From Wounds to Witness

sermon by Carrie Eikler
Easter 3
1 John 3:1-3, Luke 24:36b-48

In 2001 the French movie “Amelie” crossed the Atlantic and became a hit in the United States. Now, Americans aren’t really ones for foreign films, especially if they have subtitles, but the “Amelie” was an exception. The tagline for the movie was “one person can change your life forever . “ Amelie, an innocent and naive young woman in Paris, with her own sense of justice, decides to help those around her and along the way. In one scene, Amelie has helped someone by has anonymously returning a lost item to the owner.

The narrator says: "Amelie has a strange feeling of absolute harmony. It's a perfect moment. Soft light, a scent in the air, the quiet murmur of the city. She breathes deeply. Life is simple and clear. A surge of love, an urge to help mankind comes over her."

At this point, Amelie spots a blind man at the curb who is about to cross the busy street. She has seen the man a couple of times before in short glimpses. Amelie steps up beside him, grabs his arm, and guides him into the street saying, "Let me help you. Step down. Here we go!” She begins to move him through the cars, along the bustle of the sidewalk, through the smells and sounds that he can clearly detect. But she also becomes his eyes for him, describing what they pass, things he cannot see. Things he has perhaps never seen.”The drum major's widow! She's worn his coat since the day he died. The horse's head has lost an ear! That's the florist laughing. He has crinkly eyes. In the bakery window, lollipops. Smell that! They're giving out melon slices. Sugarplum ice cream! We're passing the park butcher. Ham, 79 francs. Spareribs, 45! Now the cheese shop. Picadors are 12.90. Cabecaus 23.50. A baby's watching a dog...[and the dog is] watching the chickens.”

The man is clearly astonished by this ride he is on, but the way his head is thrown back in a sense of abandon we realize he is enjoying this newfound sense of sight. As they reach the end of the street, Amelie lets go of his arm and says, “Now we're at the kiosk by the metro. I'll leave you here. Bye!"

Amelie trots up the steps and the man is left alone again. He raises he head to the sky, his eyes still in foggy blindness, and light radiates over his body. It’s hard to tell if the light is coming from above him or from within him.

( view scene here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZqT9kA1bcVQ)

It seems like this is the encounter with Jesus that the disciples and other followers experienced in those days following the resurrection. Jesus stepped up to people, surprised them, walked with them in the streets. He spoke with them about grief, loss, delight. And even if they were still “disbelieving in their joy,” as it says the disciples reacted in today’s scripture , he still opens something in them that allows for his light to shine into them…or maybe shine from within them.

It seems like the post-resurrection stories all move along with this tension: they seem him, but they don’t see him. On Easter Mary thought he was a gardener. On the Road to Emmaus they thought he was a uninformed stranger who didn’t know about Jesus dying and being raised from the dead. And in today’s scripture they see him, but think they see a ghost; whether they think it is a ghost of Jesus it doesn’t say, but it took him gobbling down some fish for them to get who it really was, in flesh and bone.

And isn’t that our tension, too? Not seeing and seeing? But often our stories continue on in cycle that we don’t see happening in the gospels in the post-resurrection story. We experience a cycle of not seeing, and then seeing, and then not seeing again. Not believing, and then believing, then not believing, then believing….It seems like in the gospels, we only see the confused part and then the clarity part. A happy ending. Not at all a typical French movie. (By the way, without spoiling it too much for those of you who haven’t seen it, Amelie is not a typical French movies, as endings go)

It is unfortunate for us that we only get a snapshot of the lives of those who saw Jesus’ work, his life and death and resurrection. Even though we know some of them didn’t quite get it, or were fearful, or (God forbid) even doubted, we come away from the gospel stories thinking they were somehow special--better suited to the task of witnessing than we are. They had the real stuff, we only have…bits and pieces of the real stuff. Longings for the real stuff.

But I think if the gospel stories continued on, if we saw each of the disciples--each of the followers of Jesus--throughout their lives until their death, the same way we are witnesses to our own lives, we would likely see such cycles of belief and disbelief, assuredness and questioning.

So for Jesus to say to his disciples “You are witness of these things,” and imply that they are to continue the work of sharing the message to all the nations, to witness to the nations…well its all fine and good because they actually did witness it. They saw it. But what have we seen? What have we witnessed?

We’ve sat through lots of church services, Sunday School classes, TV evangelists. We tried prayer practices and good deeds and getting in touch with ourselves. How many of us have witnessed Jesus in these ways…in these places?

For those who are lucky—perhaps to go so far to say, for those who are blessed—to have witnessed Jesus profoundly in these places, there are many of us who want to know: what’s the secret? It seems so hard in our post-modern world which places such emphasis on personal experience, to say when we have seen Jesus. Today it feels like we must experience what Jesus was all about before we can believe we have witnessed it. Believing is seeing.

Maybe the disciples were a little bit like this. Frightened and anxious, they probably felt a bit frayed around the edges, tattered and torn, rather than being seeds scattered and sown. What had they just witnessed? The crucifixion, the empty tomb. This certainly didn’t make them feel empowered to be bearers of the good news, because they locked themselves away. Secure from the outside world. They’re barring the doors and stocking up on the food, settling down for the hurricane to hit and hopefully pass.

But Jesus came to them again. Jesus stood with them and asked about their fears. He pushed up his sleeves and stuck out his feet, holes and blood and bone. Jesus invited them to himself to touch, feel. And to prove that he didn’t die, but also continued to live, he took something to eat, an essential act to sustain life. And then he opens them to the scripture. And then when they were open—their doors, their eyes, their hearts—they did more than simply see. They witnessed. They experienced. They saw and were compelled by the opening of themselves to share it with others.

It seems like it was witnessing these things that convinced them they could go and be witnesses to others? Not the seeing the dead body or the empty tomb, but witnessing the pronouncement of peace along with seeing the wounds along with some messy eating and some good old fashioned bible study.

Again, all fine and good for them. But what about us? How can we witness if we don’t know if we’ve seen the risen Lord? With all our wounds of the past and the present, for all the wounds we may likely incur or cause in the future, how could we possibly be good witnesses?

For the disciples it was seeing that Jesus’ humanity didn’t stop. He kept pronouncing peace in the midst of his wounds, the wounds that cracked open their protective shell to slowly realize who he was. I think that is what we are witness to. If we are unsure we have seen Christ, we can be sure we have witnessed his wounds.

We have witnessed Christ’s wounds this week as suicide bombers in Baghdad killed or injured at least 170 people.

We have witnessed Christ’s wounds when a family stares at their burned out house, wondering how this could have happened.

We have witnessed Christ’s wounds when immigrants seeking new lives are gunned down in their classroom.

We have witnessed Christ’s wounds when sisters and brothers in faith wonder if the church will cast them as outsiders if they revealed the hidden parts of their lives.


We may not know if we have seen Jesus, but there is no doubt that we have witnessed his wounds. And that alone prepares us to be witnesses.

The priest and theologian Henri Nouwen utilizes the image of a “wounded healer” as a powerful approach to witnessing to the world (The Wounded Healer, 1979). We begin with our own wounds in order to see and understand the wounds around us, the wounds of others, the places where Christ’s peace needs to touch you, me, everyone. At one point he brings this to a very personal approach:

"When we honestly ask ourselves which person in our lives mean the most to us, we often find that it is those who, instead of giving advice, solutions, or cures, have chosen rather to share our pain and touch our wounds with a warm and tender hand. The friend who can be silent with us in a moment of despair or confusion, who can stay with us in an hour of grief and bereavement, who can tolerate now knowing, not curing, not healing and face with us the reality of our powerlessness, that is a friend who cares."

Seeing the wounds may just be the first step. Then touching. Then Christ calls us to sit and eat with him, wherever that may be. Then Christ calls us to learn with him, however that may be… until we are completely opened: our hearts, our eyes, our minds, and our lives.

Maybe we have a lot in common with the blind man in the movie Amelie. In our wondering if we have seen Jesus, wondering if we can safely cross the busy road of our lives unscathed, let alone make any difference to the people on the other side, we may feel that firm grasp on our arm as we are led through life by the gentle, but firm and directive movement and voice of the spirit. And we begin to witness the grief and laughter, joy and pain of Christ’s testimony. With our heads thrown back in joyful disbelief and willing abandon like the blind man, and like the disciples, the light we never thought we have seen begins to radiate on us.

Or does it radiate from us? Maybe that is how the life of being Christ’s witness in the world is like. The light that shines on us is the light that shines from us. The light we see is the light others see. The Christ we have witnessed is the Christ we share with others.

Peace be with you. Touch the wounds. Eat with others. Open your minds. You are witnesses of these things.
--

In continuing with our testimonies throughout the Easter season, I’ve invited Rejoyce to come before you and testify to the ways in which she has witnessed Christ’s wounds in the world, and how she has chosen to respond as a witness of Christ’s love. When she is finished, I invite you to read the unison response, printed in your bulletin: "We rejoice in your witness to Christ's wounds. Allelulia!"