No more a stranger, nor a guest

[a Sermon for Evensong of the Second Sunday of Easter; one of the two sermons that I have ever preached, on the last occasion when these lessons were appointed. Primary text: John 14:1-7, with reference to the Eucharistic Gospel: John 20:19-31]
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Today is often called "Thomas Sunday" because of the Gospel that was read at this morning's Eucharist. "Doubting Thomas," we have called him, ever since. "Thomas, the first Theologian," is the name I prefer.

We Episcopalians sometimes call upon the theologian Richard Hooker for his "three-legged stool" of Scripture, Reason, and Tradition. In our discernment of how to act and what to believe, all three legs of the stool must play their part. In his way, perhaps Thomas was applying these criteria to the claims of the Resurrection.

Scripture? Yes, the Old Testament scriptures foretell that Christ must suffer and die, and be raised from the dead. Jesus taught this to the Twelve, repeatedly. They never understood. But we should not fault them overmuch; this take on the Old Testament was unorthodox, held only by their own Teacher. The disciples might not entirely trust that leg of the stool.

Reason? This is easy. Reason made it most profoundly clear that Jesus was dead. Quod erat demonstrandum.

Tradition? There is no tradition that would lead one to expect Jesus to rise from the dead -- except perhaps for one little wisp of hope, an idea that never quite disappears from the tradition, that this Story has a happy ending. The hope is summed up by Gabriel when he spoke with Mary: "With God, nothing shall be impossible." Again and again, from Noah's rainbow to Sarah and Abraham's impossible child, from walking through the Red Sea on dry ground to a shepherd boy killing a giant, from weak little Jerusalem standing up to the massed armies of the Assyrian Empire, to the return from exile, "those who sowed with tears" have become "those who reap with songs of joy."

We can forgive Thomas for not putting too much faith in such a hope. Would we, without two thousand years of Witnesses to the Resurrection?
- Stephen and all the martyrs.
- Francis and Clare, and all the other friends of Lady Poverty.
- Paul and Augustine and Aquinas and Luther and Calvin and, yes, Richard Hooker, and many others, who have "believed in order to understand."

Further, there is what the Quakers call the "Inner Light," which we sense in ourselves and see in others. This, too, is evidence that Christ is risen, and still "known to us in the breaking of the bread" and in many other ways.

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And so, finally, to this evening's text: It is a favorite of mine, and of many of us. I prefer the eloquence of the King James Version, especially the first three verses.

"Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in me. In my Father's house are many mansions; if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself, that where I am, there ye may be also."

"Many mansions."

Maybe something like Thomas Jefferson's Monticello -- without Adam's curse, which required so much upkeep and behind-the-scenes work that there had to be large numbers of slaves to keep the place up. Without them, the owner himself becomes a slave to the place. Some of us who have owned homes know of this.

But I gather that the Greek word used here is considerably more humble, perhaps closer to an apartment, or even a tent. I was disappointed when I first heard this. But imagine.... a tent and campfire by a Minnesota lake on a summer night, the loons diving and calling, the stars brilliant and clear and filling the sky. And again, without the effect of Adam's curse, which causes the mosquitos to consider Homo sapiens a choice delicacy. Yes, I would happily take that for an eternal dwelling.

Or it might be something like J.R.R. Tolkien's Rivendell. As Tolkien described it, Rivendell was "'a perfect house, whether you like food or sleep, or story-telling or singing, or just sitting and thinking best, or a pleasant mixture of them all.' Merely to be there was a cure for weariness, fear and sadness."

In a word, it is Home. It is the home we never quite find in this life. It is the sure and settled place where we belong -- and not alone, but in close communion with all those we love, and all those of every time and place who have called upon the name of the LORD.

Hearing all this, Thomas asks the basic question of Theology, and the basic question of all lost wanderers, of which our rootless generation is perhaps chief -- "how can we know the way" to such a place, such an end? How can we find the way home?

Jesus does not launch into a dissertation on eschatology, or the nature of knowledge. He says something far more astonishing: "I am the way."

Not just that: he adds that he is also "the truth, and the life." This relates back to the statement "I go to prepare a place for you." He does so, at least in part, by being himself "the way, the truth, and the life." St. Augustine interprets it best: "He prepares the dwelling-places by preparing those who are to dwell in them."


(here sing...)

The sure provisions of my God
attend me all my days;
oh, may thy house be mine abode,
and all my work be praise.

There would I find a settled rest,
while others go and come;
No more a stranger, nor a guest,
but like a child at home.
(from a metrical psalm by Isaac Watts: "My Shepherd will supply my need")

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