Fear and Wonder in the Upper Room

What was the fear that drove the disciples into the Upper Room on the day Jesus rose from the dead? Was it the Jews, eager to wipe them out just as they had succeeded in getting Christ crucified? Is that what sent them cowering behind closed doors? 

The account in John’s Gospel clearly says so. But might there have been another reason, one which John was either unaware of himself or, perhaps, hesitant to mention lest it prove too humiliating to the others? And what might that be? What about an understandable fear of retribution from Jesus Himself, whom they had either denied or deserted during the time He stood most in need of their support? Could that, too, have incited their fear, that Jesus would actually return to settle old scores with those who took flight at the first sign of danger?

With the exception, of course, of the Beloved Disciple Himself, John, who stood steadfast in solidarity alongside Mary and the other women at the foot of the Cross. And who, perhaps out of consideration for the other disciples, may not have wanted to draw attention to the fear that obviously gripped them, a fear of which he was blessedly free owing to his complete fidelity to the Lord.

We’ll probably never know the answer to that one. What we do know, however, is that revenge was the last thing Jesus had on his mind when, all at once, he appeared in their midst, saying to them, “Peace be with you.” That is hardly a salutation a man bent on getting even with his fair-weather friends is likely to speak. So, what is Jesus doing there? Why has He come back to the Upper Room?

For a couple of reasons, which the text makes abundantly clear: namely, to show the disciples His wounds and to breathe into each of them the power of the Holy Spirit. “As the Father has sent me, so I send you,” He tells them. “Whose sins you forgive they are forgiven them, and whose sins you retain are retained.”

Meanwhile, of the remaining disciples—not counting Judas who is dead—one is clearly missing; that would be Thomas, who had flat out refused to believe the story they told him about seeing the Risen Lord. “Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands and put my finger into the nail marks and put my hand into his side,” he insisted, “I will not believe.”

How does one disabuse a man like that? The answer comes the following Sunday when Jesus once again appears and invites the doubting Thomas to verify for himself the truth of what has happened. “Put your finger here and see my hands,” He tells him, “and bring your hand and put it into my side, and do not be unbelieving, but believe.”

It is enough. “My Lord and my God!” exclaims the no longer doubting disciple. To whom Jesus then turns to ask, “Have you come to believe because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and have believed.”

That would be the rest of us, right? People who despite not having lived in the first century, and would thus be deprived of having known Jesus in the flesh, nevertheless persist in professing the liveliest faith that He is real and present to us. And that we, no less than the disciples themselves, hunger and thirst for the same salvation Christ first brought to the men and women living in the closest possible proximity to Him. 

We all need forgiveness, in other words, especially those who disdain to ask for it, so convinced are they of their own righteousness that they cannot possibly imagine why they might need to be saved at all. Which means, of course, they will never know what it means to experience grace, will never feel the healing touch of divine mercy. Like that character in the Flannery O’Connor story, “who never knew what mercy was like because he was too good to deserve any,” but will soon enough be made to “feel the depth of his denial,” and thus turn to God in abject need of His mercy.

Or that ghostly figure in C.S. Lewis’ The Great Divorce, wandering haplessly along the edge of Paradise, who will repeatedly refuse the invitation to enter more deeply into the Precincts of Felicity because he would far rather insist on having everything his own way, including the Hell to which he will shortly return. “I only want my rights. I’m not asking for anybody’s bleeding charity.”

“Then do,” he is bluntly told by one who has come a great distance to try and persuade him, to pry him loose from the self-centered Hell to which he has long accustomed himself. “At once. Ask for the Bleeding Charity. Everything is here for the asking and nothing can be bought.”

How many souls are there for whom salvation is less than a half-minute away! If only, that is, they allow themselves to be awakened from the sleep of sin long enough to be surprised by grace. How far we have fallen from the example offered by the paralytic in the Gospels, who evinces such eagerness to experience the healing mercy of Jesus that he enlists four friends to lower him through the roof of the house where Jesus is staying.

And what does Jesus do? On seeing such faith, the Son of Man not only forgives his sin but restores him to health as well. All were so utterly astounded on seeing this, we are told, that they go away exclaiming the glory of God. “We never saw anything like this!” they announce to all who will listen.

“Name four friends who would carry your bed,” writes Rita A. Simmonds, “where paralyzed from sole to head / you lie with pangs and scars outstretched.” It is a lovely little poem called “Unparalyzed,” of which the last stanza reads:

Name four friends who would fix their gaze
on the Man who cures and the man who’s saved.   
While the crowds disperse, the friendship stays.    
Name four friends who are still amazed.

It is the amazement wrought by God that we stand most in need of today—an amazement which Christ came into the world to provoke. Let us be glad and rejoice.