REFLECTION 27TH APRIL 2025, “THE MANY FACES OF JESUS” 

By Rev Dr Fei Taule’ale’ausumai 

When I’m preparing the Order of Service for each Sunday, I read the lectionary readings and then ponder a possible theme or title for my reflection.  Often, I send out the theme or title of the reflection on a Wednesday and by Saturday it is no longer the theme that inspires me.  It’s a bit like that for me this week.  However, in honour of Pope Francis it is fitting that he is one of the many faces of Jesus.  He lived with humility, with simplicity and inclusivity.  We pray that someone of similar charisma, mana and compassion with replace him.  Father John Dew retired priest from Wellington will be part of the Conclave at the Vatican and this will be his very first conclave.  He hopes that a similar pope will replace pope Francis.  In fact, John Dew is a personal friend of mine and he himself would make a good pope.   

But if we look around here in our church this morning, can you see the many faces of Jesus among us?  I believe if we have the very 3 things that Micah 6:8 challenge us with then yes, I believe we have not just the face of Jesus but the heart of Jesus.  To do Justice, to love mercy and to walk humbly with our God.   

In the 1990’s Contextual theology was all the rage in theological colleges.  We had Liberation theology Segundo, Kosuke Koyama’s Water Buffalo Theology, Sugitharajah’s the Asian Faces of Jesus, Jione Havea’s Coconut Theology, his son Jione Havea junior Moana theology, Womanist theology from the perspective of black women and women of colour and many more.  Why did these theologies need to emerge?  Because the white gentle Jesus meek and mild no longer represented the living realities and contexts from which indigenous churches were emerging from.  Kosuke Koyama’s first field of service after completing his Ph.D. was as a pastor in northern Thailand, Koyama recognized the need for communicating with the people in his congregation, many of whom were farmers who used water buffalos in their daily work.  

My colleague in Birmingham was Prof. Sugitharajah who wrote the Asian faces of Jesus.  Although Jesus was born in the western part of Asia, it was not until fifteen hundred years later that Asia experienced the full impact of Jesus’ personality and teaching. Western missionaries, the primary transmitters of Christianity, left behind a Western understanding of Jesus. Today, Asians are seeking the face of the original Jesus- his Asian face. For them, all understandings of Jesus arise out of their particular contextual needs. Enriching the Western understanding of Jesus, Asians employ new interpretative resources, cultural symbols, and thought patterns as they make sense of Jesus for their own time and place.  

Juan Luis Segundo a Latin American liberation theologian.  Liberation theology is a theological movement within Catholicism that emerged in the 1960s and 1970s in Latin America. It emphasizes the social and political dimensions of faith, advocating for the poor and oppressed and calling for radical social and economic change. The movement seeks to interpret scripture and Christian tradition from the perspective of the marginalized, viewing social injustice as a sin that needs to be challenged. The “preferential option for the poor,” a key concept in liberation theology, emphasizes prioritizing the needs and concerns of the poor and marginalized. It’s not merely about charity but a fundamental shift in theological and societal priorities, reflecting God’s love for the vulnerable. Liberation theology, developed in Latin America, argues that God is on the side of the oppressed and that the church should also prioritize those who are marginalized.  

I guess new theologies continue to emerge when questions and doubts enter into our belief system and things that we rote learned from Sunday School and Church no longer sufficed.  Thomas questions and doubts is being realistic.  It is actually ok to question and doubt, actually that’s why many of us here are part of this St Andrew’s on the Terrace worshipping community, because we can ask questions and bring our doubts here and not be judged or condemned for thinking outside the square.   

Every year, the Sunday after Easter always features the story of unfairly named “Doubting Thomas” longing to see Jesus’ scars.  The world we live in is still a world full of violence and tragedy, hunger and poverty, brokenness and sorrow. It is sometimes hard to hold onto the victory of Easter in one hand while holding a newspaper, smartphone, Facebook, or X feed in the other.  Our warring world as it is today is the kind of world that can make people doubt. 2000 years later, the Easter story has yet to defeat all the pain and suffering we live with. And sometimes it often feels like things are just getting worse. 

So, what do we do with this reality? How do we celebrate the resurrection while also being honest about our struggling world in which so many of our neighbors and ourselves are living in? Maybe Thomas holds the key to living with this mystery: 

John’s Gospel tells us that Thomas “was not with them” on that Easter Sunday when Jesus appeared to them. We don’t know why he wasn’t there; we just know that Easter did not happen to him when it happened to the others. They saw and heard Jesus before Thomas did; and try as they might to convince him that Jesus had been raised from the dead, Thomas wasn’t convinced. He wanted to see, hear and touch Jesus for himself: “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.” He wasn’t asking for anything the others hadn’t already experienced, but that simple request has caused many preachers to call him the “Doubting Thomas.” 

Nek minnit, Thomas got what he asked for. Jesus came to his disciples again, and this time Thomas was present. Jesus said to him: “Put your finger here and see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it in my side. Do not doubt but believe.” In response, Thomas made the most astounding confession of faith found in any of the gospels: “My Lord and my God.” 

Then Jesus said something to Thomas that he meant for the rest of us-for those of us who stand where Thomas stood before Jesus appeared to him: “Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.” Jesus is not going to do for us what he did for Thomas seven days after the first Easter; he’s not going to appear among us physically in the flesh like he did for Thomas and the disciples. If you and I are going to believe, we will have to do so without “seeing.”  That is what faith is all about, trusting, hoping, believing without seeing and it’s not always easy. Remember Peter Pan and the lost boys, there was no food on the table, but the lost boys closed their eyes and imagined and believed and they ate to their hearts content from their imaginations.   

So, where in this world can we find the face of Jesus?  In the many different contexts where the basic tenets and the values of Justice, mercy, compassion, love and peace prevail.   

Faith Communities, Churches, these places are full of people have yet to figure it out. Church is a place for people who live with doubt and questions. Everyone doubts and questions just ask your neighbour next to you.  I’ll tell you, even or especially ministers, elders, teachers we all have doubts. But even when it’s hard to believe, we believe that the gift of faith is a gift given to a community – to a family of broken, doubting, fearful people who are all desperate to hear a word of hope in the midst of a world that seems to be falling apart. We’re in this together, but we don’t get far when we pretend, we haven’t got it all figured out. Bring your questions to church. You’re in good company. 

So, where can we find and see the face of Jesus today?  When people laugh and cry together over the joys and disappointments of their lives, when death is faced honestly and hopefully, when grace and mercy, not condemnation and harshness, govern our relationships, and when the church opens its heart and its doors to whoever comes yearning for the love of God, excluding no one. 

Jesus embraces the world with the arms of his followers-our arms. He speaks words of grace with our voices. He demands justice and offers peace through our actions of love and compassion. By God’s great grace, the simple and ordinary things that we are able to do and share with others are the means by which Jesus becomes real to us and to the world. They are the sights and sounds of Christ, present to us in his body, the church; they are evidence for the truth of Easter, signs of the resurrection, and ways to be the Face of Jesus in your family, in your community, among your friends.  Amen.

Audio of selected readings and reflections

Audio of the complete service