Brief synopsis of the readings: Still in the Acts of the Apostles, the apostles were performing signs and wonders. They met in Solomon’s Portico (in the Temple) where many people joined them. The crowds also brought the sick into the streets in the hopes that Peter’s shadow might fall on them and be healed. John’s Gospel recounts a time after the resurrection where the disciples hid in a locked room. While they were there Jesus appeared to them. He breathed on them and told them that they had the ability to forgive (or refuse to forgive) sins. One of the apostles, Thomas, was not present then. When he was told that the rest of them saw the risen Jesus, Thomas refused to believe them. Thomas insisted that he wouldn’t believe until he not only saw Jesus, but also his wounds. A week later they were once again gathered, and Thomas was present. Jesus appeared again and invited Thomas to place his hands inside the wounds. Thomas responded: “My Lord and my God!” Jesus replied that Thomas believed because he saw, but blessed are those who have not seen but still believe.

C’mon Thomas, Jesus is back! Isn’t that the best news? I mean, how can you not believe news this good? OK, longtime readers of these homilies know that my namesake Thomas holds a special place in my heart. But I think that’s fair. We’re reading this a long time after the events and know Jesus did indeed appear. But we’ve also become, perhaps, a bit jaded when we hear something “too good to be true.” We’ve learned that there is no Nigerian prince who needs our help (once we send him our bank account information). Given that I think we can say Thomas was ahead of his time.

And, to be fair, of all the things Thomas and the others were expecting, nobody was ready for Jesus to rise from the dead. If we look at ancient religions we can many parallels with our faith. Several others faiths had creation myths and many had flood stories similar to Noah’s Ark. We’re all familiar with pagan religions that portray gods who came to earth and interact with humans.

But the idea of someone who is both God and human, who is killed by his enemies, and rises from the dead…well, that’s unique, and we can understand how Jesus’ followers took a while to come to an understanding of what happened when they discovered the empty tomb. It’s worth noting that nobody saw the empty tomb and said: “Wow, this is just what Jesus said would happen. He has risen from the dead after three days” even though Jesus predicted exactly that at several points in the Gospels.

Frankly we don’t know much about what Jesus’ disciples expected to happen, but given their reaction to Jesus’ death they thought their story was over. When Peter denied that he knew Jesus he did it out of fear because he didn’t want to be associated with a condemned criminal. As a matter of fact almost all of Jesus’ followers fled and hid out. I think we can safely believe that they expected Jesus to lead a revolution to acquire their freedom. They awaited the coming of the Messiah but it wasn’t clear what the Messiah was supposed to do. In that absence most people probably believed the Messiah would fix what was wrong with their society. Even today Christians who anticipate Jesus’ imminent return envision an event that will solve all their problems. They believe what they want to hear.

So let us offer some respect to our friend Thomas, who refused to believe something outside his imagination because it was what he most wanted to hear. I think Thomas didn’t lack for faith so much as he lacked for imagination. He, and everyone else, saw Jesus as the answer to all their problems and nothing in their experience or imagination saw the possibility for resurrection.

I think that’s the point. When we have reached the end of our optimism, even the end of our hope, God isn’t done writing our story. We’ve always seen murder as a horrible sin, and taking a life (even when necessary) is not a good thing. Killing someone clearly ends their story no matter what happened before. But it doesn’t end God’s story and it doesn’t end God’s story with us.

Not to put too fine a point on this, but we have all been there. We’ve hoped for, prayed for, begged for something and have given in to our grief when we didn’t get what we expected. Sometimes it means we’ve focused so closely on one outcome that when it didn’t happen we’ve mistakenly assumed there was no other possible outcome.

On April 12, 1945 President Franklin Roosevelt died suddenly of a cerebral hemorrhage. While the President’s health had been declining this caught most of America off guard. We were clearly winning World War II both in Europe and the Pacific but troops were still dying at an horrific rate. More to the point, the Vice President was a generally unknown former haberdasher from Missouri, Harry Truman. Roosevelt had been President since 1933 and most people barely remembered a time when he wasn’t leading the nation. But in his years in office President Truman guided the end of the war, shepherded the founding of the United Nations, and saw the formation of NATO and other allied treaties. When President Roosevelt died it was easy to be pessimistic and even despairing. But the baton was passed to a new unknown who led better than anyone expected.

The actions of the earliest followers of Jesus tell us that we don’t have the luxury of sitting in our self inflicted hopelessness. If we think our story is over, well that’s on us. God is just getting started. And as for my friend Thomas, I’d like to point out that he declared: “My Lord and my God” without placing his hands inside Jesus’ wounds.