John 26-27 Chapters 20-21

[HKHaugan]

Now we come to the moment of moments in human history, the Resurrection of Jesus. Before we ascend to the heights 'prepared for us since the foundation of the world' we want to make sure we see the careful attention to detail that John puts into the description of the human moments before its discovery. In Chapter 20 three specific events mark the initial impact of the Resurrection, Jesus' appearance to Mary Magdalene, the ten disciples and a second gathering when Thomas is there.

But first,

Jesus has died. The soldier who stabbed Jesus with the spear saw that Jesus was dead when “blood and water (today, coagulated blood and plasma)” pouring from Jesus' side. Usually the legs of a crucified victim were broken to quicken death. Therefore, in Jesus' case, that was not necessary. Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus got permission from Pilate to bury His body in a new tomb close to the crucifixion site. Nicodemus brings about 75 pounds of spices, myrrh and aloes and wraps them around His body with strips of linen as tradition called for. We know Jesus is dead because of the soldiers' testimony, the time to get Pilate's permission, the burial preparation's two witnesses and the stone rolled in front of the tomb. Just from this Gospel it is quite apparent that as far as the world was concerned the devil, death and darkness had won. Mix sin, evil, Rome, corrupt religion, crushed hopes, add a dash of false expectations and you have a 'don't-fight-the-world' cocktail. Drink it and live with it. That's just the way things are.

Precisely the opposite is what took place. Rather than that 'atmos-fear' cocktail, world reality was shaken by spiritual reality. Something happened that no one could grasp. The ingredients that made for 'the-world-as-usual', hopelessness, despair, disillusionment, were the fertilizer for the entry of a totally new experience, life through faith, death reversed from being a stop sign to a gateway. Now it would be a continuing personal relationship with God, not a grief-marked tombstone, not a religious theory but a consciously new life and a new hope and a new faith and a new way of living. The whole time Jesus was alive in His body He was demonstrating this new kind of life, faith life, living by faith, eternal life. He was showing that His Spirit was the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of eternal life, God's life. Now it was the new reality that burst on the scene to replace the old, eternal life in Jesus and through Jesus.

20:1-2 The First Event

To get a feel for this experience you have to see the reaction of the first witnesses. Take Mary Magdalene for a start. She goes to the tomb perhaps as a dutiful mourner. “Oh no” she must have said to herself. “The stone has been moved.” So she runs to tell Peter and John that someone has taken the “Lord out of the tomb and we don't know where they have put Him.” (Note that she is still in the world's view that the person is somehow still attached to the body. This is a common idea. People talk about visiting a person's grave as though the person in some way is still there. What is there is a reminder of a person who was an image of God and special to Him with whom we had the privilege of being a part. It is a relational reminder of the importance we place on being a person before God and in the hearts of others. It's a spiritual reminder to look forward to every next moment as a faith moment being thankful for the past in order to be faithful and loving when each next moment arrives. The person isn't there. The memory reminder is.)

Vs.3-9 Peter and John run to the tomb and when they go in they see “the strips of linen lying there as well as the burial cloth that had been around Jesus' head.” The way John phrased what they saw shows the grave clothes were undisturbed not strewn about, 'the strips lying there' and 'the headcloth identifiably apart.' It was as though they were collapsed and Jesus' body simply rose through them. Now look carefully at the following words, “They still did not understand the Scripture that Jesus had to rise from the dead (Ps.16:10).” What this says is that the spiritual precedes the material; belief, trust and faith precede the world, “In the beginning God...”

Vs.10-16 The disciples go back to their homes but Mary, thinking that the gardener had taken Jesus' body, stands outside the tomb weeping. She bends over to look in the tomb and sees two angels seated “where Jesus' body had been, one at the head and the other at the foot.” Identifying the bodily position is another indication of the way Jesus went through the grave clothes. Also what we are looking at here is the horizontal dimension of two angels at either end emphasizing the vertical Kingdom of Heaven in the present.

The angels ask her why she is crying to which she responds that 'they' have taken the Lord away and she doesn't know where they put Him. She too has yet to believe. Having said this she turns around to see Jesus but of course, still wrapped in the world's concept of death's finality, she wouldn't and couldn't recognize Him. Her only vision is her personal grief at having lost someone who really meant something to her. Someone who made her feel significant, upon whom she could rely, who understood her and accepted her for who she was.

He asks her the same question the angels did but adds, “Woman, why are you crying? Who is it you are looking for?” Mary thinks the man speaking to her has taken the body and asks him where the body is so she can get “Him.”

Here is the moment that Mary's horizontal reality is pierced by the vertical. Jesus says to her, “Mary” and in that shocked Spirit awakening moment, without a pause, she responds, “Rabbi!” The thing to see here is that she recognizes Him when He calls her by name. Three significant things about this recognition. First, it's spiritual, personal, relational. Second, God the Son takes the initiative. Third, the first person to see Him is a woman (Eve, the first to sin while Adam stood by watching. Mary the first one redeemed). In Mary we see the intention of God to be personally involved with individual people, people held in culturally conditioned stereotypes, people alone, people with questionable pasts and people covered with the fig leaves of tradition, religion, social expectations, in a world of despair and the intimidation they produce.

It was for this moment of spiritual, personal and relational recognition that Jesus came. Think about it. No more ethnic, social, political, religious containers to define people. Every individual is given a new internal sense of worth, dignity and value. You mean God loves each individual person? God wants a personal relationship with each one of us? You got it! This is where the new and unique turns from recognition into realization that what God wants is a growing experience of Him in our minds, hearts and spirits. He takes us into His family and we grow as chosen individuals from one moment to the next. No wonder Jesus was such a threat. You can't just have someone freeing individuals to think on their own apart from 'their class and station in life.' No less should they be believing in a God and King you can't see and follow.

It was through the vivid memory and disappointment of the Cross that Jesus came for Mary and each of us in turn. It is through the same Cross that Jesus showed us that our cross is faith in Him and that is the faith He rose to give us. By faith we crucify our past and rise to new life in Him. That is the faith bringing Him into our moment to moment experience, our every next moment calling, our cross of faith to let Him be seen through us. This is how the world is changed.
The question of 'why' applies to Mary Magdalene. Why not Jesus' mother Mary? Why not James and His other brothers? Why not?

Back to Mary Magdalene for a moment. Remember her horizontal loss, aloneness, disappointment and grief? Intersecting her horizontal world came the vertical reality of an eternal God in the bodily Resurrection of Jesus. “Rabboni (Teacher)” she cries. When the vertical intersects the horizontal we have the Cross and the risen Lord. The very idea of reality was changed from temporary to permanent. What changes our personal reality from moment-by-moment survival to an expectant every-next-moment life of faith was proven by the bodily Resurrection of Jesus.

Vs.17-18 Upon Mary's recognition Jesus says to her, “Do not hold on to me for I have not yet returned to the Father. Go instead to my brothers and tell them, 'I am returning to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.” She does exactly that. There's something very connected here. Her personal experience is meant for everyone who believes in Jesus. When Jesus says to her that He is going to His Father and her Father, to His God and her God, He is making sure that the disciples and all who believe in Him will understand just how personal that is. It is a statement about how unique each human being is to God and to each other. There will never ever be anyone the same as anyone else, ever. Each human being is special to God and will be eternally. That depth of spiritual, personal and relational life with God is for every individual in the world who will accept it. All inclusive. Mary was the first example.

What Jesus started here was not the organization of an institution but His personal message to individual hearts. If there is to be structure then let it always be Jesus-conscious and Scripture-centered. That means it is personal, spiritual and relational by definition, nature and practice to transform the individual mind, heart and spirit, to be a conscious image of God.

Vs.19 The Second Event

Now keep in mind this deep personal experience has not yet gripped the disciples. They haven't yet had Mary's experience. The locked doors evidence the fear still gripping them. Mary or no Mary they are still in the world's atmosfear. But into it, through the locked doors (the condition of their hearts as well) Jesus appears and says “Peace be with you” and shows them His hands, feet and side. The disciples now know what Mary Magdalene was all about. Here is the moment. Make it yours for this moment and think of how you might have reacted.

Jesus says “Peace be with you” again but this time with a purpose, to get them forward looking. This is not a time to stand still and bask in a miracle, feel good and wallow in emotion. Jesus is getting them into the most important mission in human history, being His personal ambassadors to change the world heart by heart, “As the Father has sent me I am sending you.” Immediately He gives them the theme, the support Person and substance of their mission, forgiveness. It starts with them.

Imagine what it must have been like to gather in fear because you were an identifiable believer in their world. Fear of retribution was their unity. As they started to look at one another they would judge who was most responsible for getting them in this situation...Who had deserted Jesus?...Who had betrayed Him?...Who had denied Him?...The blame game starts and goes who knows where? Their aloneness is surfacing. Jesus is gone. Faith is gone. They are horizontally self-obsessed and vertically empty. Fear is their enemy.

“With that He breathed on them and said, 'Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive anyone his sins, they are forgiven; if you do not forgive them they are not forgiven (vs.22).'”

This is a most important verse to grasp. It is not Pentecost when the Spirit infills all believers. It is a special filling with a special purpose. This is for the disciples themselves. Aloneness, fear, blame and hiding describe their spiritual condition, the same as Adam's in Genesis 3. This is sin in the raw. They desperately need forgiveness and the ability to forgive each other. They will begin to look at each other with blame and try to shift the heat from one to another through accusation and one up comparison. They need to face themselves, accept the reality of their being sinners together, know it, repent and accept each other. They are all guilty and know it. Only the Lord can forgive them. Only the Lord can enable them to forgive each other, find their unity in Him, not fear, and know it.

As Jesus' personal messengers they need to experience being forgiven in order to forgive and to teach and preach forgiveness as well as the rest of the Gospel He has given them. It is the Holy Spirit who carries forgiveness from Jesus to each of them. His gift is His presence and His forgiveness. After being forgiven how could you not want that for everyone else? If you don't forgive others how can they have the blessing His forgiveness gave you? The Holy Spirit is the heart transformer, thus the attitude changer. The disciples receive the first taste of the Holy Spirit. The full taste is yet to come. This is the beginning of growing the born again mind, heart and spirit. Jesus and His forgiveness were their unity until Pentecost's full filling.

Vs.24-31 The Third Event

This third event centers around the absent disciple, Thomas. Three things seem to mark his demeanor. He is a pessimist, a doubter and subject to a limited spiritual outlook regardless of having witnessed past miracles and healings. “Unless I see the nail marks in His hands and put my fingers where the nails were and put my hand into His side, I will not believe it.” I would add that he, like the other disciples, is fearful, grieving, hurt, disappointed. What's more he is probably trying to get over having bought into what turned out to be a dead hero with a now dead dream. But Thomas joins the others anyway.

Again, still in fear, the disciples are behind locked doors. Jesus came right in and said “Peace be with you” a third time in this sequence of events. Obviously peace is an antidote to fear and it's Jesus' peace that comes with His presence. So peace is not the absence of conflict, the world's concept. Rather it is the presence of Jesus. He is our peace, a whole new relational experience, eternal by nature, spiritual and personal in the heart. He then addresses Thomas directly, “Put your finger here; see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it into my side. Stop doubting and believe.” Thomas immediately bursts out, “My Lord and my God!” There, right then, Jesus makes the declaration that covers all future believers. It's what He prayed for in the Garden with His disciples before He was crucified (17:20-26). It's the whole point of His life, His Cross and His Resurrection. “Because you have seen me, you have believed; blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.” John's conclusion follows, “Jesus did many other miraculous signs in the presence of His disciples, which are not recorded in this book. But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may life in His name.”

There is a fourth event, the third appearance to the disciples in the early morning. This event is a chapter in itself, Chapter 21. It comes next. It is a 'looking forward' chapter that lays out the future mission of the disciples who will become apostles.

John 27 Chapter 21

Vs.1-14 As we have said, Chapter 21 is one continuous event, one continuous moment. But for the disciples, especially Peter, it is a series of moments where he will be put to the test. It was early on a morning after the meeting with Thomas that seven of the disciples were together by the Sea of Tiberias (Galilee). They had been fishing all night and caught nothing. As they were returning He calls out to them from the shore if they have caught anything. They said no so He told them to throw their net on the right side of the boat. They are still a hundred yards from shore. They did and were unable to pull the net in it had so many fish in it. Then John tells Peter “It is the Lord!” Peter immediately covers himself with his outer garment and jumps in the water (This hearkens back to Adam and Eve covering themselves with fig leaves to hide their nakedness after disobeying God in Eden.). Could this be a replay with Peter trying to cover his lingering guilt after his triple denial? We'll get to that in a moment.

The other disciples follow in the boat dragging the full net, 158 fish, to shore. They found a fire with fish already cooking over it. He tells them to eat breakfast with Him. He gives them His bread and His fish. Two flashbacks occur here. This certainly had to remind them of the Feeding of the 5000. He not only provides the bread and fish to eat, He has provided extra fish for them. It follows His calling them to be fishers of men (Mt.4:19). The groundwork for their mission is being orchestrated right here by the risen Lord who will accompany them through the Holy Spirit after Pentecost.

Vs.15 After breakfast Jesus focuses in on Peter. “Simon, son of John, do you truly love me more than these? Is these Peter's occupation, owning a boat, having a relatively secure life or is it the other disciples with whom he has built real relationships in Jesus? Or is it both? Either way it is a reminder of what He said early on “Anyone who loves his father or mother more than me is not worthy of me (Mt.10:37)” and the young rich man who was sad when Jesus told Him he should sell everything he had and follow Him to find eternal life (Lk.18:22). Jesus has to come first. Only in Jesus does any human relationship, the place of possessions and job security find their fulfillment. So the first question is about family, friends and things.

The interesting thing here is the use of the word love. In Greek Jesus uses agape (God's love) and Peter responds with philo (brother, friend love). Jesus says, “Feed my lambs.” Are these the spiritually reborn Jesus is prophesying? Is He preparing Peter for his mission after Pentecost? Why doesn't Peter respond with agape? It may be the issue of spiritual intimacy that Peter does not yet get. Only the Holy Spirit can bring it.

Vs.16 Now comes the second question in which Jesus points to Himself. So He asks Peter again, “Peter do you truly love (agape) me?” It seems Peter still isn't able to answer the spiritual intimacy question because he responds, “Yes, Lord, you know that I love (philo) you.” Jesus then says, “Take care of my sheep.” This implies pastoring the growing sheep, the ones who have become disciples. Teaching the Word, equipping with gifts of the Spirit as well as sharing how to pray and worship.

vs.17 The third question has got to hit home with Peter. Just as the rooster crowed at Peter's third denial so now Jesus is asking a third time if Peter truly loves Him this time using the philo word. “Peter was hurt because Jesus asked Him the third time.” Peter replies that since Jesus knows all things, surely He knows now how much he loves (philo) Him. We know that Peter understands agape after Pentecost because agape appears in both of his epistles. Jesus then says simply and pointedly, “Feed my sheep.” Jesus has set Peter's future in motion and though Peter doesn't understand now he will later. When Peter looks back on this moment His life will be totally and completely devoted to the task of making disciples, growing disciples and developing leadership to present Jesus to the world.

Vs.18 God's love, eternal life and heart changing mission; all this comes with a cost. To know and live the love of God in Jesus threatens the core of the secular world which is run by the devil. He isolates, alienates and divides lost hearts subtly and silently through fear. Jesus tells Peter what he will be facing to bring real love into his world. “When you were younger you dressed yourself and went wherever you wanted; but when you are old...”
1. “you will stretch out your hands...”
2. “someone will dress you...”
3. “and lead you where you do not want to go.”

Vs.19 This is exactly what happened to Jesus. And it would happen to Peter for the glory of God. So Jesus is emphatic when He says, “Follow me!” That 'follow' means total mind, heart and spirit devotion.

Vs.20-25 You might say there is a fifth event here in regard to John who is present through all this. Peter asks, “What about him?” It's a 'looking forward' event. He knows the affection John has for Jesus. Is he asking Jesus if he has to die is John going to live? Jesus replies that if He wants John to remain alive until He returns, so be it. Don't get bogged down in worldly concerns. Following Jesus is real life, not life in this world. Even though a rumor starts that John would not die Jesus was misread. So John makes sure that we know Jesus prefaced His statement with an if. And John knows all that has been written before this is true since he is the one who wrote it down. We have to remember too that the Lord's plan for John is not only to write this Gospel but to write three more epistles and to be the one who by being exiled receives and writes a special revelation of coming events that keeps all believers looking forward. John closes by saying that Jesus did a host of other things as well. If all of them had been written there would be no room for all the books. This is only the beginning!