Building to Unbuild

John 20:19-31

When it was evening on that day, the first day of the week, and the doors of the house where the disciples had met were locked for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you.” After he said this, he showed them his hands and his side. Then the disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord. Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.” When he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.”  But Thomas (who was called the Twin), one of the twelve, was not with them when Jesus came. So the other disciples told him, “We have seen the Lord.” But he said to them, “Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands, and put my finger in the mark of the nails and my hand in his side, I will not believe.” A week later his disciples were again in the house, and Thomas was with them. Although the doors were shut, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you.” Then he said to Thomas, “Put your finger here and see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it in my side. Do not doubt but believe.” Thomas answered him, “My Lord and my God!” Jesus said to him, “Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.”  Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book. But these are written so that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name.

__________

In 1954, a man named Godtfred Kirk Christiansen (son of Ole Kirk Christiansen, founder of the LEGO Group), visited a toy exhibition in Britain. On his way back home, he met Troels Petersen, who lamented about the state of the toy industry. Petersen told Godtfred, "What an industry this is - no system of any kind whatsoever!" This conversation inspiredGodtfred to challenge what most companies offered children at the time, which was a "cut and dry" solution. Something was missing, something that would continually test children's creativity and imagination within a system that would lend itself to endless possibilities. Ultimately this led Godtfred to the creation of the LEGO brick, a simple piece of plastic, but something that could enable a child to use them to create anything and everything again and again. Essentially a way of playing that encouraged building to unbuild.

The innovation of the simple LEGO brick that Godtfred set to create is that it would establish the LEGO "system of play" that balanced endless creativity and instructions that sought to provide basic guidelines. However, Godtfred Christiansen understood that the power of this new creation laid within the fact that youth (and even adults) could now create, take apart, and create again using the power of their imagination. The LEGO Group designed a product that they intended you to deconstruct and so that you then could make something new (of course, if you have a limited Star Wars Millennium Falcon set, don't take that apart). It is this idea of creating and recreating, or building to unbuild, that reminds me of a critical Easter truth, which is that life can nor never should be the same. Put another way, going back to "normal" is not as normal as we would like it to be as Easter, resurrection people. We are meant to be builders that build to unbuild and repeat this ongoing process of learning and living. 

Amid everything that is going on, one thing I have heard people say is, "I can't wait for things to go back to being normal." The truth is that we can't go back to what I am not referring to as the "before times." Too much has changed, too much has happened. We are seeing the flaws in our current systems and ways of living and to go back to “normal” just wouldn’t make any sense. I mention Godtfred Christiansen and his creative work at the LEGO Group because it should draw our attention to something we should have realized all along. Which is that from the moment of Christ’s death and resurrection we were forever changed, everything has been impacted.  What caused this change? COVID-19 may have been the awakening of what we have been missing, but this call for change took place back at the resurrection of Jesus from the empty tomb.   

We might consider our lives before this event as a LEGO set that came with instructions we followed. Yet just as Godtfred intended that LEGO's be turned into new creations, so too did Christ intend, and continues to intend, that we make our lives and our world into something that draws closer to the generosity, grace, and love that God has shown. We must now keep building to unbuild. A light is shining on the ways we have not changed and how we have failed to love our neighbors, care for issues surrounding poverty and homelessness, and how our selfish desires might end up costing precious lives as some people now deny their responsibility to stay home and stop the spread of this infectious disease! There is a lot for us to deconstruct at the moment, which is good! That is what we are meant to do as people who live with resurrection hope. 

Friends, the good news that we need to remember as we continue being apart is that this messy work will be fueled by God’s abundant grace. That is the hope of Easter, and how our lives are continuing to transform and take shape.  We do this as we recall that we have been created to be a people of hope, looking forward with confidence, radical love, and a belief that Christ rose for all people and that means we have to do our part (as a church and as a people at large) for EVERYONE (no if, and, or buts).  

There will be times, probably many, when we are hesitant to embrace this charge to love wholly, to serve wholly with our whole selves. We may find ourselves in the shoes or sandals of Thomas, who didn't initially believe that Jesus rose from the dead, that the world had fundamentally changed as a result. Being in Thomas' position doesn't make us "bad people,” it makes us human. We are all struggling with so much going on in our lives and one more thing is added to our plate, who wouldn’t have a hard time believing.

When the fog of life surrounds us, like the one we are experiencing right now, we might think and act like Thomas. We want to see Jesus moving in the world around us, and we want to grab hold of something that connects us to what we had before our season of change arrived. And this is fine; there is undoubtedly a time of grief that we need to sit with for a while. But next is a time of letting go, of changing who we are as individuals and as a people to fit more appropriately what it means to live with the ever-changing resurrection hope that Jesus provides. 

So how are we going to be different when the dust settles? How will you keep on building to unbuild? How will we be changed as we begin to make our way into the outside world once again? We can't go back! We can't climb into the empty tomb because Jesus has already broken out and forever altered our lives. We can't go back because we have found new ways to connect, new ways to stay in touch, and while we crave in-person interactions, we cannot forget about the virtual relationships that have kept us going day after day. To undo everything that we have built-in this strange time would be a disservice to the Easter message we still hear this day. Even now, there are many avenues in which we can live out the fulfilled promise of Easter change! We are exploring organizing a group that might be able to help make masks for our local police department or health care works, and also seeing how we could be an aide to our neighbor Gilead Presbyterian Church who runs a food pantry as well. 

I understand that at this point, weariness and fatigue is settling in for many. So if you are looking for something to distract yourselves, here is my task for you this day. Find something that inspires you (it could be a talent or a skill) and imagine what it would look like for you to use it to serve the community of faith and community at large to which God has called you to be a part. For Godtfred Christiansen, all it took was a boat ride. For the disciples, it required a visit from Jesus and for Thomas a reappearance. For us, it may well be the climate we find ourselves in this very moment. Let's start by taking a brick (it could be an idea or unformed thought), and let's add to it! Perhaps we need to build and unbuild, discovering what could and should be. May we arrive at the other side of this season embracing the ever-changing innovations that God has set in front of us to embrace. Let us start to build brick by brick and imagine AND act together as we explore the unending possibilities that await us. In our building to unbuild we will create, learn, and explore the new realities that face us together in faith and trust in God. Amen.