When Doubting Is What You Do

For us it is the week after Easter.
For many who are in our scriptures over the next several weeks, it is still that day. 

What we are looking at over the next few Sundays are those first moments of contact between our Savior and those who were closest to Him. He has risen. Many are bewildered. Confused. Not sure what to believe. Questioning. Everything they are feeling is natural. Jesus wants his followers to stand strong. He wants them to believe and trust. He also knows it is a process. A process that can either be fed with more doubt and fear, or be encouraged and strengthened with these blast filled moments that come inside powerful moments like the ones following His resurrection. Several of them happen the same day he rose from the grave. And, then the next few days and the next month. We have a limited amount of Sundays. If we stay the course and hope to be ready for Pentecost, then we need to accept that we only get a glimpse at what our Lord and Master was doing through this stretch. This week we will spend with Thomas, other wise known as the Doubter. Next week we on the road to Emmaus. some week we will cover multiple people and places. We will keep a steady pace right up until Pentecost. We aren't going to focus on timeline and who Jesus approached and in what order they go. We are more concerned with Jesus revealing Himself and making contact with His followers. 

What we read last week was that Mary Magdalene was in the area of he tomb when Jesus opened her eyes to who He is. She was crying. She thought it was a gardener or someone who could have moved the body. She finds Jesus instead. He sends Mary back to tell the others, but Thomas was not with the rest of the group at that moment. So, the disciple gets a special moment all to himself. And, like so many other times where something out of the ordinary happens, we have a chance to put ourselves in the shoes of someone going through a thing that maybe we could relate to in our own world. Lets see it together. 

The Twin, huh? Hmm. Whose Twin could Thomas possibly be?
There is plenty of speculation among scholars and commentators that the one referred as his Twin is post likely Peter. We don't see many moments where the rest of the twelve get notable dialogue beyond Peter, but if any get a chance - it would be Thomas. Peter had that way of blurting things out or saying what was on his mind. There are some minor moments where Thomas seems to get that same reference. 

Before the group heads to Bethany to mourn for Lazarus, we see Thomas make one of those blurting moments when he suggests that they all should get along to the village so that they might all die together. John 11 shadows whether The Twin knew exactly what he was referring. It's bod statement that could be taken spiritually or physically. Most of all is seems like a Peter kind of way of boldly saying something about following Jesus. 

The Apostle John also seems to remember Thomas fondly in the 15th chapter when they are walking to Gethsemane. Jesus is speaking about going on to be with the Father. Thomas famously blurts out a question about not knowing where Jesus is going, so how can any of them follow to where he is going. John's gospel account is full of recollection about Peter and his antics so maybe it is best to think of Thomas as a twin. There does not seem to be any animosity in the reference. All of the disciples have struggled, fainted, given up in their faith. And, here they are needing to find hope and help. Thomas' depiction here after the Resurrection is one we need to see for ourselves if we are to find our way ahead toward Pentecost. 

So, in the paragraph and section we skipped to get here, Jesus appears to all the disciples. This group most likely extends beyond the group of twelve. There were women who were a part of this larger group of disciples. At one point he sends out 70 in pairs of two. How many are there that day behind closed doors is truly not important. What is notable is that one of them is missing - Thomas. We don't know why either. Most of the time, we see all the group together. Something keeps Didymus away and Jesus takes full advantage to make a point that will stand for every generation since this time has gone by. 

It is a grand thing for these early followers who begin writing letters and exchanging their faith in a world that does not truly understand what has happened. It is quite a statement to make as John will put in the opening words of his first epistle. "That which we have touched with our hands....which we have seen with our eyes.... we beheld the glory ..." It is a foundation for our faith that we have people whose accounts are grounded in the fact that they were there when it all happened. What about those who would come next? What about the next generation? Jesus isn't sticking around so that everyone can see his hands and side. He isn't staying so that every person who wants to see Him can do so. Some are going to have to put their faith and trust in Jesus without having he blessings of actually seeing Him in person. It is the same day as his resurrections and our Lord wastes no time getting to the point of it all. One of the Twelve wasn't there to see Him as all the others and he jumps on he chance to speak the truth about what is coming next. None of us in 2025, some two thousand years after the fact, have ever seen Him. Yet we hold on to the truth that this is reality. Jesus dies on a cross, gave His life for our sins, bled and died and was placed in a tomb half way around the world and then rose from the dead.  

What about those who doubt that any of that happened? Again, it was one thing to have been there, in the day, and walk away from those events not believing. I believe Jesus handed down some "woes" to a sinful generation who had the blessings and the chance to witness it all first hand and yet still doubted and chose not to believe. Thomas isn't one of those. At least I don't see him that way. He does believe. What I see happening here in John's account I choose to read with a lens of reverse psychology. Jesus knows the heart of his disciple. He must know that Thomas just wanted to be there that day like everyone else. Jesus calls him on grounds of doubt. But, what Thomas wants is simply the blessings that everyone else had the opportunity to partake in. To see Jesus. To see his hands and side. To touch him. Hug him, most likely. Thomas blurts out in Peter like fashion that he will not believe unless he gets the same blessing that everyone else got. Still children. Arguing about who is the greatest. Asking those Why? questions all along the way. So many of us try and act all righteous and pious as we go about our day. In what ways are we still like little children struggling with simply encouragement to believe and trust? There will be generations coming that do not have the blessing to just look at Jesus' hands and side. There are those who will have to listen to the testimony of others and hear about what Jesus has done - for them. For you. But, I'm not sure what I believe. Ok. Start with what you do know. And, if you haven't given it any real thought before; start now. Always be ready to give an account of the hope that lies within you. Hope? I just thought I was supposed to sit here and let you figure all this out for us, preacher man. No, you need to have an account of your own. You need to be able to speak and share what Jesus has done for you. Just as Thomas now has a unique word he can share with everyone he comes in contact, we find ourselves in 2025 with an equally special and troubling mission. Over come your own doubts and fears. And, go share this faith you have with someone else. 

Jesus would ask us to go into all the world. 
Who's world do you need to enter this week?
Who in your circle needs to hear that God loves them?

Share love, not doubt. 

Go for it. It's a sure win. 

Blessings

Jeremy