Christian Fellowship

On the first Sunday after Easter, we always have the Gospel reading we just heard about poor Doubting Thomas. That means, I have preached on this same reading thirteen times. If I had thought ahead, I would have foisted it onto Deacon Terry! 
 
Thankfully, it’s a rich passage. As a way in to our passage this morning, I want to start with our opening prayer. We asked God to “grant that all who have been reborn into the fellowship of Christ’s body may show forth in [our] lives what we profess by [our] faith.” That is to say, we asked God to help us live out what we say we believe.  
 
We make that prayer in the confidence that, with God’s help, we really can do it, we really can live right. But we ask for God’s help because we know that living right is hard, that we often fail, that we need help if we are to have any hope of truly living right.  
 
Many obstacles stand in our way.  
 
The obstacle highlighted in our Gospel reading is doubt.  
 
By the time we get to our reading, Thomas has seen Jesus walk on water, calm a storm, feed multitudes at least twice, drive out demons, miraculously heal dozens, maybe hundreds of people. Thomas has heard Jesus preach the Sermon on the Mount. Thomas has heard Peter call Jesus “the Christ, the Son of God.” Thomas was at the Last Supper. Thomas has heard Jesus predict his own death and also his resurrection at least three times.  
 
After all that, it seems like Thomas could just accept the testimony of his fellow disciples that they had seen Jesus resurrected from the dead. But Thomas couldn’t bring himself to believe. And ever since, we have called him Doubting Thomas.  
 
But we shouldn’t judge Thomas too harshly. After all, many of us struggle with occasional doubt. We wonder if anyone is really out there, or if Jesus was really who he said he was, or if Christ’s resurrection really does redeem the world, or, most personally, if God really cares about me. And those doubts can make it hard to show forth in our lives what we profess by our faith, especially when the demands of our faith are challenging. 
 
But doubt is not the only obstacle that prevents us from living as we should, as we can see from plenty of passages in Scripture. Another obstacle is fear.  
 
As best we can tell, Peter didn’t have doubts about who Jesus was when the soldiers showed up to arrest Jesus in Gethsemane. But in that moment of testing, Peter didn’t have the courage to stand by Jesus because Peter knew that he might get crucified for it, and crucifixion is a scary prospect.  
 
We shouldn’t judge Peter too harshly either. Showing forth in our lives what we profess by our faith takes courage, sometimes more courage than we can muster. I have never faced the prospect of crucifixion. But many is the time I have hesitated to do or say what I should have done or said for fear of some possible consequence that was considerably less frightening than crucifixion.  
 
And, of course, temptation and sin stand in the way of living as God calls us to live.  
 
As we heard in our reading from Acts, the earliest disciples sold everything they owned, gave the proceeds to the apostles, and trusted God to watch over them. But not all the early Christians were prepared to go all the way. Just three verses after our reading from Acts, a Christian couple named Ananias and Sapphira sold their property, but held back some of the proceeds. That didn’t end well for them (Acts 5:1-11). 
 
By we shouldn’t judge Ananias and Sapphira too harshly. I don’t know what I would do if I heard God telling me to sell everything I own, donate it all to Saint David’s, and trust God to take care of me as I age. Among other problems, I wouldn’t enjoy announcing that plan to Carrie! 
 
The challenges to living out our faith are significant. We need help.  
 
And the help that today’s readings emphasize is each other. 
 
Notice all the fellowship language in our collect and readings. 
 
In our opening prayer, it says we “have been reborn into the fellowship of Christ’s body.” Acts says the earliest Christians were so united in “heart and soul” that “no one claimed private ownership of any possessions, but everything they owned was held in common.” The Psalm says “how good and pleasant it is when brethren live together in unity.” First John says “we have fellowship with one another” and also “fellowship…with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ.” 
 
And in the Gospel, Thomas’ problem comes from the fact that he was “not with [the other disciples]” when Jesus appeared to them the first time. Only when “Thomas was with them” did Jesus appear and resolve Thomas’ doubts. And Jesus praised those who, unlike Thomas, trust their brothers and sisters enough to believe even without seeing. 
 
The lesson here is clear. If we want to have strong faith and live that faith out in our lives, we should look to each other for help. 
 
I don’t want to be misunderstood here. Christ promises to be with us all always, including when we are alone. Throughout Christian history and in many of our lives, people have had powerful encounters with Christ when they were alone. Many people are impressively faithful without being part of Church. Of course. 
 
It is possible to live faithfully on our own. But living faithfully on our own is harder than it has to be, and living faithfully is hard enough under the best of circumstances.  
 
And, it’s worth adding, even for those of us who are part of the Church, we don’t have to be physically together to benefit. I think first about all the people in our separate services, people who miss Church on any particular day, people who join us on television or the internet. We can still draw strength from each other.  
 
It goes farther than that. We are joined with Christians we will never know, Christians around the world and through the centuries. That’s what the communion of the saints means. That’s what we celebrate when we say that we join our voices with angels and archangels and all the company of heaven.   
 
Being baptized into the Body of Christ, sharing regularly in the sacrament of Christ’s body and blood, drawing strength from mature believers, sharing spiritual gifts, those are all powerful ways God touches us, empowers us, helps us overcome doubt and fear and temptation in order to live out our faith better than we otherwise could.  
 
I can testify to the help we receive from each other. I am blessed to be part of this parish, surrounded by people who take their faith seriously and do their best to live it out. We are not saints. Certainly I am not! But I am a tiny bit closer to saintliness thanks to all of you. As I drive home from one event or another, I am often overcome with gratitude for the good and faithful people I have encountered over the course of an ordinary day here at Saint David’s.  
 
And so, on this second Sunday of Easter, I give thanks to God for Christ’s resurrection, for the opportunity to be part of the fellowship of Christ’s Body, and for you my brothers and sisters in Christ. And I pray that God will help all of us, together, to show forth in our lives what we profess by our faith.  
 
In Christ’s name. Amen.  ​