First Reading
3rd Sunday of Easter-Cycle B-2009 Acts of the Apostles 3:13-15, 17-19
Peter said to the people: “The God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, the God of our fathers, has glorified his servant Jesus, whom you handed over and denied in Pilate’s presence when he had decided to release him. You denied the Holy and Righteous One and asked that a murderer be released to you. The author of life you put to death, but God raised him from the dead; of this we are witnesses. Now I know, brothers, that you acted out of ignorance, just as your leaders did; but God has thus brought to fulfillment what he had announced beforehand through the mouth of all the prophets, that his Christ would suffer. Repent, therefore, and be converted, that your sins may be wiped away.”
Second Reading
1 John 2:1-5a
My children, I am writing this to you so that you may not commit sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous one. He is expiation for our sins, and not for our sins only but for those of the whole world. The way we may be sure that we know him is to keep his commandments. Those who say, “I know him,” but do not keep his commandments are liars, and the truth is not in them. But whoever keeps his word, the love of God is truly perfected in him.
Gospel Cycle Cycle B
Luke 24:35-48
The two disciples recounted what had taken place on the way, and how Jesus was made known to them in the breaking of bread. While they were still speaking about this, he stood in their midst and said to them, “Peace be with you.” But they were startled and terrified and thought that they were seeing a ghost. Then he said to them, “Why are you troubled? And why do questions arise in your hearts? Look at my hands and my feet, that it is I myself. Touch me and see, because a ghost does not have flesh and bones as you can see I have.” And as he said this, he showed them his hands and his feet. While they were still incredulous for joy and were amazed, he asked them, “Have you anything here to eat?” They gave him a piece of baked fish; he took it and ate it in front of them. He said to them, “These are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you, that everything written about me in the law of Moses and in the prophets and psalms must be fulfilled.” Then he opened their minds to understand the Scriptures. And he said to them, “Thus it is written that the Christ would suffer and rise from the dead on the third day and that repentance, for the forgiveness of sins, would be preached in his name to all the nations, beginning from Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things.”
There are two points in today’s readings that might draw our attention. First, in the Gospel of Luke that we have today, we hear the experience of two followers of Jesus, totally disillusioned by his death and burial, really sad and downcast—and yet Jesus Himself came to them. They were on their way to Emmaus, a small village outside of Jerusalem and that name is now known to us because of their experience.
The earlier part of this Gospel tells us that they were debating and discussing. Most likely they were debating and discussing about Jesus, wondering if they had been totally deceived by Him.
Part of our Christian experience at times is about disillusionment and being sad, really wondering if God is present in our lives, wondering if Jesus is our Lord and wondering if God cares about us at all. Sometimes we walk through those times and only very slowly does our faith deepen. At other times we seem to be given other gifts of faith that allow us to believe without such effort. Some people even seem to be given extraordinary gifts of faith by which—without any effort of their own—they are able to remain in the divine presence and rejoice.
In these matters of faith, we can come to trust in God who knows best what truly will help us grow humanly and in divine grace. We can profit by comparing our walk of faith with that of others only if we have complete trust that God chooses us just as we are right now and is there striving to bring about what is absolutely the best for us right in the here and now. Even when we fall and sin, God is right there trying to help us walk in faith once more.
It is as though Jesus Christ is standing right beside us each moment and saying: see my hands and me feet! Touch me! I am truly with you. It is like an echo of that great Easter Homily of Saint John Chrysostom: it does not matter when you come to the Lord, what matters is that you begin to follow Him and He will love just as much as He would have loved you. God’s love is so much better than our own, so much stronger, so much more powerful. Yet we hesitate to believe that God could love us so much.
The image of how much God loves us is always Jesus crucified. God is not only willing to die for us, God in Jesus Christ has died for us and gone through the pains and sufferings of a most cruel death. All this has been done so that we can live a new life. We often prefer our old life of sin because of the pleasures and the comfort involved in it. But we are challenged to see that it is not truly life but leads to a dead in and death.
Let us rejoice today on this third Sunday of Easter. Let us renew our faith and trust in God. Let us ask God to send His Spirit on us to open our eyes to see the truth of love in Christ Jesus. Alleluia.