It is the Lord!

The story of the resurrection was not a common event in history. It was never heard that a man who died and was buried came back to life on his own accord. The raising of Lazarus was by no means the same in magnitude with the resurrection of Christ. Theologically speaking, the resurrection, the ascension and the descent of the Holy Spirit upon the Apostles took place in one and the same day. But since this concept would be too heavy for our material minds to conceive, the Church saw the need to spread this event over a period of 50 days; 40 days before the ascension and 10 days before the descent of the Holy Spirit on the Apostles. During this period, we witness Jesus appearing on different occasions to his apostles. But can we prove that Christ truly rose from the dead?

The first prove of the resurrection is the empty tomb. The women saw the tomb, they saw when Christ was buried and they saw the soldiers who guarded the tomb. They went back to the tomb three days later and saw it was empty. The body of Christ was not in it. They “saw the wrappings lying on the ground. Presently, Simon Peter came along behind him and entered the tomb. He observed the wrappings on the ground and saw the piece of cloth which had covered the head not lying with the wrappings, but rolled up in a place by itself” John 20:5-8. We are told that they saw and they believed - believed what? Could it be that they remembered what he had told them? “As Jesus was going up to Jerusalem, he took the twelve aside by themselves, and said to them on the way, “Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will be handed over to the chief priests and the scribes, and they will condemn him to death, and hand him over to the Gentiles to be mocked and scourged and crucified, and he will be raised on the third day” Mt. 20:17-19.

The second prove is the fact that Christ ate with his apostles. “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? 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” Luke 24:36-43.If one eats fish some bones will certainly remain and these bones can be seen, touch and felt. After the resurrection Christ was constantly reminding his apostles of what Scriptures said about himself.   

In spite of all these it was still not easy for the apostles to understand it easily. Little wonder then why they were bent on returning to their trade - fishing. This was the situation in John 21:1-14. Here we read the following: “Together were Simon Peter, Thomas called Didymus, Nathanael from Cana in Galilee, Zebedee’s sons, and two other of his disciples. Simon Peter said to them, “I am going fishing.” They said to him, “We also will come with you.” So they went out and got into the boat, but that night they caught nothing.” We can understand the statement of Peter in two ways. I am going fishing could mean that he was returning to the trade that he knew so much about before his call, or it could mean that he was bored and wanted to do something to distract himself. For the purpose of this post, I want to take the first option. That is Peter was returning to his trade. Unfortunately for him, the trade he thought he knew so much about failed him, for we are told that they caught nothing the whole night. Here again Christ made his appearance to prove to Peter that apart from him he could do nothing. He demonstrated to Peter that he Christ was better in Peter’s trade than Peter himself. He now took it upon himself to teach Peter how to fish. “Cast the net over the right side of the boat and you will find something. So they cast it, and were not able to pull it in because of the number of fish. So the disciple whom Jesus loved said to Peter, “It is the Lord.”

Many times we seem to think that we know it all. We often attempt to put God out of our existence and feel we can do it all by ourselves alone. We often celebrate our scanty triumphs and strike our breast that we have achieved what no other person has ever achieved in life. But truth be told; we can do nothing if God the father did not provide the strength, the energy and the wisdom needed to do it. We have to see the Lord standing by the shore of our lake as we struggle on our own for a catch of fish. Yes, where can we run from him? The Psalmist asks us a simple question: “Where can I hide from your spirit? From your presence, where can I flee? If I ascend to the heavens, you are there; if I lie down in Sheol, you are there too. If I fly with the wings of dawn and alight beyond the sea, even there your hand will guide me, your right hand holds me fast. If I say, “Surely darkness shall hide me, and night shall be my light” – Darkness and light are but one.” Psalm 139:7-12. Peter and his friends may have thought that they had run away from Christ, but he found them once again and taught them a lesson in humility, love, patience and providence. If God does not provide for us all our labor is in vain. God’s providence is beyond our expectation, beyond our dreams. For what I am sure about tomorrow is that providence will rise before the dawn. Why? It is the Lord and he will provide for my needs.