Second Sunday of Easter
John 20:19-31
April 12, 2026
Alleluia! Christ is risen!
On the evening of that first Easter day, the disciples were afraid. The doors were locked. The world that had shattered their hopes on Good Friday was still very much the same world on Easter evening. Jesus had risen from the dead, yes—but they had not yet fully grasped what that meant. Fear still ruled their hearts. Death still felt powerful. The future was uncertain.
And it is into that locked room, thick with fear and confusion, that Jesus appears.
The Gospel according to St. John tells us, “Jesus came and stood among them and said to them, ‘Peace be with you’”. He does not knock. He does not wait for permission. He does not rebuke them for hiding. He simply comes, stands among them, and speaks peace.
That is how the risen Christ deals with His Church.
Most importantly, this Gospel text insists on something very concrete and very real: Jesus truly rose from the dead, and He truly appeared to His disciples.
This is not a vision. This is not a hallucination born of grief or wishful thinking. Jesus shows them His hands and His side. The wounds remain, no longer bleeding, no longer signs of defeat, but now marks of victory. The same body that was nailed to the cross now stands alive and glorified among them.
This matters deeply, because Christianity does not rest on ideas or moral lessons or spiritual metaphors. It rests on a historical fact: Jesus Christ died and rose again in the body. As St. Paul says elsewhere, if Christ is not raised, then our faith is futile, and we are still in our sins.
But Christ is raised. And therefore, sin is forgiven. Death is defeated. Satan is undone.
Notice also when Jesus appears. It’s on the first day of the week, the day that will become the Lord’s Day, Sunday. From the very beginning, the Church gathers on this day because this is the day when the risen Christ comes to His people.
It’s also the 8th day, the day of new creation when, what was done on account of sin in the Garden of Eden is undone on account of the new Adam who died and rose again.
And how does He come? He comes speaking peace. “Peace be with you.”
This is not the peace of the world, which depends on circumstances, or success, or safety. This is the peace that flows from reconciliation with God. This is the peace that only the crucified and risen Christ can give.
The disciples believe in Jesus. They love Jesus. But on that evening, their faith is still fragile. Fear threatens to overwhelm it.
That should not surprise us. Faith in this fallen world is always under attack. It is assaulted by fear, by suffering, by doubt, by guilt. Even after Easter, the old Adam clings tightly. Even believers struggle. We fear on account of finances; we fear our futures; we fear for our families, our children; we fear for our health. And sometimes that fear causes us to make sinful, unfaithful decisions, keeping the Lord out of the conversation altogether, and on account of fear, creating for ourselves double-locked rooms, sort of like tombs without hope. Yet, in the midst of this fear, Jesus comes and says, peace be with you.
Notice what Jesus does not say.
He does not say, “Why are you so weak?” He does not say, “How could you doubt after everything you’ve seen?” He does not say, “Get yourselves together, get right with God, fix yourself!”
Instead, He speaks what they need: peace, and He shows them Himself.
Faith is not produced by human effort. It is not sustained by inward strength. Faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the Word of Christ. The disciples do not talk themselves into believing the resurrection. Jesus Himself stands before them and gives what He promises. And Jesus…He doesn’t come tap, tap, tapping on the door of our hearts hoping we’ll answer. Revelation 3:20 has nothing to do with how our Lord saves us. No, Jesus appears, He comes; He walks right into our dark and closed up hearts and says, “Peace be with you.” After all, He can’t wait for us to unlock the door of our hearts; we never would. But by His Word He comes.
Christ knows how fragile our faith can be. He knows our fears, our doubts, our hidden shame, our locked doors. And He does not wait for us to overcome them first. He comes to us where we are, through His Word and Sacraments, and gives Himself to us again and again without cost.
That is why the Church is not built on emotional intensity or personal certainty, but on Christ’s objective gifts. Faith does not look inward for assurance. It looks outward—to the cross and to the risen Lord who speaks peace. If the church and her preachers would preach this Gospel rather than a message of works-righteousness; if the Lord would reveal to them this mystery of salvation apart from works or self-developed certainties…we would be a much different church today.
After greeting His disciples with peace, Jesus does something profound. He says, “As the Father has sent me, even so I am sending you.” And then He breathes on them and says, “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you withhold forgiveness from any, it is withheld”.
Here we have the institution of what we call the Office of the Keys.
This is not about power or control. It is about the delivery of forgiveness. The same Jesus who was sent by the Father to reconcile the world now sends His Church to speak that reconciliation.
The Keys are not magic. They do not belong to the personality or holiness of the pastor. They belong to Christ. He alone won forgiveness by His death and resurrection. But He chooses to distribute that forgiveness through human mouths.
When the Church proclaims the Gospel, when the pastor absolves the penitent sinner in the stead and by the command of Christ, it is Christ Himself who forgives.
Of course, there is the key we don’t like, the “withhold forgiveness from any” key. Why would anyone want to withhold forgiveness; why would a pastor withhold forgiveness; why would Jesus give His church the authority to withhold forgiveness? It seems unloving; it doesn’t seem Jesusy, and yet He’s the one who not only gives the authority, but holds the key.
Impenitence, the stubborn refusal to acknowledge sin, the unwillingness to be straight with God and confess is a real thing in the church. It’s not just unbelievers who are impenitent, but Christians can be impenitent. And should an impenitent heart, a heart that refuses to confess sins, continue on day after day, eventually it snuffs out faith and the sin against the Holy Spirit, the unforgivable sin, rejection of Jesus and His cross and resurrection, is the result.
Therefore, we use the unforgiveness key in order to bring people to repentance. This is what St. Paul means in 1 Corinthians 5 when he says, “hand such a man over to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, so that the spirit may be saved on the day of our Lord Jesus.” The most loving thing we can do for a person who refuses to repent is say, “You are not forgiven” and to then pray God would see fit to break the person’s heart and turn him to Christ.
Now, private confession and absolution, though often neglected, remains a great treasure of the Church. It places the risen Christ directly into the ear of the sinner. It replaces fear with peace. “It’s too Roman Catholic, pastor…” No, private confession and absolution was done long before the Roman Catholic church and the Lutheran church fixed it, so it’s not merit based, and retained it, even required it until very recently.
So, you are always welcome and encouraged to use private confession and absolution, but confessing your sins and hearing the absolution in the public service as we did earlier is just as good and proper. Either way it’s confession and absolution.
Now, Thomas was not present that first evening. When told, “We have seen the Lord,” he refused to believe unless he could see and touch. He was a skeptic; he didn’t trust the disciples, and he didn’t trust Jesus words.
One week later, Jesus appears again. He invites Thomas to see, to touch, and to believe. Thomas confesses, “My Lord and my God!” And make no mistake here, this IS a confession that Jesus is both Lord and God. It is a trinitarian confession of faith.
Jesus then speaks words meant for us as well: “Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.”
We have not seen with our eyes as the disciples had seen, but we have heard with our ears. We have received the Word, the absolution, and we see by faith in the Sacrament. These are written so that we may believe—and by believing, have life in His name.
Dear saints, the risen Christ still comes into locked rooms. He still speaks peace into fearful hearts. He still delivers forgiveness through His Church.
The resurrection means that nothing—not sin, not death, not doubt—has the final word. But only Christ Jesus and His Word for you. Amen.
