Resurrection – Darrow Woods: Writer of Things

A locked room mystery- the learning time for April 16 at Harrow United Church

This is the cover of a book by Carolyn Keene. She also wrote the Nancy Drew stories, published by the same company that made the Hardy Boys books. Anyone here read, or watch the Hardy Boys or Nancy Drew? Those stories are often the gateway drug for people who go on to develop an addiction to mystery fiction.

In the world of mystery fiction, there is a sub-genre called the Locked Room Mystery. In its classic form, a crime has been committed in a locked room, and there is no obvious way to tell how it happened, or who did it. It’s usually a murder.

A corpse is found in a room that was locked from the inside, and there is no explanation of how it could have happened, or who did it.

The detective comes in to gather clues, interview witnesses and suspects, and develop a theory.

Scholars of mystery fiction, and yes, that really is a field of study, generally agree the first locked room mystery was written in 1841 by Edgar Allan Poe. It was called the Murders in the Rue Morgue, and is also considered by many to be the first detective story.

1841 is a long time ago, but I was thinking this week about the Gospel story we just heard, that was written down around 100 years after the earthly life of Jesus. It’s over 1900 years old, and is a kind of locked room mystery.

We can cast Thomas, the one called the Twin, in the role of the reluctant sleuth. He is faced with a most bothersome mystery.

What the story reveals is Jesus’ closest companions, the disciples, were gathered together behind locked doors. This was just after Jesus had been crucified, and the disciples had locked all the doors. The story says they were afraid. Perhaps they worried they might be next.

Somehow, Jesus entered, and stood among them. They were awestruck.

Jesus said to them, “Peace to you.”

But Thomas was not with them when Jesus came. The other disciples told him, “We saw the Master.”

But he said, “Unless I see the nail holes in his hands, put my finger in the nail holes, and stick my hand in his side, I won’t believe it.”

Some translations of the Bible give this story the heading: Doubting Thomas.

Many preachers over the centuries have used this story as a launching pad from which to send out sermons extolling the virtues of faith, and encouraging their listeners to simply believe. It’s a pretty powerful line of argument. Don’t be a doubting Thomas. You don’t need proof, just believe.

But I like Thomas. I like people who question assumptions, who want to investigate, to try to understand, who look at available evidence, before reaching a conclusion.

There is always a temptation to not make waves, or upset apple carts, swim against the current, or challenge the group thought. But the Good Friday story is a good example of why it’s not always good to go along with the crowd. Pilate found no reason to condemn Jesus, and offered to set him free.

The people in the gathered crowd called out for Jesus to be crucified. Popular opinion can’t always be relied upon.

The disciples told Thomas Jesus had appeared to them in a locked room. The same Jesus they knew had been crucified.

It makes perfect sense to me that Thomas wanted evidence. Good for him, for thinking for himself.

The story jumps ahead 8 days. The disciples were in the same locked room. Had they gone out at all, or had they stayed hidden away all that time?

Thomas was with them this time, when Jesus somehow came through the locked doors to appear in their midst, and say, “Peace to you.”

Jesus then turned specifically to Thomas. He said, “Take your finger and examine my hands. Take your hand and stick it in my side. Don’t be unbelieving. Believe.”

Thomas said, “My Master! My God!”

It’s a good story. Often, when I read a good mystery, the main question- who did the crime, is solved, but I am left with other questions. I may want to know more about the character of the detective. Many of the mysteries I read, like those old Nancy Drew and Hardy Boys books, are written as series, so I can go on to the next, and learn more.

Honestly, the crimes they solve are often just a vehicle to move the book along, so I can spend more time with the detective, and learn how they think and what matters to them.

In the case of Detective Thomas, there are some things I’d like to know. The first being, what was he doing, while all the other disciples were together, behind the locked doors? Where was he?

I like to imagine that he was pursuing other mysteries, that any of us who have had a death in the family, lost a loved one, can understand.

Thomas’ good friend, and teacher, and leader, Jesus had been killed. Thomas and the others followed Jesus because they loved the message he brought about how they each mattered to God. Jesus taught them that God loved them, in such a personal way they could think of God as a parent, pray to God calling him Abba, or Daddy.

More than that, Thomas and the disciples saw the way Jesus lit up a room, or a hillside. People flocked to be close to him, to hear his message, and experience healing, happiness, peace, and wholeness in Jesus’ presence.

I imagine Thomas was out in the world beyond the locked room, searching for clues about how to go on. What would his life mean, now that Jesus was gone? What would be worth doing? What would his purpose be?

Would Thomas be able to continue to trust that his own life had meaning, worth, or purpose after Jesus was so cruelly taken away and killed?

When we lose someone who matters to us, it can shake us to the core, and have us question everything. It can take a while before we feel like we can feel anything except exhaustion and sadness, and at some stages of grief, anger, fear and hopelessness.

So what was Thomas up to, while the other disciples were locked away in a room, fearful?

The Gospel of John leaves that a mystery. The focus was on Jesus, and the writer says near the end of the Gospel there were so many more stories and signs that could have been written down, that would have filled many more books. We don’t get the next volume in the adventures of Detective Thomas, with a flashback showing us what he was doing during those 8 days while the others were in hiding.

I like to imagine that Thomas was finding his way back to life, after the loss of his friend and teacher, by traveling around, and visiting with others like him, who were grieving the loss of Jesus. I think maybe he was checking in on people to see how they were doing.

I think he may have been looking for clues about how to carry on, by doing what Jesus had taught from the beginning. Take care of people. See to their needs. Remind them they are loved, and not alone.

I think this, because when I read about Jesus appearing in the locked room, that’s essentially what Jesus told the other disciples.

After Jesus said, “Peace to you,” he said, “Just as the Father sent me, I send you.”

Jesus sent them back out into the world, in the same way God had sent him. Get out and there and be with the hurting, the lonely, the worried. Help people. Let them know they are known, and remembered, and that they matter. Amen

Here is a link to the YouTube video of the whole worship service. My learning time about the Locked Room Mystery starts at 35:02.

Lenten Devotion for March 7, 2023

We like to watch some competitive reality shows. Our current favourites include The Great Canadian Baking Show, and The Great Pottery Throwdown.

On the pottery show, amateurs are challenged to push their creativity and pottery skills to new heights. We grow attached to them, and it’s always a bit sad to see one of these kind souls eliminated at the end of an episode. We know they have a full existence beyond tv, but still.

There is another moment on the show that has some of the life, death, and new life vibe of the scripture that was part of today’s devotional reading from Good Courage. The quote was from 1 Corinthians, and it’s a fairly well known one about “treasure in clay pots”.

On the pottery show, competitors are often asked to complete a technical challenge- to throw as many pots of a certain style in a brief allotment of time. They are judged on how well they match the example they were given, the consistency in size and shape and stylistic features, and the sheer number of successful pots.

As they approach each competitor’s work area, one of the judges carries a metal bucket. When he sees a below standard pot, he mashes it with a quick slap of his palm and scoops the flattened clay into the bucket. Presumably the clay will be used again, fashioned into something wonderful.

We know it’s just clay. We know that each potter on the show has likely done the same to their failed pots, in their own workshop, many times.

Still, to see anyone’s creative efforts summarily reduced to be recycled is a little heart-breaking. (I feel that way about some of the sentences I cut from pieces that I write- it’s called “killing your darlings”.)

There is comfort in the assurance that beyond affliction and despair we have the promise of a life beyond this one. But I still flinch when I see some one, or something I care about being flattened.

Worship Service for April 25, 2021 “No Doubt about Thomas”

Learning Time: “No doubt about Thomas”

A writer named Carolyn Gratton used a story from the Sufi spiritual tradition in her book, The Art of Spiritual Guidance. It’s about a wise fish.

It seems that there once were some fish who spent their days swimming around in search of water. Anxiously looking for their destination, they shared their worries and confusion with each other as they swam. One day they met a wise fish and asked him the question that had preoccupied them for so long: “Where is the sea?” The wise fish answered: “If you stop swimming so busily and struggling so anxiously, you would discover that you are already in the sea. You need look no further than where you already are.” (p. 5)

Carolyn used the story to talk about the presence of God, and the peace, and hope, and meaning, and sense of purpose and value that people experience, when they have the awareness that God is with them. This is not just an intellectual knowing that God is real, or a philosophical position, or even a statement of faith. It is not really a “head” thing at all. It is a deeper knowing. A knowing in our soul, that God is with us, nurturing, and loving, and helping us live, in the same way that water surrounds the fish, and offers them what they need to live and thrive.

One of the ways we can think about Jesus, is that in his teaching, in his listening to people, in the healing that he offered, Jesus was like the wise fish. He helped the other fish know that they did not need to swim madly about looking for what they needed, for it was all around them, if they could learn to see it.

Jesus helped people know that God was all around them, and that helped them live with courage, and confidence. Some people were so inspired that they left behind their old lives to follow him, to swim where he swam.

We know the names of some of these daring fish, because they were the first disciples. One of them was Thomas. The Gospel story for today tells us that Thomas was not with the group when they had a shared experience of the Risen Christ. The others told him about this mysterious time when Jesus appeared to them and said, “Peace be with you”, and showed them his hands and his side.

Thomas was not there when the disciples heard Jesus say, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.”

Thomas was not there when Jesus breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.”

The next time Thomas was with the group, they told him about what they had seen and heard, but it was not enough. Thomas said, “Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands, and put my finger in the mark of the nails and my hand in his side, I will not believe.”

Thomas’ friends had received the assurance that all that Jesus had started was not over. There was more work for them to do. They would be carrying on, helping others to know the reality, and the love of God.

But Thomas was not so sure. Because Thomas was so honest and forthright, he has gone down in Christian tradition as the doubter. He has been used as the “poster boy” in many “just have faith” campaigns, that suggest that doubt is a big problem.

I don’t think using the Thomas story this way is fair to him, or to anyone else who has questions, or doubts. I think that Thomas’ hesitancy is normal, and that his doubts are healthy. As the writer Anne Lamott has said, “the opposite of faith is not doubt, but certainty. “

I am suspicious of people who never admit to having any doubts, especially about something as mysterious, and important as God. People who act as if they have it all figured out, often act without compassion, or understanding of the rest of us, who are still struggling along, doing the best we can.

Jesus was not only the wise fish, who helped other fish slow down enough to know that the sea of God is all around us. Jesus was also kind , and empathetic, and knew that confusion and doubt are part of what it means to live in this world.

In a part of the Gospels we call the Beatitudes, or the blessings, Jesus spoke on a hillside to crowds of people who were desperate for encouragement, and said,

“Blessed are the poor in spirit,

for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted. “(Matthew 5:3-4)

In his wonderful paraphrase of the Bible called “The Message”, the writer Eugene Peterson has Jesus say it this way, in more down to earth language: “You’re blessed when you’re at the end of your rope. With less of you there is more of God and his rule. You’re blessed when you feel you’ve lost what is most dear to you. Only then can you be embraced by the One most dear to you. “

That sounds like Thomas, who has lost his teacher and friend. I don’t think Jesus would condemn Thomas for having doubts and questions.

This story in John’s Gospel, like all the other Jesus stories, was collected, and eventually written down, many years after Jesus’ earthly life. The stories were passed on by people who never actually met Jesus, for the benefit of people like us, who have also never met Jesus in the flesh.

Let’s consider that for a moment. This is a story about Thomas, who expresses difficulty in believing in what he has not seen. Thomas’ story was written down by people who never actually saw Jesus in the flesh, for people like us, who also never saw the earthly Jesus. The writer, the early editors of the Gospels left us this story, not to make us feel worse, but to encourage us.

Maybe that can help us look a little deeper.

“A week later his disciples were again in the house, and Thomas was with them. Although the doors were shut, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you.”

Then he said to Thomas, “Put your finger here and see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it in my side. Do not doubt but believe.”

Thomas answered him, “My Lord and my God!”

Jesus said to him, “Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.”

That’s the line that hooks me, because it sounds so much like what Jesus said to the people on the hillside: “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. “

Jesus understands how hard it is for us in this life. We are the poor in spirit. We have trouble trusting in God, and we have difficulty believing in things that we can’t see with our own eyes. We have doubts. We are all kind of like the fish swimming around frantically looking for the sea.

If we just skim the surface of the story, it is easy to focus on Thomas putting his finger in Jesus’ wounds. But what if this story is not just about Jesus’ wounds, but about the woundedness of Thomas, and me and you, anyone else who finds it hard to be a little fish swimming about, in search of something they fear they won’t find?

Thomas, the one who touched Jesus’ wounds, is also in touch with his own fears, and weaknesses, his own vulnerability. That’s the place where Jesus meets him, and reassures him that what his friends have told him is true. What Jesus started will continue, and he can be part of it.

It may be that it is in recognizing our own woundedness, our own vulnerability, our own fears and doubts that we are able to begin to look beyond ourselves, and see, not with our eyes, but with our heart and souls, that God is always with us. Returning again to that paraphrase called “The Message”:

“You’re blessed when you’ve worked up a good appetite for God. God is food and drink in the best meal you’ll ever eat.

“You’re blessed when you care. At the moment of being ‘care-full,’ you find yourselves cared for.

“You’re blessed when you get your inside world—your mind and heart—put right. Then you can see God in the outside world.

Peace be with you. Amen