The disciples were afraid. “Is this some kind of apparition?” they wondered, or perhaps a ghost? So He shows them His wounds - the nail marks in His hands, the wound of the spear in His side. And there, before their eyes, was the fulfilment of what the prophet Isaiah had said so many generations before: "He was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed.” Jesus Christ, the Victim of violence, now stands before them as the Prince of Peace, and saying to them “Peace to you.” This was a peace which the world cannot give. The Hebrew word for peace is “shalom,” which means more than simply the absence of war and fighting. It means that everything is in its place, everything is in harmony, everything is whole. What Jesus accomplished on the Cross is now spoken to the disciples, and to all of us, “Peace to you.”
Wherever Jesus is, peace is there. Sin is atoned for. Death is conquered. Life is brimming over. And there is peace. Jesus, the Crucified and Risen One, is our peace. From Jesus Christ Himself, from His wounded Body, come His sacraments of peace and life and salvation. They are there for us in the font and on the altar, all as real as was Jesus in the upper room on that first Easter evening.
The Gospel tells us that the disciples were so joyful, they could scarcely believe it. And who wouldn't be overcome with joy? The Easter news is true. The Lord is risen! How great their joy must have been! To see His wounds, to hear His words, to be filled with His peace.
"Peace to you," the Lord Jesus said to them. He was giving peace for themselves, to quiet their fear, to turn their sorrow into gladness, and He was giving them peace for others – peace to move their feet out of their little locked room and into the world. He tells them that they should “preach in His name to all nations” because they are “witnesses” to all that He has done.
And we know from other Gospel accounts that He breathed His breath on them, and He told them, "Receive the Holy Spirit.” Of course, without the Holy Spirit the disciples couldn’t do what Jesus was sending them to do. "If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained," He tells them.
So they are sent out with authority. With His breath and with His words, Jesus authorizes them to do what God alone can do – to forgive sin. There would always be those, even in our own day, who demand to know, “How can mere men presume to forgive sin?” But it isn’t men who forgive sin; rather, it’s the One who sends them, the One who breathes on them, who gives them His Spirit and authority. So when Peter or James or John or Bartholomew or Andrew or any of the other apostles forgave, it was Jesus forgiving. Jesus sends them with His own authority, the authority with which the Father had sent Him. Jesus binds His mouth to their mouths, His word to their words, His breath to their breath, His Spirit to their spirit. Their forgiveness was His forgiveness.
And we know that Jesus not only sent out his original apostles, but that He also makes present His words, His peace, and His forgiveness through the priesthood He has entrusted to His Church through apostolic succession. This means that every bishop, and every priest ordained by a bishop, speaks with the very breath and authority of the Risen Christ when it comes to dealing with sin. Every ordination is an echo of that first Easter Sunday in the locked room when the risen Lord Jesus Christ breathed on that fearful band of disciples and sent them as His apostles to be His witnesses, to forgive and to retain sin. Bishops and Priests don’t represent their own persons when they administer Christ's Word and sacraments, but they speak and act in the stead, and by the command, of the Crucified and Risen Christ who sends them through His Church and who ministers through them.
What a comfort this is for those who are looking for forgiveness and peace. This is Christ’s promise – that He doesn't leave us uncertain about forgiveness. He doesn't leave us searching for peace. Rather, God locates forgiveness and peace where it can be found and received - in Peter and the other apostles, and in those who succeed them. Jesus Christ puts men under holy orders, and included as part of those orders is to minister forgiveness in His Name, to conquer sin through the lordship of Christ’s death and resurrection, to proclaim Christ’s word in season and out of season.
Jesus Christ really is risen from the dead. He is alive; He is not dead. He is present; He is not absent. And in the power of His resurrection, He is present with us in the fullness of His divinity and His humanity. Locked doors could not keep Him out. Nothing can. He is present among us as surely and as fully as He was with the disciples in the locked room on that first Easter. He is with us to free us from our fears, to speak His peace into our hearts, to forgive our sins, to turn our sorrow into gladness, and to bless us.
We have been reborn in His baptism; we have received His forgiveness; we are nourished with His Body and His Blood. His words, His sacrifice, His ministry – these are the gifts of Easter from Christ to His Church. This is the peace which Christ promised – the peace of God which passes all understanding.
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Pictured: "Appearance Behind Locked Doors"
by Duccio di Buoninsegna (c. 1255-1260 - c. 1318-1319)