Presence of the Risen Christ

Can we know if Christ is risen? For an event so long ago it seems impossible to really know. How could we today investigate the claim that he rose from the dead, and prove what happened or didn’t happen?

But if we look at the question in another way, we know the Lord is risen because we are here. We are his body, one which made up of believers, and the body of Christ is most certainly alive today. The resurrected Jesus is present in his followers; we in the risen Lord, and he in us.

Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. John 12:24

Jesus pointed to a pattern of resurrection in creation, illustrated by how a seed is buried and then rises again in its fruit. Why did he mention fruit explicitly and exclusively? He says nothing about a plant or tree, just a buried seed and the fruit which comes from it.

The tangible fruit of his resurrection is all those whose lives are changed because of him. We need to remember that when the church is called the body of Christ, the statement is not simply figurative but naming of the real mystery of the incarnation.

We might think the term incarnation only applies to Jesus’ birth, but he is enfleshed in the church through resurrection. Christ becomes incarnate in us, “Christ in you, the hope of glory,” as Paul puts it (Colossians 1:27). But where else do we see a the presence of the risen Christ we can actually touch?

For you always have the poor with you; but you do not always have me. Matthew 26:11

A few days before his death, Jesus alluded to his immanent departure but said the poor would still be present. Is there a connection between the two statements? Yes, we recognize how these two are intertwined when we remember that Jesus said, in the previous chapter, that he is present in the poor: what you do “to the least of these” you do to me (Matthew 25:40).

The poor are with us, and Jesus, the risen Christ, is in them. We can see the resurrected Lord not only in all who follow him, but also in all those who are on the margins and lower levels of society. The resurrected Jesus is everywhere if we know how to see him.

And when He had taken some bread and given thanks, He broke it and gave it to them, saying, “This is My body, which is being given for you; do this in remembrance of Me.” Luke 22:19

Where else is the risen Christ? He is in the sacraments. These gifts of divine grace through Christ, within simple earthly elements, such as bread and cup, and baptism in water, indicate not a rare encounter with the divine, but the sheer abundance of the risen Christ who in all and in all. Nowhere is the risen Christ not present. All creation is risen in him and with him.