Sermon LXVI. [CXVI. Ben.] On the words of the Gospel, Luke xxiv. 36, “He himself stood in the midst of them, and saith unto them, peace be unto you,” etc. 1. The Lord appeared to His disciples after His resurrection, as ye have heard, and saluted them, saying, “Peace be unto you.”3554 This is peace indeed, and the salutation of salvation: for the very word salutation has received its name from salvation.3555 And what can be better than that Salvation Itself should salute man? For Christ is our Salvation. He is our Salvation, who was wounded for us, and fixed by nails to the tree, and being taken down from the tree, was laid in the sepulchre. And from the sepulchre He arose, with His wounds healed, His scars kept. For this He judged expedient for His disciples, that His scars should be kept, where by the wounds of their hearts might be healed. What wounds? The wounds of unbelief. For He appeared to their eyes, exhibiting real flesh, and they thought they saw a spirit. It is no light wound, this wound of the heart. Yea, they have made a malignant heresy who have abided in this wound. But do we suppose that the disciples had not been wounded, because they were so quickly healed? Only, Beloved, suppose, if they had continued in this wound, to think that the Body which had been buried, could not rise again, but that a spirit in the image of a body, deceived the eyes of men: if they had continued in this belief, yea, rather in this unbelief, not their wounds, but their death would have had to be bewailed. 2. But what said the Lord Jesus? “Why are ye troubled, and why do thoughts ascend into your hearts?”3556 If thoughts ascend into your heart, the thoughts come from the earth. But it is good for a man, not that a thought should ascend into his heart, but that his heart should itself ascend upwards, where the Apostle would have believers place their hearts, to whom he said, “If ye be risen with Christ, mind those things which are above, where Christ is sitting at the right hand of God. Seek those things which are above, not the things which are upon the earth. For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God. When Christ your life shall appear, then shall ye also appear with Him in glory.”3557 In what glory? The glory of the resurrection. In what glory? Hear the Apostle saying of this body, “It is sown in dishonour, it shall rise in glory.”3558 This glory the Apostles were unwilling to assign to their Master, their Christ, their Lord: they did not believe that His Body could rise from the sepulchre: they thought Him to be a Spirit, though they saw His flesh, and they believed not their very eyes. Yet we believe them who preach but do not show Him. Lo, they believed 3554 Luke xxiv. 36. 3555 Salutatio a salute. 3556 Luke xxiv. 38. 3557 Col. iii. 1, etc. 3558 1 Cor. xv. 43. On the words of the Gospel, Luke xxiv. 36, ‘He himself stood in the midst of them, and saith unto them, peace be unto you,’ etc. 949 On the words of the Gospel, Luke xxiv. 36, ‘He himself stood in the midst…