Sermon for April 12, 2026, Second Sunday of Easter

John 20:19-23 (Second Sunday of Easter—Series A)

“Peace Be with You”

Lutheran Church of Our Redeemer, Enfield, CT

April 12, 2026

Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen.

Our text is from the Gospel recorded in John 20:

¹⁹So when it was evening on that day, the first day of the week, and the doors stood locked where the disciples were on account of the fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood in their midst and said to them, “Peace be with you.” ²⁰And after He said this, He showed them His hands and His side. The disciples, therefore, were glad when they saw the Lord. ²¹Therefore Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you. Just as the Father has sent me, even so I am sending you.” ²²And after He said this, He breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit. ²³If you forgive the sins of anyone, they are forgiven them; if you withhold forgiveness, it is withheld.”

          When Jesus stood before Pontius Pilate on Good Friday the Roman governor of Judea asked, “What is truth?” Given our Gospel text this morning, we might ask the question, “What is peace?”

          Peace can have many different facets. Sometimes we long for “peace and quiet,” a break from the noise and distractions of the world and daily life. Along the same lines, don’t we sometimes say, “I just need 20 minutes of peace,” meaning, “I want to be left alone.” Peace is the opposite of war, conflict, and hostility. Nations sign peace treaties to end wars like the Treaty of Paris in 1783, which concluded the American Revolution.

          Peace is related to reconciliation. To be reconciled emphasizes the unity brought about while peace emphasizes the ending of conflict that occurs at the same time. In the New Testament, peace draws on the rich meaning of the Hebrew word for peace, which you might be familiar with, shalom. Shalom is the general well-being God brings about for and in His people. He blessed His people with peace, shalom. “The Lord look upon you with favor and give you peace” (Num. 6:26).

          Shalom, peace, also forms a significant part of the prophets’ announcements of the coming Messiah. Isaiah 66:12, “For thus says the Lord: ‘Behold, I will extend peace to her like a river, and the glory of the nations like an overflowing stream.’” Ezekiel proclaimed that God would “make a covenant of peace with [the people]. It shall be an everlasting covenant with them” (Ezk. 37:26). And the well-know promise from Isaiah 9, “For to us a child is born, to us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.”

          With this background, we can better understand Jesus’ greeting on the first Easter evening. “So when it was evening on that day, the first day of the week, and the doors stood locked where the disciples were on account of the fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood in their midst and said to them, ‘Peace be with you.’ And after He said this, He showed them His hands and His side.” While a greeting of shalom, peace, was common, there is much more at work here as Jesus repeats the bestowal of peace upon His disciples. “The disciples, therefore, were glad when they saw the Lord. Jesus said to them again, ‘Peace be with you. Just as the Father has sent me, even so I am sending you.’”

          Christ came to bring peace. He came to be peace for the world. Jesus Himself is called the “Lord of peace” (2 Thess. 3:16). So it is that peace comes because of a person, and it comes in the form of a person—Jesus, the Risen Savior.

          And the peace that Jesus brings is not a worldly peace. In the Upper Room on the night of His betrayal, Jesus told the disciples, “I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world” (John 16:33 ESV). Is it really possible, then, to have peace and still endure the troubles of this world? In Jesus, the answer is yes, because Jesus is our peace and He gives to us a peace that goes beyond the world in which we live, a peace that, in fact, passes all understanding (Phil 4:7). It is the ultimate peace, shalom, with God.

          Because of our sinful condition, humanity’s relationship to God had been severed and destroyed. People, by nature, are hostile to God (Rom. 8:7). We are not content to follow the Word and the Commandments of God even though they bring us blessing. Romans 5 reminds us that at one time we were God’s enemies. Now, enemies are not at peace in their relationship; they are at odds with one another. This was our relationship with Lord. We were separated from Him in our sinfulness. All of our impure thoughts, words, and actions contrary to God’s Word condemned us as sinners who must be punished with eternal death and separated from God forever in hell.

But God is faithful to us despite our sinful condition, despite our being His enemies by nature. “God shows His love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8). God the Son became fully human so that He might take your place and mine as “enemy of God” and might win for us complete forgiveness, peace, and reconciliation with God.

At Jesus’ incarnation and birth, angels announced that there is now “peace on earth among those with whom he is pleased!” (Luke 2:14 ESV). Jesus had come as True God and True Man to make peace between God and sinners with His perfect life lived in our place, and with His perfect suffering, death, and resurrection.

On the cross, Jesus allowed Himself to become God’s greatest enemy of all time as He bore the sins of the whole world in His own body. On the cross, Jesus was the sinner of sinners for us, and He faced the full separation from God when He was completely forsaken, totally cut off from the Father, enduring hell in our place so that we would no longer be separated from our heavenly Father. We read in Romans 5:1, “Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.” Jesus suffered and died, shedding His blood to bring about true peace with God through the forgiveness of our sins.

The Risen Christ’s declaration, “Peace be with you,” is His pronouncement that through the cross and His resurrection, the work of winning peace with God is done. “It is finished!” In Christ Jesus, God the Father has mended our most serious breach between us and Him. Peace now exists between God and people. This peace does not depend on our perception or feeling of it. It is real and true because Christ, our Prince of Peace, has made it so through His suffering on the cross and resurrection from the grave. When we don’t feel peace in our lives in this world, we rejoice that we are still, through Christ, at peace with God. When we do feel moments of peace, we rejoice in it as a gift from God.

We, then, like the disciples, are overjoyed when we hear the Lord’s announcement, “Peace!” But where is it that the Risen Lord comes to us and says to us, “Peace be with you”? He doesn’t come to us behind locked doors and show us His hands and His side as He did on the first Easter evening, but He does come to us in His Word and real presence in the Means of Grace.

Jesus comes to us in the peace and joy of sins forgiven in the Word of His Gospel. The very Word of God who was made flesh, who suffered and died to win our peace with the Father, who is risen from the dead, comes to us in the Good News that announces, “Your sins are forgiven. You have peace with God.” As we receive the Gospel in the Absolution, we rejoice to hear the living Lord who speaks those words to us through the human voice of His called pastors as we receive those words as from God Himself.

Jesus also comes to us with His Word combined with water in Holy Baptism. In this Sacrament Christ, through the Holy Spirit, washes away our sins and declares us to be at peace with God, reconciled to Him as God’s own children. In Baptism, you and I as children of God are united with Christ in His own death and resurrection. Romans 6, “Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life” (Rom. 6:3-4 ESV).

The Risen Christ comes to us also in Word and sign with His very Body and Blood in the Lord’s Supper. By the power of His Word, “This is My Body; this is My Blood,” the Risen Christ gives His true Body and Blood in, with, and under the blessed bread and wine. As the hymn writer says, “Here, O my Lord, I see Thee face to face; Here would I touch and handle things unseen; Here grasp with firmer hand the eternal grace, And all my weariness upon Thee lean” (LSB 631:1). At peace with God, we joyfully approach the Lord’s Table to eat and drink Jesus’ true Body and Blood with the bread and wine for the forgiveness of sins. In this blessed meal we also receive from Christ eternal life and salvation along with strength for a new life in Him.

Today, the Risen and Victorious Lord Jesus Christ comes to you in Word and Sacrament and says, “Peace be with you.” Through His cross and resurrection, He won the forgiveness of your sins and reconciled you to God through His blood. You are at peace with God as His beloved sons and daughters to whom Jesus your Lord and Savior brings the refreshment of forgiveness, eternal life, and peace with God. As you continue to receive the Lord Jesus through His Means of Grace, rejoice and be glad. Look forward with great joy to these special moments when your Risen Lord comes to you with His blessings of peace and love.

“Now may the God of peace who brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus, the great shepherd of the sheep, by the blood of the eternal covenant, equip you with everything good that you may do his will, working in us that which is pleasing in his sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen” (Heb. 13:20 ESV).