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Peace & A Mission

Fear Is Present After the Resurrection

John 20:19 Then the same day at evening, being the first day of the week, when the doors were shut where the disciples were assembled for fear of the Jews, came Jesus and stood in the middle, and said to them, “Peace be to you.”

The disciples at this point of the story were still gripped with fear.

Our natural reason seeks proof from the senses before it is convinced. It shuts itself out from the fellowship of the faithful. The heart remains empty in its unrest and dejection.

Jesus Gives Peace & A Mission

John 20:21 Then said Jesus to them again, “Peace be to you: as my Father has sent Me, even so send I you.”

This verse introduces the commission associated with the encounter with the risen Christ and defines the resource for carrying out the commission.

What does our joy flow from?

Does it flow from experiences, riches, friends?

The disciples’ joy proceeded from a spiritual sight of the Lord Jesus.

Jesus had been sent into the world to redeem it through His life and works, His truth, and His atoning death. But now, though He was ascending to His Father, that work was not to cease. His instruments for the beginning of that work were before Him.

The mission began with the disciples, and you and I are to continue with the mission Christ gave.

The peace He gave them we can also possess.

Sins Remitted

John 20:23 Whosesoever sins you remit, they are remitted to them; and whosesoever sins you retain, they are retained.

No Christian doubts the authority of the Father or the Son to forgive sins on the basis of Christ’s death on our behalf.

The best explanation emphasizes the difference between absolution and proclamation. The disciples’ duty was to proclaim the forgiveness of sins; the actual forgiving would take place in heaven by the Lord, who paid for those sins.

Nevertheless, the claims of the gospel are clear:
Forgiveness is only on the basis of Jesus’ death on the cross.

The meaning of this is that the Spirit-filled church can pronounce with authority that the sins of men have been forgiven or have been retained.

This sentence does at all not mean that the power to forgive sins was ever entrusted to any man or to any men. It means that the power to proclaim that forgiveness was so entrusted; and it means that the power to warn that forgiveness is not open to those refusing to repent was also entrusted to them.

Unbelief is Overcome

John 20:28 And Thomas answered and said to him, “My LORD and my God.”

Thomas moved quickly from rough-talking skeptic to willing worshiper. In the New Testament, no one had yet said to Jesus, “My Lord and my God.”

Happy are the millions who since that day have not had the opportunity of Thomas and the other ten and yet have believed. The Savior knew His disciples and followers in all their varying shades of character—in all their strength and all their weakness, in all their individual peculiarities! How considerately and tenderly He dealt with each! He does the same today with us.

Salvation is the Issue

John 20:31 But these are written, that you might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing you might have life through His name.

With such an initial summation this work of John reaches its powerful conclusion. The living, risen Christ on the day of His resurrection appeared to His followers in order to make them partakers of this peace.

John’s purpose is primarily evangelistic, but it must be admitted that throughout the history of the church this Gospel has served not only as a means for reaching unbelievers, but as a means for instructing, edifying and comforting believers.

The peace Christ gives is still possible today. The mission He gave is ongoing!

Allow God to give you His peace and mission.