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!

10151. 'And the altar' means reception of what is Divine from the Lord in the higher heavens. This is clear from the meaning of 'sanctifying' as the reception of what is Divine from the Lord, dealt with above in 10149; and from the meaning of 'the altar' as that which was representative of the Lord in respect of Divine Good, dealt with in 9964, at this point in respect of Divine Good emanating from Him in the heavens where that Good is received, thus in the higher heavens. For these heavens receive the Lord as to His Divine Good, but the lower heavens receive the Lord as to His Divine Truth, in accord with what has been shown immediately above in 10150.

[2] It should be recognized that whatever served to represent the Lord Himself represented heaven also; for what is Divine, emanating from the Lord and received by angels, constitutes heaven. The angels themselves, as to what is properly their own, do not constitute heaven; only what is Divine, received by them from the Lord, does so. The truth of this may be recognized from the consideration that every one of them there acknowledges, believes, and also perceives that not a grain of good originates in themselves, only in the Lord, and that whatever originates in themselves is not good, so that - exactly as the Church teaches - everything good comes down from above. All this being so, it follows that what is Divine and the Lord's is what constitutes heavenly life among them, consequently constitutes heaven. All this goes to show how the idea that the Lord is the All in all of heaven should be understood, that the Lord dwells there in what is His own, and also that 'an angel' in the Word means some attribute that is the Lord's, ideas that have been the subject in various places in what has gone before.

[3] The situation is the same with regard to the Church. People there, as to what is properly their own, do not constitute the Church; only what is Divine, received by them from the Lord, does so. For no one there who fails to acknowledge and believe that the good of love and the truth of faith come entirely from God forms part of the Church, because he wishes to love God with what is his own and to believe in God with what is his own, which however no one is able to do. From this too it is evident that what is Divine and the Lord's constitutes the Church, just as it constitutes heaven. The Church furthermore is the Lord's heaven on earth, and therefore also the Lord is the All in all within the Church, just as He is in heaven, and dwells with people there in what is His own, just as He does with angels in heaven. Also, people of the Church who thus receive what is Divine and the Lord's in love and faith, they and no others, become angels of heaven after life in the world.

[4] That what is Divine and the Lord's constitutes His kingdom with a person, that is, heaven and the Church with him, is also the Lord's teaching in John,

The Spirit of truth will remain with you and will be in you. And you will know that I am in My Father, and you in Me, and I in you. John 14:17, 20.

'The Spirit of truth' is Divine Truth emanating from the Lord, about which He says that it 'will remain with you'. After this He says that He is in the Father, they are in Him, and He is in them, meaning that they will be in what is Divine and the Lord's, and what is Divine and the Lord's will be in them, by which, it is evident, the Divine Human should be understood. Elsewhere in the same gospel He says,

Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself unless it abides in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in Me. He who abides in Me, and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from Me you cannot do anything. John 15:4-5.