Readings 1 Peter 1:3-9; John 20: 19-31 My daughter Margaret keeps me well supplied with novels. Recently she gave me one with the title `Judas Child` - it took me quite a long while to read it - the story was a bit complicated but in essence it was about the mysterious disappearance of two ten year old girls who were close friends. lt wasn`t the first time that children had disappeared in that community and there was a strong feeling that a serial killer was responsible - with the technique of enticing one child to meet her friend and then for both to be abducted (hence the title `Judas Child`) - one to be killed almost immediately and the other to be slowly tortured before being also killed. A sub-plot was all about a Catholic Priest who had been found guilty of murdering a child and who was serving a life sentence in prison.

Because of what had happened in the past there was a strong conviction in the community that one of the missing children named Sadie was dead and that the other, Gwen, was probably still alive. In spite of massive searches no trace of either girl was found. The story then shifts to an underground cellar, used for growing mushrooms, where their abductor had locked them. Sadie pointed to a grave shaped hole where she said the killer had put her - but she had tricked him by keeping her eyes shut and holding her breath and then pushing aside the dirt with which he had covered her. The two girls then start planning how to get out - this involved trying to get past a savage dog - which managed to bite Gwen and which kept her in constant pain. But Sadie managed to tame the dog and set it up to attack the killer if and when he returned to the cellar - that ploy failed and the dog was shot by the killer who, to punish the girls, turned off the lights in the cellar as well as the heat. This made life even more difficult for the girls but then he returned to the cellar with his gun and killed Sadie before being killed himself by a rescuer who had followed him. There is, of course, much more to the story including the release of the Priest when evidence was found showing that the killer of Sadie was also responsible for the killer of the child for whose death the Priest had been convicted.

Then comes a twist which I had not expected - Gwen is admitted to hospital for treatment to her leg injury and gets terribly upset when she is told that the body of her friend Sadie had been found in a grave in the cellar - and clearly had been there for some time. `That can`t be true,` she screamed. `Sadie was with me all the time, she made plans for our escape, she encouraged me not to give up, she comforted me - I would never have survived without her presence with me.`

It isn`t a great novel but I found a lot of Easter theology in that story - for I have come to believe that that there is only one way that we can harmonise all the accounts of the resurrection of Jesus and that is to see them as accounts of a spiritual presence so powerful that, as with the story of Sadie and Gwen, it took a physical form in the minds of his followers. Of course there are many Christians who believe that Jesus did return to life in a physical form - but there are also many other people who are unable to accept the Christian faith because they believe that it requires them to believe what is for them the unbelievable. To see the resurrection as being about a spiritual presence doesn`t answer all the questions, but it does help to explain how locked doors present no barriers; how disciples on the road to Emmaus fail to recognise a companion walking with them and how on the road to Damascus, Paul becomes a witness to the resurrection even though he had never seen Jesus after his death.

To offer this explanation doesn`t in any way lessen the mystery of the first Easter. I align myself with St Bernard who said, `I believe though I do not comprehend, and I hold by faith what I cannot grasp with my mind`. I believe that the love of God is stronger than the power of death and that, in some mysterious manner, Jesus rose from the dead in such an unmistakable way that those who followed him were empowered to share their possessions, overcame their fear of death and behaved in such a way that they both commended and exemplified the teaching and values of Jesus.

Perhaps like Gwen they really did see Jesus in a physical form but I believe that they were more like Paul, overpowered by the strength of a spiritual presence.

And, of course, that applies far beyond the original disciples – for many people the proof of the resurrection does not arise from what they read in the New Testament but from their encounter with a living presence beyond their understanding but incredibly powerful in their lives. l`m not only thinking of well known figures in the present or from the past - the saints and martyrs like John Hus burnt to death in Constance because he wanted people to be able to read the bible in their own language and Dietrich Bonhoeffer who refused to accept freedom from prison on condition that he stopped his opposition to Hitler- or the playboys like St Augustine and St Francis whose life styles dramatically changed - the dispirited like John Wesley who experienced a great warming of his heart - the slave owner John Newton and the agnostic C S Lewis - all of whom in one way or another encountered a living and life changing presence. l`m also thinking of ordinary people whose stories may never be known who have found that a living Jesus has been present with them as a challenging, reassuring, encouraging or comforting presence in whatever temptation, tragedy or disappointment that has visited them.

ln all of this I haven`t mentioned the so-called `Doubting Thomas` of our Gospel reading - make what you will of that story but please don`t forget the words attributed to Jesus: `Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet believe.` I have never seen Jesus but I do believe that, in the words of Peter we have all `been born anew to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus from the dead` - the form of that new life remains a mystery but the reality of it does not. `I believe though I do not comprehend, and I hold by faith what I cannot grasp with my mind.`