Second Sunday of Easter
Sunday of Divine Mercy
As I reflect on the Gospel today, I am reminded of how mysteriously hidden God’s Providence can feel. We are so familiar with the Gospel stories that it can be easy to forget just how much fear, doubt, and uncertainty the disciples faced during this time. Even though the appearance of the risen Lord must have been an occasion of extreme joy, amazement, and relief, there was still the question of their expectations for the future. What were they to do now? What was to become of them? All we know is that a week after Jesus first appeared to them, they were still huddled inside with the door locked. This fact alone seems to indicate that they were still grappling with residual fears and uncertainties about the future.
Meditating on these and other experiences of the disciples should be a source of tremendous comfort for us though. The disciples, like us, were ordinary people with ordinary worries, fears, and anxieties. They couldn’t predict the future and had no idea what was going to become of them. They had to walk the path that God laid for them one step at a time. At the same time, we see the remarkable ways that God did provide for them at every turn. God always gave them precisely what they needed when they needed it. The same holds as true for us in our own lives today as it did for the disciples.