So, more about me. I’ve been thinking about this all week. If you live long enough, you wake up one day and you realize you really are kind of an expert on some things, right? I know what it’s like to be on the team. Here’s a picture. I know you can’t see it; I’ll describe it to you. This is our football team, and it says Monarchs. We were the Marysville Monarchs. “Monarchs win league championship. First league championship in 18 years.” We won the Metro League Championship that year. There’re pictures of us. I’m in some of these pictures. I know what it’s like to be on a team. Then you turn a few pages, and you’ve got varsity basketball. I was the starting point guard on our basketball team. “Captains Jay Groat and Larry Nichol.” I was captain. There is nothing here about winning a championship. Not even close, not even close. And then last thing, the baseball picture, and we had a good baseball team. We came in second in the league. We should have won it all, but we didn’t.

So, what you can do if you’re called by the spirit to preach a message about teamwork and being on a team, you can do things like Google that, and you can find some pretty interesting stuff. One of the things that I found was a college class taught at George Washington University in Washington, D.C., on athletics and teamwork. I found in the class materials these five characteristics. They call them the principles of teamwork. I’m going to read them, and while I read them, I’m inviting you to think about being on a team, being on a Christian team. I’m also inviting you to think about teams like family, friends, workplace. “Principles of teamwork. Number one – clear communication. All team members understand their roles and responsibilities.” We all clearly understand our roles and responsibilities. Clear communication. I’d like to confess to you that in preparation for this message I asked myself these questions, the ones that I am asking you now. One of the things that I keep thinking about is the state of our nation, the state of our world. Principles of teamwork. Number one – clear communication. Number two. Here’s one – mutual respect. “When you’re on a team, you share mutual respect, valuing each member’s contributions and perspective.” Number three – shared goals. “A team has shared goals, aligning objectives to work through a common project.” Number four – trust and accountability. We trust the other team members and we are accountable to each other. If you take a college class about teamwork, these are the things that we can learn. And number five – collaboration. Encouraging teamwork and cooperation.

One of my mentors taught us this. I’ve always been intrigued. I’m inviting you to use your imagination and to wonder, wonder about the state of mind and the state of being of the disciples when they heard that Jesus might be back. Let’s remember that they were living in fear. Let’s remember that when things started to go very wrong, to the point of death, they ran. I’m not trying to cast aspersions. I’m not blaming them for anything, but I’m trying to say this is what happened. And John tells us this morning, 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 in fear. They were afraid. The doors were locked. And now they’ve heard that he’s back. He’s back? What does this mean? Did we let him down? What’s he going to say to us? He’s back. Huh. Is this good news? I love this notion. I love the fact that John tells us that the doors were locked, and Jesus just appears. I love that. I love that he doesn’t explain it, because it invites us to think about, as I tried to briefly communicate in the opening prayer, what doors are locked inside of us today out of fear. And how does Jesus get in? Don’t know. But apparently, he does. That’s a miracle. That’s grace. The doors were locked. He’s back? What’s he going to say to us? Well, according to John, the first word out of his mouth was “peace.” “Peace be with you.” This is an amazing message. Of all the things he could have said, peace be with you. “After he said this, he showed them his hands and his side, and the disciples were overjoyed when they saw the Lord.” Jesus said to them again, just in case they missed it, “Peace be with you.” “‘As the Father has sent me, so I send you.’ And when he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit.’”

Let me read this to you from my commentary. Quote, the verb “to breathe” that we just heard, the Greek word is “emphusaó.” Emphusaó, emphysema, breathing. The verb ‘to breathe,’ ‘emphusaó,’ occurs only here in the New Testament. This is the one and only time this verb appears in the New Testament. “Its usage clearly evokes the description of God breathing the breath of life into the first human in Genesis 2:7.” That’s why I read that to us earlier. “It also recalls the description of the breath of life in other parts of the Old Testament. Jesus breathing the Holy Spirit on his disciples thus is described as a new second creation.” What a wonderful phrase. A new second creation. In other words, “You are my team,” Jesus says to them. You are my team.

Here’s where the sermon title comes from this morning, and then I’m going to be done. Many years ago, and it’s important to know that this was pre-9/11, I was serving a church in suburban Chicago, and I had a lunch appointment with a parishioner. I call it breaking bread. We had no real agenda. It was minister and parishioner getting together to break bread, a good time. I took the train downtown. He worked in a high-rise office building in downtown Chicago, in the Loop. His office was on the 15th, 20th floor, I remember it was way up there. He said, “Jay, when you get here, just come into the lobby and you have to sign in and then come on up to my office. I’ll show you around and we’ll go to lunch.” I said great, and that’s what we did. So, I got there, I walked into the lobby. Again, this is pre-9/11. There probably wasn’t hardly any security at all. There was one of those classic, half-circle big desks, the kind that come up to my chin, right? Kind of a half-desk and a very, very bored security guard sitting behind the desk. And he, I remember this, he didn’t even look up at me, which was fine. I wasn’t offended. It was clear that you were supposed to sign in, they had a sign-in book, and the book had two columns. On the one column on the left it said, “Name.” Do you remember last week? When did Mary realize she wasn’t looking at the gardener and she was looking at Jesus? Anybody remember that precise moment when we recognize him? He called her by name, Mary. And I threatened last Sunday to have all of you say your name? Two columns. “Name.” In the column on the right, one word — “Representing.” Get it? You’re visiting this office building. What’s your name? Who are you representing? I knew immediately what I wanted to write down, and the reason why I remember it to this day is because I did. I wrote under “name,” Jay Groat, and under “representing” I wrote, “The Lord God Almighty.” That’s who I represent. That’s Presbyterian language, by the way. We don’t normally go around talking about the Lord God Almighty. It’s part of you that still loves it. That’s who we represent, and I wrote it down. I thought, “If somebody reads this, what are they going to do? Are they going to escort me out?” I don’t think anybody ever even read it. But that’s OK. I remember it. I remember whose team I was on, and I’m inviting you to remember with me. That’s who we represent, and Jesus breathes on us and says, “You’re on my team.” You’re on my team. I exist because of you. Amen? Amen.