laquan? Jamar? Eric?

If you can’t recognize Jesus in them?

Then you can’t recognize Jesus.

Amen.