The Rev. Frank Logue
King of Peace Episcopal Church
Kingsland, Georgia
April 27, 2003

50 Days of Grace
John 20:1-31 

Today is the Second Sunday of Easter. It’s an interesting term historically—the Sundays of Easter. As far as the early Christian church was concerned, Easter was not a one-day festival. Christians celebrated the entire 50 days from Easter through Pentecost as The Great Fifty Days. This week of weeks leading up to Pentecost was to be 50 days of joyous celebration of Jesus’ resurrection, ascension, and the giving of the Holy Spirit. The Great Fifty Days were a time for mystagogy, preaching on the mysteries of the sacraments and new life in Jesus Christ.  

This Second Sunday of Easter goes by another name in contemporary church life—Low Sunday. This is Low Sunday, as in low attendance Sunday, perhaps low-energy Sunday too. The reason for this is simple: congregations which have kept the 40 days of Lent and observed the full Holy Week schedule of services are churched out by now. Many priests are on vacation. When I was in seminary, every seminarian preached on this Second Sunday of Easter. It’s going to be low attendance anyway, why not let the seminarian preach? 

There is no doubt about it; we do a better job of observing the 40 days of Lent than we do celebrating the Great Fifty Days of Eastertide. That’s not what you would expect at first glance. After all, Lent is a time of self-examination and perhaps even denial. Lent is the time for giving up things like chocolate and other desserts, or Cokes or even meat, while in Eastertide we only give up the General Confession in our worship services. Lent is also a time for taking on additional things such as reading more scripture, attending more church services or studies. While in Eastertide, there are no such demands to do more.  

Lent is work. Eastertide is grace. Yet, the church as a whole excels at Lent and then cruises from this Second Sunday of Easter to Pentecost Sunday as if nothing has changed.  

Let me compare a couple examples of people from church history—Pelagius, who I will call the patron saint of Lent and Thomas, who can be our patron saint of Eastertide. 

Pelagius was a fifth century monk who lived in what is now Britain. Pelagius became a widely known preacher and teacher. He taught that humans have a totally free will and we are responsible for our own sins. He went on to reason that God made humanity and knows what we are capable of doing. God commanded nothing of humans that could not be obeyed. God then demanded human perfection and gave us Jesus as an example of a perfect life. We then take the first initial steps of salvation on our own. By our works, the way we live, the things we do, we show that we are worthy of God’s love. We earn God’s goodness and favor towards us by these works.  

This idea of earning God’s love is what we might learn from Lent. But before I go to far, I should note that Pelagius was a heretic. Pelagius’ teachings were renounced as unchristian. Saint Augustine of Hippo was the champion of the orthodox view that we are born into a sinful world with little control over the sinfulness in which we are mired. God’s grace reaches out to us in the midst of sin and loves us just the same. We do not earn God’s love, God gives love to us freely due to no merit of our own. Augustine defined grace as God’s generous, undeserved love and attention, which begin the process of our deeper healing. 

We see this grace in the story of Thomas. Thomas is picked on by history with the name Doubting Thomas as if doubting is a bad thing. Jesus does not reprimand Thomas for his doubts, but returns to his disciples a second time to put Thomas’ doubts to rest. Thomas does nothing to earn Jesus’ attention. In fact, we might guess that his insistence on a sign, on seeing the nail prints and spear mark would earn disfavor if anything. Thomas demands, “Unless I see the nail holes in his hands and put my finger in the holes, place my hand where the spear went into his side, I will not believe.”  

Yet, Jesus returns to the still-locked room stands among his followers and offers Thomas exactly what Thomas said he needed in order to believe. Thomas finds he no longer needs to touch his risen Lord. On seeing and hearing Jesus he declares his own-time Rabbi as Lord and God.  

I call Thomas the patron Saint of Eastertide as we see him doing nothing to earn Jesus love and attention and yet Thomas receives the love he needs to get shalom—a deeper healing and wholeness. 

I don’t mean to knock Lent in this sermon. I love Lent. The 40 days are a great time to me of preparing for Easter’s joy. I only want to make sure that we don’t learn the wrong lessons from our 40 days of denial and self-examination. During Lent, you do not work to earn God’s love. Paul tells us in the letter to the Romans that “While we were yet sinners Christ died for us.” He further notes that, “All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.”  

So, you can’t do enough, be good enough, get it all right enough to earn God’s love and favor. That’s OK. You don’t have to. Pelagius got it wrong. The things we do to make ourselves more Christ-like, like the observances of Lent, are not done to earn God’s love, but are done in thankfulness to a God who already loves us.  

We don’t have to be perfect to get God to notice us. God has noticed you since you were formed in your mother’s womb. God loves you. God wants a relationship with you and you don’t have to earn it. You just have to open yourself up to receiving God’s love.  

Open yourself up to 50 Days of Grace. Rejoice in the season of remembrance that Easter was not a long ago event. The Jesus raised at Easter remains with us in our hearts and lives. The Holy Spirit given at Pentecost is with us even at this very moment. Enjoy this time of rejoicing. For Alleluia! Christ is risen. 

The Lord is risen indeed. Alleluia! 

Amen.