April 11 ,2010 • The Season of Easter • Alleluia!
The Locker Room
The apostles were all huddled in fear in a locked room when Jesus appeared to them after his resurrection. I have images not of the “locked” room, but a “locker” room after a particularly bad loss when the coach confronts the team with a job poorly done. Will he yell a them? Will he tell them of his disappointment?
Yet more than a game had just happened. The apostles had failed Jesus in a big way -- they betrayed him, denied him, ran away from him in his hour of need, refused to believe the faithful women’s testimony that he had risen. It was a tremendous loss of grace. They were left shattered -- not solely by the crucifixion -- but by their own weakness and fear and disloyalty.
So Jesus comes into their “locker room” and among the choices of things he could say were:
(a) Where were you when I needed you?
(b) How could you abandon me after all I did for you?
(c) You’re all pathetic
(d) Didn’t you learn anything over these past three years?
(e) To think that I had chosen you to lead my church. Big
mistake!
But nothing like that comes from him. He speaks one word.
Shalom.
We translate the word “shalom” to mean peace. But the kind of peace that this word embodies was understood by the apostles as: completeness, wholeness, health, peace, welfare, safety soundness, tranquility, prosperity, perfectness, fullness, rest, harmony, the absence of agitation or discord.
Can you feel the apostle’s relief at hearing this word from Jesus? It’s a word we need to hear again today. The media continues to reveal the betrayals that took place over the past decades with regards to the abuse of children and young people by some clergy. We’re all disturbed by these betrayals. And in each of our lives there are things we’re not proud of, our own personal betrayals of others. So Jesus wants to come into our “locker rooms” and offer us his brand of peace and forgiveness. Thank you Jesus.
