Now is your time of grief, but I will see you again and you will rejoice, and no one will take away your joy. John 16:22
As I was reflecting on the events of Holy Week: the last supper Jesus enjoyed with his friends, Jesus getting arrested, the trial and Jesus’ death on the cross, and finally the startling news of his resurrection, I thought about the disciples.
Their emotions must have run the gamut during those last days of Jesus’ life. First, he rides into town as the proclaimed King. A few days later, the disciples watch one of their own betray him. Then they stand around helplessly on Friday through the hours of torture heaped on their Master, Teacher, and friend.
Saturday must have been a dark day of silence and wondering for these men. Wasn’t Jesus God’s Son–the true King of the Jews who had come to set the world aright in a display of power? Had they followed Jesus for nothing? Where were all these rewards and blessings of the kingdom Jesus kept talking about?
No wonder, then, that Peter shoved his own denial aside the best he could and went back to fishing. Because, after all, a terrible day on the lake hauling in empty net after empty net was better than a day filled with pain in which he had too much time on his hands to think about his great loss.
I can imagine all the disciples felt that way. The more fortunate ones had livelihoods to return to that helped keep their thoughts and their hearts occupied. The others, like Matthew, who no longer had an occupation to call his own, may have felt overwhelmed in their devastation. Jesus was gone. And here they sat. Empty. Grieving. Might the Jews hunt them all down and kill them too?
But at some point, each of these bereft disciples will personally experience the resurrection. It may not happen right away or even at a time when they expect it, but the resurrection will happen to them. Contact with the risen Jesus is what marks them as a community. Each one of these disciples encountered Jesus after he rose from the dead.
And then all those hazy words Jesus spoke to them and prayed for them before his arrest will begin to make sense. Now is your time of grief, but I will see you again and you will rejoice, and no one will take away your joy (John 16:22). The Father himself loves you because you have loved me and have believed that I came from God (verse 27). I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world (verse 33).
Oh, we get it, Jesus. Joy. Victory. Deeper levels of love. These things only come after suffering and grief have ravaged our souls. Jesus revealed himself to the disciples on three separate occasions: behind locked doors, the following week to Thomas, and by the Sea of Galilee. Each of these times the disciples were together. All of them saw Jesus. All of them experienced the resurrection as they received this revelation from the Lord himself.
A group of people such as the disciples who have seen the Lord are a community of people who live out of the healing and joy the resurrection brings. No one in this group saw life in the same way as they did before Jesus went to the cross. They’re changed, healed, and empowered.
The fourth time Jesus appeared to his disciples was to commission them to go and add numbers to this resurrection community. Proclaim the good news that Jesus lives. Teach them how to encounter Jesus for themselves.
The resurrection community keeps on giving. Increased love for God and firm belief in Jesus continues to spread into our lives and the lives of others sustaining us through those times of pain and loss. We face them together. As brothers and sisters in Christ we’re devoted to one another because we have seen the Savior. His work and presence is evident in our lives. We see him in each other. So we love and serve together in the name of the resurrected Jesus.
With Mary, we declare together, “I have seen the Lord!” And this is a joy that can never get taken away.
