The Peace from Above

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. God is one.Amen.

In today’s Gospel from chapter 20 of the Gospel of St John, Christ’s opening words to His disciples are: “Peace be with you.” The fourth-century preacher and teacher, St Cyril, Patriarch of Alexandria, explains that, and I quote: “When Christ greeted His holy disciples with the words ‘peace be with you,’ by peace He meant Himself, for Christ’s presence always brings [calmness] of soul.” St Cyril continued, “This is the grace Paul desired for his believers when he wrote, ‘The peace of Christ which passes all understanding will guard your hearts and minds. . .’” (Philippians 4.7), concluded St Cyril [Commentary on the Gospel of John 12.1, cited in Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture, New Testament IVb, John 11-21, p. 357]. So, what is this “peace of Christ” that both St Cyril and St Paul insist will “guard [our] hearts and minds?”

In the fourth century, Marius Victorinus, who at the age of 65 came to a deep belief in Christ wrote, and I quote: “When [the peace of Christ,] the peace of God has come upon us we shall understand God. There will be no [conflict], no disagreement, no quarrelsome arguments, nothing subject to question. This is hardly the case in worldly life. But it shall be so when we have [the peace of Christ,] the peace of God, wherein all understanding shall be ours. For peace is the state of being already at rest, already secure” concluded Marius Victorinus [Epistle to the Philippians 4.8-9, Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture, New Testament, VIII, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, p. 282].

Notice that this “peace of God” which comes upon us is sent by the Lord to us. We do not grow this deep peace within ourselves by our own thoughts and actions. The Bible translator, Eugene H. Peterson, points out in the introduction to The Message: The Bible in Contemporary Language that, and I quote: “The Bible is given to us in the first place simply to invite us to make ourselves at home in the world of God, God’s Word and world, and [to] become familiar with the way God speaks and the ways in which we answer Him with our lives. . . . For Jesus [Christ] is the descent of God to our lives just as they are, not the ascent of our lives to God, hoping He might approve when He sees how hard we try” [Colorado Springs CO, NavPress, 2004, pp. 7, 1319].

I find that insight from Eugene Peterson very helpful. He is not an Orthodox Christian, but that is a profoundly Orthodox Christian idea: Jesus Christ came down to Holy Mary and to each of us in the Incarnation. Our lives do NOT go up to God until we die. We gain “the peace of God” just as Marius Victorinus said in the fourth century, because we learn to be “already at rest, already secure . . . when the peace of God has come upon us.” In essence then, we each at some point in our lives—young or old—make the decision to believe in Christ, and then trust Him with our lives on earth. We are each free to pray and to act, to express to God our own needs and fears and hopes, but we should also remember the words of Psalm 45(46), verse 11: “Be still, and know that I am God.”

Now, what is quite striking in this passage from the Gospel of St John, chapter 20, is that the peace of God comes down upon all of the apostles who have gathered when Christ wishes “Peace be with you” except for one—Thomas—whose life we celebrate today on St Thomas Sunday. Why not? Well, of course, Thomas was not there. The New Testament doesn’t tell us why Thomas was not present. But we know that Thomas was a remarkably committed follower of Jesus Christ. As the Gospel of St John tells us in chapter 11, verse 16, when Jesus Christ told his disciples that He was going down from Galilee to Jerusalem, it was Thomas who first “said to his fellow disciples, ‘Let us also go, that we may die with Him.’”

Several of the Church Fathers give a firm answer as to why Thomas was not present when Christ wished “Peace be with you” upon the other disciples. In the sixth century, St Gregory the Great preached, and I quote: “It was not an accident that that particular disciple was not present. The divine mercy ordained that a doubting disciple should, by feeling in his Master the wounds of the flesh, heal in us the wounds of unbelief. The unbelief of Thomas is more profitable to our faith then the belief of the other disciples. For the touch by which [Thomas] is brought to believe confirms our minds in belief, beyond all question,” concluded St Gregory [Forty Gospel Homilies 26, cited in Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture, New Testament IVb, John 11-21, p. 367]. Ammonius, a fifth-century teacher in Alexandria, had earlier written of Thomas, and I quote: “It fit God’s purpose that Thomas did not believe, so that we all might know through him that the body [of Christ] that had been crucified had [indeed] been raised. . . . Thomas wanted to see the wounds all around Christ’s flesh, as well as His flesh itself, to see if He had risen. Thomas was searching for Him,” concluded Ammonius [cited in Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture, New Testament IVb, John 11-21, p. 368].

We too can “search” for Christ. We will find Him in the Incarnation, in His remarkable life on earth as prophesised in the Old Testament and revealed in the New Testament, and in the unity of the Crucifixion and the Resurrection. Therefore, on this St Thomas Sunday, let us now invite the Lord to send down to each of us a deeper faith in Him and to say with St Paul in Philippians, chapter 4, verse 4: “Rejoice in the Lord always; again, I will say, rejoice.”

And so, we ascribe as is justly due all might, majesty, dominion, power and praise to God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, always now and ever and unto the ages of ages.

Father Emmanuel Kahn