You can listen to this reflection here. The gospel reading appointed for Easter Thursday is here.
This Easter week we are exploring the Gospel appointed for each day. Today's reading continues on from the Road to Emmaus story we heard yesterday. We are back in that upper room with Jesus’s disciples, grieving unimaginable loss (“How could he have died?), processing unimaginable news (“He is risen?” “Some of the women saw him?” “Was it just a vision?”), enduring unimaginable terror (“They’re coming for us next…”). Into that swirl of emotions, Jesus appears. He doesn’t come in through a door or a window – he is just there, speaking peace, showing his wounds, explaining God’s Word and naming them witnesses of what God has done and is doing.
And, to quell their fears that they are seeing his ghost, in Luke’s version of the scene (we had John’s on Monday), Jesus invites them to touch the healed wounds in his hands and feet. “Touch me and see; for a ghost does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have." He asks for something to eat; they give him broiled fish. Not much of a meal for someone who’s returned from the grave, but they get the point.
Luke makes a wonderful statement: “While in their joy they were disbelieving and still wondering…” The joy the risen Christ brings is our gift in the midst of disbelieving and wondering and grieving, not only after. We are invited to be people of joy in all circumstances, and especially this Eastertide. The dislocations caused by the world’s turmoil and tumults may not rise to the level of what Jesus’ followers were going through, but they do help us have insight into their situation. We too are having to process intense and competing emotions, too much information – and too little – and to cope with communal trauma if not personal. No wonder so many of us are more tired than we think we should be. (I found this piece on living with trauma very helpful on that subject.)
Jesus’ first followers didn’t know it was “Easter” either. It was just a Sunday, and they knew he had died, and learned he was risen, and was being seen. And there he was. If we can let go of our expectations of what “Easter” is or should be, and remain present to where Jesus is around us, we might find ourselves filled with joy while disbelieving and wondering.
Here’s another verse from my song “Was That You.” (Modest iphone recording of it here.) This verse didn’t make the cut in what is already too long a song, but it’s the one that goes with this resurrection appearance:
All of us were gathered, shut inside that room;
Doors were locked, windows blocked, it felt just like a tomb;
Then there he was among us, and he showed his feet and hands.
He said, “Be not afraid, my friends, I’ll help you understand.”
Was that you speaking peace to me when all I knew was fear?
Was that you, breathing your Spirit so we’d always have you near?
Was that you blessing me more than I could ever understand?
Don’t know why it always takes a while for me to open up my eyes and see:
That was you, right there next to me.
© Kate Heichler, 2026. To receive Water Daily by email each morning, subscribe here. Here are the bible readings for Thursday in Easter Week. Water Daily is also a podcast – subscribe to it here on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.
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