Jesus Ministers to Their Doubts - Luke 24:36b-49, Third Sunday of Easter

An experienced pastor once advised, "...that when making grief calls to a home, when it seems that the grieving are disoriented and having difficulty focusing, it is helpful to ask, 'Do you have the coffee pot on?…' It helps to keep going about ordinary tasks in the midst of life’s moments of disorientation.” I'm not sure where I read or heard that sage wisdom but it makes sense at some level to me.

As Jesus appears to the disciples, Luke describes the disciples as "startled" and "terrified" which might be a reflection of their own disorientation and inability to focus. Even after showing them his wounds, they are still struggling with who stands before them. That's when he asks, “Have you anything here to eat?”

In the midst of all this, Jesus helps the disciples get reoriented by helping them go about this ordinary task of eating. He continues to help them get back on track by again explaining the scriptures to them and then reminds them that they are witnesses of all of these happenings. They have a mission to be about. As I've been writing these notes I am reminded that while Jesus' helps the disciples be reoriented through the ordinary task of eating, eating in the gospels is never an ordinary thing. It always has political and theological significance. Who you eat with says a lot. So as Jesus reminds them to be about the ordinary tasks of living, he is also reminding them how those ordinary tasks and our manner of doing them points beyond ourselves to God.

It is easy in many ways to make sense of the crucifixion. Throughout history, we see people put to death for upsetting the status quo or for failing to bow down to the powers that be. But the resurrection? It just doesn't make sense; it doesn't seem to be in the realm of logical possibility. So I can see why the disciples are full of terror. But even in the midst of this disorientation though, Jesus is present to the disciples and still to us ministering to our doubts and fears.