Recognizing Jesus after the Resurrection

Q: In some of the resurrection stories, the disciples do not recognize Jesus. How could that be?

Q: Why didn't the disciples recognize Jesus after the resurrection?

The two questions that were submitted are almost the same. Therefore, I decided to address the two in the same post. Scripture doesn't tell us why it the disciples didn't recognize Jesus after the resurrection. Therefore, I will try to explain how I understand it. Hopefully, this will help you discern an understanding for yourself.

First, people did not expect the dead to rise again. Therefore, regardless of how much Jesus told them that "the Son of Man must be handed over to sinners, and be crucified, and on the third day rise again" (Luke 18:33, 24:7, 24:46, Mark 8:31, 9:31, 10:34) they didn't understand. They continued not to understand until they were reminded. Therefore, it's hard to recognize what we don't expect.

The way I understand resurrection is that it is "life after life after death." More Here (good article on the resurrection!) To me, this means that resurrection life is a different state of being. I would expect the appearance of the resurrected Christ to be different - and unexpected by his followers. However, regardless of how he looks (whether he looks like Jesus or not), the disciples know it is him. 

In the Gospel according to John, Mary encounters the risen Christ in the garden and thinks he is the gardener. (John 20:15) Obviously upset because she thinks that someone has stolen the body of Jesus, she must have been crying. Have you ever seen any thing clearly when you've been crying? Not expecting Jesus to have been raised from the dead, she didn't recognize Jesus until he called her by name.

Again, in the Gospel according to John, the disciples are 100 yards off the shore in a boat and the risen Christ calls out to them to cast their net on the other side. (John 21) It was day break and 100 yards would cause some confusion. We must also understand that the disciples didn't expect to see Jesus again. However, in an act of the miraculous catch of fish that was experienced before (Matt 4, Mark 1, Luke 5), they recognize that it is Jesus. Evidently the resurrected Jesus doesn't look the same, but they somehow know it's him.

I feel that we are continuously called to "look for" the risen Christ in this world. If we do, Jesus shows up in many unexpected places and at the most unexpected times. We should become sensitive to the fact that Jesus will not appear as we expect... We may see the risen Christ in the face of the stranger, the other, those extremely different from us, those who we may not like very much, those who are in need, etc... In the Rule of St. Benedict, it says, "All who present themselves are to be welcomed as Christ." (Benedict's Rule Chapter 53) I think that this rule leaves room for the fact that the risen Christ may show himself in the lives of others. We should never expect the risen Christ to look like the Jesus we would expect.