Doubt-- A Sermon Delivered 7/29/12

John 20:19-31

    Today I would like to discuss the topic of doubt.  We can learn many things about this subject by observing this episode between Jesus and Doubting Thomas; but first, let’s look at the context.  Verse 19 tells us that it was the evening of the first day.  This was the Sunday on which Jesus was resurrected.  The first 18 verses of this passage describe for us Mary’s encounter with the empty tomb.  Upon finding the tomb empty, Mary immediately went and alerted Peter and John, who ran to the tomb and investigated.  Surely enough, all that was left in the tomb was the burial cloths of Jesus.  Peter and John went home without seeing Jesus at that time.  Mary, however, stayed by the tomb weeping and Jesus appeared to her. 

    Mary went and told the disciples that she had seen Jesus.  Can you imagine the joy they would have had?  Their crucified Teacher had arisen from the dead!  There had probably been some confusion over the empty tomb.  The disciples may have wondered if someone had stolen the body or something like that.  Mary’s news certainly came as a comfort. 

    That evening, the disciples assembled.  We do not know exactly why they were meeting together.  They were probably discussing the events of the previous weekend and praising God for Jesus’s resurrection.  Whatever they were doing, they were doing so under the protection of dark and inside closed doors.  The Jews had just put their Teacher and Savior to death, and would probably try to punish His followers as well.  Besides that, the Jews would probably try to blame somebody for the empty tomb, and His disciples were the obvious choice. 

    Suddenly, Jesus appeared in their midst.  Some have conjectured that this means that Jesus, in His resurrected body, was capable of phasing—that is, walking through solid objects such as walls and doors.  The passage does not indicate that, however.  It simply says that He appeared in their midst.  It does not take the time to say how he did so.  He probably walked through the door.  Walking through the door isn’t really that interesting, which is why John doesn’t take the time to explain that in great detail.  If Jesus had walked through a wall, I think John would’ve made an explicit note about that. 

    Jesus greets them with the common greeting of the Jews, “Peace be with you.”  Remember, Christ had been abandoned by His disciples on the night of his death.  Jesus was assuring them that there were no hard feelings.  

He showed them His hands and His side, which still bore the marks of His suffering on the cross.  He did this to prove two things: firstly, that He was truly the man that they had followed for the previous three years.  He was no imposter.  He was no look alike.  Secondly, He did this to prove that He was a man.  He was not a spirit, or an apparition, or a manifestation.  He was truly flesh and blood. 

    At this point we might wonder whether Jesus was then in His glorified, resurrection body.  Some have suggested that Jesus’s body was later perfected and His scars were removed, and that He maintained His wounds only longer enough to prove that it was truly Him.  People wonder this because the Orthodox Church has always believed that our resurrection bodies will be fashioned after Christ’s body, and that they will be free of flaws.  I, however, am of the opinion that Jesus, even now, has those holes in His hands and feet, and that hole in His side.  I believe that we will behold Him and see those wounds for ourselves. 

    Before Jesus left, He commissioned them and breathed upon them, thereby granting them the Holy Spirit.  He gives them a foretaste of the baptism of the Spirit that they would receive some days later.  He tells them that they would be arbiters of forgiving sins, which is a topic that could fill an entire sermon by itself. 

    In verse 26 we meet the main character of our story—Thomas.  Let’s take a few moments to acquaint ourselves with this man.  Thomas was one of the 12 Disciples of Jesus.  Most people know little or nothing about him besides the fact that he doubted Jesus’s resurrection.  There are a few other familiar passages that involve him, however, that are not so negative.  In John 14:5-6 we find this familiar conversation between Thomas and our Savior: “Thomas said to him, ‘Lord, we do not know where you are going.  How can we know the way?’  Jesus said to him, ‘I am the way, and the truth, and the life.  No one comes to the Father except through me.” 

    In John 11, we read of the story of Lazarus.  Jesus was going to travel to Bethany to raise him from the dead, but His disciples feared for His, and their, safety.  Beginning in verse 14 we read, “Then Jesus told them plainly, ‘Lazarus has died, and for your sake I am glad that I was not there, so that you may believe.  But let us go to him.’  So Thomas, called the Twin, said to his fellow disciples, ‘Let us also go, that we may die with him.’”  Thomas shows dedication, faith, and courage in this passage. 

    Very little is known about the origins of Thomas.  He was known as Thomas and as Didymus.  It was very common for Jews in the first century to have a Greek name and an Aramaic name, Aramaic having replaced Hebrew as their national language a few centuries before.  Both John 11 and John 20 state that Thomas was also called the Twin.  That is a strange choice of a translation, however.  You see, both Thomas and Didymus are proper names, meaning the Twin, Thomas being the Greek rendering and Didymus being the Aramaic.  It is assumed that Thomas was a twin, though we are never actually told that he was, nor are we informed as to who his twin might be.  We do know that Thomas died a martyr’s death on December 21^st, 72 A.D.  He was thrust through by a spear, just as His Savior had been.  He was probably the only apostle to travel outside of the Roman Empire, having established a church in India.  In a few minutes, I will tell you why I think that is significant.

    Well, for some reason or another, Thomas was not there with the rest of the disciples.  When Jesus was arrested, the disciples had been scattered.  For some reason, Thomas had not met back up with his fellow disciples.  Perhaps he feared the Jews too greatly.  Perhaps he was simply distraught at losing His master.  Whatever the cause, this teaches us that we can miss a lot when we aren’t with our Christian brethren.  Christian fellowship is a major theme in the New Testament.  It is a necessary part of the Christian life.  When we forsake the assembling of ourselves together, we lose touch of the body of Christ.  Refusing to be around your Christian brethren would be like your eye shunning your hand.  It’s silly.  It’s petty.  It’s dangerous.  I’m not just talking about going to church.  There are way too many people who never miss a Sunday at church and yet have never really experienced the communion of the saints.  Fellowshipping with your Christian brethren ought to be a lifestyle. 

    The disciples wasted no time informing him of their Savior’s resurrection, but to their surprise, instead leaping for joy, Thomas refused to believe them.  Now, in the Old Testament, it only took two or three witness to substantiate any story, yet Thomas refused to believe ten of his closest companions.  He did not doubt their sincerity.  He knew that they had nothing to gain from tricking him.  What he doubted was their credibility.  They were not worthy of his belief.  He could not rest his decision to believe on their witness. 

    I think this tells us a lot about Thomas and about human nature as well.  Thomas refused to believe that Jesus had been resurrected from the dead because he believed that that was impossible.  The concept of Jesus coming back to life didn’t fit into Thomas’s worldview, and so he rejected it.  Because he couldn’t understand it, because he couldn’t wrap his head around it, he rejected it. 

    We commonly do the same thing.  We put God into our own little box.  We define Him by human standards.  We only trust Him when He follows the rules of logic as we understand them.  We only rest in His will when we understand the reasons for what He is doing.  That is not faith, however.  That is just concurring about a good idea.  We as Christians are called to a life of faith, and that means following God even when we don’t understand what’s going on—even when we can’t fathom where God is taking us or how He’s going to get us there.  Faith is trusting that God is infinite and that we are finite and that His ways are immeasurably superior to our own.

    Too often when we are called to faith—an implicit approval of God’s actions—we allow doubt to creep in.  We just know that something is impossible, and so we just know that God could never do it.  We begin to doubt whether God can change a heart or heal a body.  We begin to wonder if God can really take away a loved one’s cancer in a moment or resolve our business issues overnight.  Many times God doesn’t answer prayer that dramatically, and so deep down we begin to define for ourselves what is possible and what is not possible, and we impose those limitations on God.  Let me tell you something: God is so much greater than we can even begin to understand.  We can’t even begin to understand the doctrine of the Trinity—the basic nature of our God.  How can we begin to place Him in our own, human boundaries?  This is exactly what Thomas did.

    Thomas made himself the only standard of truth.  Sure, Jesus’s other ten disciples had all told him that Jesus was alive, but that didn’t mean anything until he verified it with his own two eyes.  He insisted that he would not believe that Jesus has been raised until he looked upon Jesus with his own eyes.  Not only must he see Jesus, but he must also touch Jesus.  He must utilize all his senses before he is sure.  How foolish!  Thomas had no excuse.  First of all, Thomas, along with the rest of the disciples, had been told by Jesus time after time that He would die and be raised again after three days.  Thomas should have been remembered Jesus’s words and rejoiced to hear them fulfilled!  Secondly, Thomas should have believed the other ten disciples.  Jesus had established the Disciples as the foundation of the Church, but apparently that didn’t mean that they were trustworthy.  No, he must witness this for himself.

    Verse 26 says that the disciples were gathered together again, Thomas included, 8 days later.  In the Hebrew mind, eight days later was what we would call one week later.  So, the disciples gathered together again on the first day of the week.  One would presume that they were probably in each other’s company more often than once a week, but Sunday seems to be the day that Jesus dignified with His presence.  We see this day established throughout the New Testament as the day of commemoration of the resurrection of Jesus Christ.  Thomas made sure that he was with them this time so that he could verify their reports with his own eyes and hands.  Can you imagine the type of week he had?  Imagine yourself in college.  Imagine that you have a professor who is very dear to you and to whom you have drawn very close.  No, imagine that he died, but your fellow students are telling you that he is alive again.  Can you imagine the confusion, the excitement, and the anxiety that you would go through while you waited to confirm the reports?  Well, Thomas was causing himself needless strain, as Jesus subsequently told him.

    This time, the doors were closed, and yet Jesus came in.  The ESV says that the doors were locked, but the same word can simply mean closed, as many other translations render it.  I think that this indicates that the disciples were shut up for fear of the Jews, rather than implying that Jesus made a habit of ignoring doors.  Once again, it does not say that Jesus walked through a wall or through a closed door, although that is possible.  After walking with two of His disciples on the road to Emmaus, Jesus stopped at a house with them.  After He had broken bread, He vanished.  Speculation is dangerous, so I’ll leave it at that.

    Jesus walked in and greeted them just as He had done a week before.  “Peace be with you,” he says.  Immediately, He turned to Thomas and invited him to see and touch the holes that had been left in His body.  He called Thomas to believe what he had previously doubted.  Now, let me clarify two things.  Firstly, doubt is sin.  We are called to child-like faith in our Heavenly Father.  We are called to brotherly trust in Jesus Christ.  We are sinning when we do not fully commit ourselves to God.  The first and greatest commandment is that we love God with our heart, soul, mind, and strength.  If we give our hearts to God but hold back our minds, or visa versa, we are holding back from God that which He deserves and owns. 

    Secondly, doubt is not the unforgiveable sin.  Doubting God leads to doubting one’s salvation.  Weak faith is just that—faith.  It is weak, but it is truly faith.  Jesus did not storm in and reprimand Thomas for his disbelief.  He came to him gently and showed him His wounds.  He offered Himself to Thomas as proof so that he might believe.  What a gentle Savior we have!  What a generous Father we have!  We have been given and are continually given many signs from the hand of God.  We have been given a magnificent world that shows forth the power and beauty of our God.  We have been given the seasons as a reminder of the faithfulness of God.  Praise God that He continues to reveal Himself to us, despite our doubt and disobedience!

    Our response to doubt must be the same as Thomas’s.  He says, “My Lord and my God!”  It does not say that Thomas took Jesus’s invitation to touch His scars.  Immediately upon seeing Jesus, he responded in faith.  We have here a clear confirmation of the deity of Jesus.  What kind of Teacher would Jesus have been if He was not God and yet allowed His disciples to call Him that?  The fact that Jesus silently accepted Thomas’s worship is a clear affirmation that He deserved such worship.  Jesus did not earn this deity, as some cults suggest.  No, the first chapter of John makes it very clear that Jesus, the Word, was God from the beginning. 

    Thomas acknowledged not only that He was God, but that He was also the Lord, or Master.  He had been granted the Kingdom.  He had been given authority over all things in Heaven and on Earth, and accordingly, deserved obedience and submission.  There are many who claim to respect the teachings of Jesus.  They claim to be followers of His lifestyle and morality, but they do not believe that He is their Master, that is, they do not believe that He has a claim over their lives as a King.  Jesus said, “If you love me, keep my commandments.”  Jesus is no mere teacher.  He is a sovereign ruler and He demands your obedience.  You cannot have Him as a Savior or Teacher if you will not have Him as your Lord. 

    In verse 29 Jesus responds, “Have you believed because you have seen me?  Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.”  The New Testament is clear on how Jesus felt about people who would only believe after their standards of verification were met.  In Matthew 16:1, the Pharisees and Sadducees come to Jesus and ask him for a sign from Heaven.  They wanted Him to prove, to their satisfaction, who He really was.  Now, they had witnessed His miracles, so they had ample proof of His divine origin and mission, but hey had blasphemed the Holy Spirit by ascribing His handiwork to the Devil.  In verse 4, Jesus responds, “An evil and adulterous generation seeks for a sign, but no sign will be given to it except the sign of Jonah.”  In Luke 4:12, Jesus, quoting Deuteronomy, says, “You shall not put the Lord your God to the test.”  God does not have to prove anything to us.  He deserves our respect and belief just by virtue of being God.  A righteous and faithful generation believes despite what seems like a lack of evidence.  Even in seasons of darkness and trouble, true children of God confide in Him. 

    I’d like to spend a few minutes discussing that last phrase of verse 29: “Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.”  In the immediate context, Jesus was probably referring to the other ten disciples, who had believed the report of Mary Magdalene without requiring visual confirmation.  Their faith was more pure, uninhibited, and without reserve than Thomas’s.  Even though they had failed to recall Jesus’s own prophecies regarding His death and resurrection, they believed that He was alive when Mary told them. 

    I think this phrase has a much wider meaning, however.  As I said before, Thomas wound up many years later in India.  He was the only Apostle to venture out of the Roman Empire.  Now, Jesus was a very famous person.  Many people had witnessed His miracles and many had spread the news far and wide throughout the Roman Empire.  Thomas, however, took the Gospel to those who had probably never heard of Him at all.  The possibility that the people of India had ever seen Jesus was very, very minute.  I think Thomas took this phrase to heart and took the Gospel to those who would have to believe without ever seeing.

    You and I are such people.  We believe in someone that we have never physically seen.  We have never audibly heard the words of Jesus Christ.  Certainly we have witnessed the power of the Spirit in our lives and in the world, but we have not actually seen the holes in Jesus’s hands and the wound in his side.  Jesus tells us that our faith is more blessed than that of Thomas.  Thomas swore that he would never believe until he saw Jesus with his own eyes.  Good thing Thomas lived in the days of Jesus.  Thankfully, he was able to see and believe.  I’m afraid there are many today who are similarly skeptical.  They want God to prove Himself to them.  They want God to prove to their satisfaction that He is real.  I tell you, friends, if you’re waiting for Jesus to come and show you the holes in His hands, then you’re going to die in your sin.  When you finally see Jesus, He will be your Judge and not your Savior.

    I think that there is another relevant application we can draw from this verse.  There is an epidemic in our country that is ravaging the Church.  It’s called adolescence—that period in a young adult’s life when he tries out all that the world has to offer.  Young people are not only allowed, but actually encouraged in many instances, to sow their wild oats.  Their parents make excuses for them and their pastors fail to shepherd them and watch for their souls.  Many times, Christian youth end up leaving the church for a period of time until they figure out that the world has nothing that can satisfy their urges.  Sometimes they never come back.  Teenagers especially insist on learning everything the hard way.  They refuse to accept their parents’ word for it.  They must see what the world is like for themselves. 

    Well, I think we know what Jesus would say.  “Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.”  I think it is a great blessing to be ignorant of how life is outside of the communion of God’s covenant.  Now what I’m not talking about is sheltering kids from everything.  I’m not suggesting that children should be locked in their rooms until they’re thirty.  What I am suggesting to you, what I’m pleading for from the young people of this church, is that you believe without seeing.  Don’t tempt God.  Trust the word of those who have ventured away from God and found the world to be an empty, shallow mistress.  Don’t be one of those people who plan on getting “right with God” after you’ve had your fun.  Sin, even forgiven sin, has consequences.  Sin causes pain and estrangement, not only for you, but also for those whom you trample as you dabble in lawlessness. Don’t find out for yourself how unsatisfying the world is!

    In the final two verses of our passage, John explains why it is that he had included these specific stories from the life of Christ.  There were many other miracles that Christ had done, not only in the three years before His death, but more specifically after His resurrection.  Why is it that these were the only ones included?  So that we might believe, and that believing, we might have life.  Why are we given this strange story about Thomas?  So that we might believe without seeing.  The purpose of John’s entire Gospel was so that we might have a trustworthy account of the life of Christ so that we might believe on Christ and live. 

    John says something very similar in 1 John 1:1-4.  He says, “That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon and have touched with our hands, concerning the word of life—the life was made manifest, and we have seen it, and testify to it and proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and was made manifest to us—that which we have seen and heard we proclaim also to you, so that you too may have fellowship with us; and indeed our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ.  And we are writing these things so that our joy may be complete.”  John is asking us to trust him.  He is asking us to take his word for it.  John heard Jesus’s teaching.  He saw Him dead and alive once again.  He touched our Savior’s resurrected body.  He did all these things so that we might believe, even though we’ve never had these experiences.  Had the news of Jesus’s life, death, and resurrection been lost in ancient history, we would have been condemned to a life of hopeless ignorance.  Jesus, however, commissioned His disciples as witnesses of the Resurrection to spread the hope of eternal life.  John, for one, made sure that he faithfully fulfilled his commission.  We must believe his testimony.  We must embrace the Savior whom he sets forth.  We must take hold of the life offered in the person and work of Jesus Christ. 

    We must not be like Thomas.  Ten of his closest companions, the very men whom Jesus called to be witnesses of the resurrection, all confirmed the same news, and yet he would not believe.  He stubbornly refused to look outside of himself for confirmation.  We do not have this luxury, my friends.  If we reject the witness of the Apostles, we will do so to the peril of our souls. 

    In conclusion, I’d like to share a few thoughts about doubt and what to do about it.  Firstly, as I said before, having doubts does not mean that you are not a Christian.  It does mean that you need to mature spiritually, but then again, we all need to do that.  Secondly, I think that doubt is both a tool of God and a weapon of Satan.  Certainly doubt is a weapon in Satan’s arsenal.  He seeks every day to sully the name of Christ and to weaken the foundations of our faith.  He has utilized science in this endeavor, but he has also used liberal Christian scholarship. 

    I believe, however, that God also uses doubt.  He uses it to humble us by showing us our weakness.  He works through our doubt to bring us crawling back to Him.  The question is, when you have doubts, what are you going to do about it?  Are you going to let them continually eat away at your faith?  Or, by overcoming them, are you going to strengthen your faith in Christ and your resolve to serve Him? 

    I offer to you three ways to react to doubt.  I have three m’s.  Firstly, meet with the Lord in prayer.  You’ll notice that that is my first suggestion for just about everything.  Take your doubts to God.  Be honest about it with Him.  He already knows your heart.  He knows your thoughts.  Give them up to Him.  Ask Him to strengthen your faith.  Ask for forgiveness for doubting Him.  Meditate on His character and love and ask Him to move in your life freshly every day. 

    Secondly, meditate on the ways that He has revealed Himself to you before.  Read the Bible.  Read of His faithfulness to the great saints of Scripture and throughout Church history.  Think about the ways that He has revealed Himself to you in the beauty and the power of nature, as well as in the providences of your own life.  Don’t tempt Him.  Don’t ask Him for a sing; think of all the signs He has already given you.

    Thirdly and finally, maintain Christian fellowship, especially among those who are seasoned veterans in the army of God.  Older saints have many war stories they can tell you from their own experiences.  They can tell of God’s faithfulness and communing presence.  Share your doubts with them.  Maybe they’ve been there.  Maybe they’ll have just the words you need to remove your doubts and replace them with joyful, peaceful faith.