Faith in Boots

Second Sunday of Easter. April 12, 2026. DeSoto and Freeman Lutheran Churches, Ferryville and DeSoto, Wisconsin.

The Gospel is John 20:19-31. The disciples are behind locked doors on Easter evening. The tomb is empty. The news has been spoken out loud. They are still afraid. Thomas was not even there.

This sermon draws on what was already happening in two small Mississippi River communities: volunteers at the Genoa National Fish Hatchery repairing mussel cages ten days before Easter, a birding workshop at the village hall on a Saturday morning, Friends of Pool Nine preparing for the annual river cleanup, and the fire department running a meat bundle raffle to fund their own equipment because the county budget does not cover it. Nobody was waiting for certainty before they showed up.

Thomas did not get a lecture. Jesus came back for him. Through locked doors. With the wounds still showing.

The river is open. The birds are back on Pool Nine. Easter happened and you are still here.

SHOW NOTES

Marc My Words | Season 2, Episode 3 April 12, 2026 | Second Sunday of Easter | Year A DeSoto and Freeman Lutheran Churches | Ferryville and DeSoto, Wisconsin

Presiding: Marc Bulandr Reader: Jennifer Bulandr

Scripture First Reading: Acts 2:14a, 22-32 Psalm 16 Second Reading: 1 Peter 1:3-9 Gospel: John 20:19-31

Sermon "Faith in Boots" | Marc Bulandr | 11:44

Hymns from Worship Gathering Song: I Know My Redeemer Lives (ELW 619) https://youtu.be/Cl4lKtBuF6E?si=jIVXo8gi3b65RQaJ

Hymn of the Day: O Sons and Daughters, Let Us Sing (ELW 386) https://youtu.be/Y5GCvaJGH3A?si=A-9waI7RSIpI6wqa

Closing Hymn: Beautiful Savior (ELW 838) https://youtu.be/XxMaMOrEKRU?si=fxD5Ka8BTumncZ4R

Note on worship music: DeSoto and Freeman do not have an organist or accompanist. Marc donated a large-screen television and built a curated YouTube playlist so the music could live in these services. The congregation sings along. That is the whole system.

Community referenced in the sermon Genoa National Fish Hatchery volunteer work, ten days before Easter, mussel cage repairs Ferryville birding workshop, Saturday morning, village hall Friends of Pool Nine annual river cleanup, Lansing VFW Ferryville Fire Department meat bundle raffle, self-funded equipment Congregants volunteering at area hospitals weekly April is National Volunteer Month. In this community, that is just a Tuesday.

About Marc My Words Marc My Words is the podcast of Marc Bulandr, lay worship leader and SAM candidacy candidate in the La Crosse Area Synod (ELCA), and founder of Qualitative Intelligence Systems. Weekend episodes are grounded in Scripture and drawn from active congregational ministry at two small Mississippi River churches in the Driftless region of Wisconsin.

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Transcript

Grace and peace to you. As I prepared for this week's sermon, this morning, I heard the following: God does not abandon his people in the dark. He reveals, leads, and stays with them there.

Something has changed since we were last together. It's April now. You can feel it on the drive. The air is different. The light is different. The river is open. The backwaters are filling out. If you stopped at the bank this week and looked out over Pool Nine, you would have seen the Eagles working the current. The birds are back. Spring is not coming anymore. Spring is here.

Five weeks ago, we talked about thaw-season faith, about standing in a bare field and trusting that something was going to grow, about the Mississippi never stopping being a river even when it's frozen. We said God's covenant keeps moving beneath the surface even when you cannot see it.

Well, look around. Something has happened between then and now. Easter happened.

And yet, this morning's Gospel finds the disciples in a locked room. It's Easter evening. The tomb is empty. Mary Magdalene has already told them that she saw the Lord. The news has been spoken out loud. And the disciples are behind locked doors, afraid. Good news did not automatically move them out of fear. They had heard the most important thing that had ever happened, and they were still holding everything close. Still unsure. Still waiting to see what it all meant.

And Thomas was not even there. We do not know where he was. What we know is that when the others told him, he did not believe them. And we know exactly what he said: Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands and put my finger in the mark of the nails and put my hand in his side, I will not believe.

Now, that is not a man without faith. That is a man being honest. That is the same Thomas who said earlier, when Jesus said he was going back to Judea, where people had tried to stone him, let us also go, that we may die with him. He was not a coward. He was not looking for reasons to walk away. He was the one willing to go when it was the most dangerous.

He was not in that room, and he was not willing to believe secondhand something this large. That is not faithlessness. That is integrity. Thomas was not walking away. He was refusing to close the book on a story God had not finished writing. This moment is not the whole story. He just needed to see the next page.

Think about what has been happening in this community. On Holy Thursday, ten days ago, volunteers were out at the Genoa National Fish Hatchery repairing mussel cages, getting the river ready for the new season. Not waiting for Easter to be confirmed. Doing the work before the outcome is guaranteed.

Yesterday morning, people gathered at the village hall right here in Ferryville for a birding workshop to learn what is alive and what is returning on this river. Next Saturday, Friends of Pool Nine will be out for the annual cleanup, meeting at the Lansing VFW at 8 AM, picking up what winter left behind.

And the fire department is out selling raffle tickets to keep their own equipment running, because the county budget does not cover it. You cover it yourself. You show up at Swett Swing Inn and you run a meat bundle raffle, and you make it work.

Congregants from these churches volunteer at hospitals every week because that is who you are. April is National Volunteer Month. In this community, that is not a designation. That is just a Tuesday.

Nobody here is waiting for conditions to be perfect before they act. Nobody is waiting for certainty before they show up. This is just how the community operates.

That is what faith looks like when it puts on its boots.

And then there's the river itself. Pool Nine is alive right now. The Eagles are back on the sandbars. The current is doing what the current does. Volunteers were out ten days ago repairing what winter damaged, getting ready for a season they could not yet see but trusted was coming.

We said five weeks ago that the Mississippi never stops being a river, even when frozen, even when the surface looks still. It keeps going underneath, through every season.

Now you can see it.

That is what covenant looks like when it surfaces.

In the Gospel this morning, Jesus comes to the disciples through the locked doors and says, Peace be with you. And he shows them his hands and his side. Then the disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord.

But Thomas was not there. And a week later, Jesus comes back. Same room. Door shut again. And this time Thomas is there. And Jesus goes straight to him.

Put your finger here. See my hands. Reach out your hand and put it in my side. Do not doubt, but believe.

No lecture. No speech about how he should have trusted the others. No rebuke for being absent the first time. Just: here I am. I came back for you.

Notice something about the risen Christ in this story. He still has the wounds. The resurrection did not erase what happened on Friday. The risen Lord still carries the marks of what it cost. And he shows them, not to prove something, not to shame someone, but because those wounds are part of who he is now.

The risen Christ is not a polished, untroubled version of Jesus. He is the same one who came through something the world thought was the end. And he says, Peace be with you. Because he comes through locked doors with wounds still showing.

You are free to put on boots without having to prove anything.

Peter stands up in Jerusalem and tells the crowd what they had witnessed. David foresaw it. God had sworn an oath. The holy one would not be abandoned to death. This Jesus, God raised up. We are witnesses.

And then Peter says something that belongs in this room this morning. Although you have not seen him, you love him. Although you do not see him now, you believe in him and rejoice with an indescribable and glorious joy.

That is not a description of incomplete faith waiting to become real someday. That is a description of faith already present in this room. The faith that sends people out to repair mussel cages ten days before Easter. The faith that fills folding chairs at a birding workshop on a Saturday morning. The faith that has kept these doors open season after season, without a settled pastor, without the numbers you once had, and without the certainty of what comes next.

You have not seen him, and you love him anyway. That is what is happening here this morning.

And if you are the one who was not at the hatchery or the hall or the raffle, if your boots this week were dishes, bills, a doctor's ride, getting out of bed, that is the same faith. This word is for you too.

And then Jesus says the thing that belongs to every person in this building. Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.

That is a beatitude. Jesus did not say it as a consolation prize. He said it as a declaration. The people who trust on the basis of testimony, of Scripture, of a community that has kept showing up generation after generation, those are the blessed ones. Those are the ones he had in mind.

That is you. Not tolerated. Not almost faithful enough. Not on probation until your questions get resolved. Blessed.

The God who came back for Thomas comes back for this congregation. Through locked doors. Through hard winters and uncertain springs. Through markets that do not cooperate and demographics that do not trend the right direction. And Sundays without a settled pastor. He comes through shut doors. He comes back for the ones who missed it. He comes bearing the marks of what it cost. And he says the same thing he always says.

Peace be with you.

The river is open. The birds are back on Pool Nine. Easter happened, and you are still here.

That is not an accident. That is not coincidence. Jesus called it blessed.

And so we trust. Amen.