Late on the first Easter Sunday, after the Lord had risen from the sepulcher, ten of the disciples gathered for the evening in the upper room of a house in Jerusalem (John 20). They were afraid and probably confused. Since their leader had been crucified by the Roman power, as organized by their own Jewish leaders, they feared that now his followers might also be hunted down and punished. They closed and locked the doors. Were any of the women there? The story does not say, but Peter and John were, who saw and talked with the angels that morning, and the stories of the women were known. Some time must have been spent wondering and perhaps arguing - was He really alive? How could they know it was really Him? This kind of thing, coming back to life after you’re dead, this doesn’t happen in this real world, there must be some mistake!

Then two of the followers, not of the twelve, but the two that had gone to the village of Emmaus, came in, excited and bursting with their news. They had seen Him! They had walked with Him for seven miles and He had told them wondrous things! They had only recognized Him when He broke bread and ate with them. "Don’t doubt us, it really was Jesus!"

And then as they all talked and argued, there He was, standing with them in the room. "Peace be unto you," He said, and He showed them His hands and feet and His side, where he was wounded. He calmed them, and told them that just as he had come down to mankind, so they must go out and teach to all people all the true things that He had taught in the years He was with them.

It was these truths about how to live one’s life that were saving, not the disciples themselves. These saving truths have the power to remit or retain sins, because they were from the Lord, the disciples only transmitted them from the Lord to those who would listen and take them to heart. Then He breathed on them - representing His holy spirit - so that they would not only want to pass these truths on to people, but would also be given the words to say whenever the times came. And then He was gone again.

Thomas was not there that night. We don’t know why. And Thomas, when he heard the story, just could not swallow it. "Except I see in His hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the print of the nails, and thrust my hand into His side, I will not believe", he said. (John 20:25.)

The next verse tells us that the next Sunday they gathered again, and that Thomas was present this time. As before, the Lord was suddenly there, saying again, "Peace be unto you", and then directly to Thomas, "Reach hither thy finger… and reach hither thy hand… and be not faithless but believing". Now Thomas's response was, "my Lord and my God". It seems as if the Lord came this time just to convince Thomas, because it was Thomas who needed Him.

I think He does work this way. I am reminded of another story, from the gospel of Mark (Mark 9:17-27) where a father comes to Jesus with a young son who is possessed by a devil, and asks Jesus to cure him, and is asked in turn: "Do you believe I can do this?" In Mark 9:24 the father responds. Crying out, he said with tears, "I believe, help thou my unbelief."

I think many people have this conflict between lingering doubts and a desire to have the doubts taken away. If we carry on and make our decisions in life as if the doubts were indeed gone, then indeed they will lose their strength and actually will be gone.

These are the only details given of these two meetings in Jerusalem. Chronologically the next post-Easter stories are the ones that take place in Galilee.

John does go on to say at the end of his gospel "...many other signs truly did Jesus in the presence of His disciples which are not written in this book. But these are written that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the son of God...." (John 20:30-31). Perhaps there were more post-Easter stories that weren't written down, but the ones we do have are strong. For the disciples who were involved, there was an unstoppable impact from the life and teachings of the Lord, and His crucifixion, and physical death, and now - in these stories - His resurrection. Hearing the Lord's charges to them, these Galilean fishermen and their colleagues launch out into the wide world, and work to achieve the Great Commission, enduring hardships and persecution, and succeeding - probably beyond their wildest dreams!

14. The Lord is the Word.

In the innermost sense of the Word the only consideration is the Lord Himself, and all the states of the glorification of His human form are described; that is, of His union with the Divine Itself; and all the states in which He was bringing hell into subjection to Himself, imposing order on everything there, and in heaven also: 2249, 7014. So, the whole life of the Lord in the world is described in that sense, and through the Word the presence of the Lord with the angels is continuous: 2523. Therefore the Lord alone is in the innermost part of the Word, and the divinity and sanctity of the Word derive from that: 1873, 9357. The Lord's saying that the Scripture concerning Himself has been fulfilled means the fulfilment of all things in its innermost sense: 7933.

The Word means divine truth: 4692, 5075, 9987. The Lord is the Word because He is the divine truth: 2533. The Lord is also the Word because it comes from Him and is about Him, see Arcana Caelestia 2859, and about the Lord alone in the innermost sense, and thus the Lord Himself is there: 1873, 9357. And because in every single part of the Word there is the marriage of divine good and divine truth, that marriage is in the Lord alone: 3004-3005, 3009, 4138, 5194, 5502, 6343, 7945, 8339, 9263, 9314. The divine Word is the one and only reality, and that in which it is, which is from what is divine, is the only true essence: 5272, 6880, 7004, 8200. And because the divine truth proceeding from the Lord, as from the sun in heaven, is the light there, and the divine good is the warmth there; and because all things there exist from these, just as everything in the world exists from light and warmth, which are also in their own essential substances and act through them; and because the natural world comes into being through heaven or the spiritual world; it is clear that all things which have been created were created from the divine truth, and so from the Word, according to these words from John: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God, and through it ¹ all things were made that were made; and THE WORD WAS MADE FLESH; John 1:1-3, 14, 2803, 2894, 5272, 7850. More about the creation of all things from the divine truth, and thus from the Lord, may be seen in the work Heaven and Hell 137, and more fully in the section where there is a discussion of the sun in heaven, which is the Lord, and which is His divine love: 116-125. And the divine truth is light, and the divine good is warmth from that same sun in heaven: 126-140.

The linking of the Lord with man comes through the Word by means of its internal sense: 10375. This linking comes about through every single detail of the Word, and for this reason the Word is wonderful compared with everything ever written: 10632-10634. Once the Word was written, the Lord spoke through it to people: 10290. In addition there may also be seen ideas raised in the work Heaven and Hell concerning the linking of heaven with people through the Word: 303-310.

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