We Are Still Learning

5 April 2026  John 20:1-9

The Resurrection of the Lord

“They did not yet understand the Scripture that He had to rise from the dead.” (John 20:99) 

The disciples did not figure everything out on Easter Day. Not even close.

According to John, only two of the disciples went to the tomb, and finding it empty they just went home (John 20:10). A couple of guys encountered the Risen Christ on the road to Emmaus, and didn’t recognize Him at all, not even when He was explaining scripture to them. They didn’t recognize Him until He blessed and broke the bread before them. They ran back to Jerusalem, and told the disciples, who reported that Jesus had appeared to Peter, too. Yet despite these reports, when Jesus finally appeared them all, they thought it was a ghost (Luke 24:28-36).

We are still learning (and relearning) the essential things about the Resurrection of Jesus. It is looking like we are not quite done with that. But maybe that’s OK. Indications are that more and more people are wanting to learn them, too. Bible sales continue to be high (double what they were in 2019), and conversions to Roman Catholicism, especially among the young, are occurring at sharply increased levels.

When Jesus was about to ascend into heaven, after the disciples had been with Jesus for over six weeks after the Resurrection, one of them still asked, “Lord, will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?” (Acts 1:6). Even after all they had seen since Calvary, they still could not get the idea of a worldly, political Messiah out of their heads.

It took Pentecost and the coming of the Holy Spirit before the disciples finally understood enough to start preaching, but even Pentecost didn’t straighten out everything. Even Pentecost was not enough for them to get their heads entirely around the Gentile Mission, which is why the Jerusalem Church did not have anything to do with getting it started. That was done by the Church in Antioch, by a group of witnesses most of whose names we no longer know. It took Paul’s first missionary journey – which was unauthorized by the apostles in Jerusalem – and the subsequent Jerusalem Council before the apostles finally understood that the Gentile Mission was the future (cf. Acts 15:1-35).

There were other controversies later. Challenges posed by Gnosticism, Montanism and Manichaeism weren’t resolved until the canon of scripture was determined, that took three more councils (Rome A.D. 382, Hippo A.D. 393, and Carthage A.D. 397). Then there were controversies over the nature of Christ and three more councils (Nicaea A.D. 325, Constantinople A.D. 391, and Chalcedon A.D. 451). It took a long time for the Church to learn all the things it needed to know, and some of them had to be relearned. The Second Vatican Council (A.D. 1962-65) was called in part because the Church had forgotten some of the lessons about evangelization and mission that had been the subject of the very first council (Jerusalem, see Acts 15). The Church had become too insulated and walled off from the world and required aggiornamento, “updating” following the shocks and horrors of World War 2 and the beginning of the Cold War.  

We are still learning (and relearning) the essential things about the Resurrection of Jesus. It is looking like we are not quite done with that. But maybe that’s OK. Indications are that more and more people are wanting to learn them, too. Bible sales continue to be high (double what they were in 2019), and conversions to Roman Catholicism, especially among the young, are occurring at sharply increased levels – 112% in Norwich, CT; 51% in Des Moines, IA; 60% in Philadelphia, PA; 72% in Newark, NJ; 84% in St. Petersburg, FL; 53% in Austin, TX; 105% in Pueblo, CO. The evidence that a religious revival may be underway is clarifying and solidifying. It would be even more solid and clear if the Church were to get out in front of this. Indications that people are ready to draw closer to Jesus don’t get very much clearer than this.

Not even close.