April 15, 2009 + “Faith from Doubt” (John 20: 19-31) + Hayward Fong

The Gospels document four people at the foot of the cross when Jesus was crucified. Were you there with the four?

His mother, who had carried him in her womb; nursed him through infancy; watched him playing as a child; worried when he wandered away in Jerusalem at the age of twelve and discovered him learning from the elders in the temple; watched him learning the trade as a carpenter; worried but proud of what he did as an itinerant teacher in his brief adult years; and now this, with heavy heart, watching her son, her flesh and blood hanging on the cross. Were you there?

Mary, his mother’s sister, the wife of Clopus, and mother of James which would make her his Aunt Mary. Then there was Mary Magdalene, a one time prostitute, from whom Jesus cast out the seven demons, a follower who experienced a genuine conversion and whose life would never the same again after she met him. Finally, there was the disciple “whom Jesus loved,” generally acknowledged to be John, the writer of the Fourth Gospel. Were you there?

Where were the other ten disciples? Where had they scattered when Jesus was arrested? Where were the others whose lives Jesus had touched in his brief years of teaching and healing? There must have been hundreds if not thousands. Where were they? The Gospels only name these four. Were you there?

When Jesus appeared to Mary Magdalene at the empty tomb on that first Easter morn, she was instructed to tell his disciples to go to Galilee and he would meet them there. Now the Gospels differ on the details of who all were there but suffice to say the message was delivered.
Our reading this morning finds the disciples closeted behind closed doors that evening in what was probably the same room where they had observed the Passover with the Lord the preceding week. They had good reason to barricade the doors for the Jews were searching for these followers of Jesus. Since Galilee is some distance to the north of Jerusalem, the details in the Gospels don’t add up, but don’t let it interfere with the substance of the message which deals with doubt and faith.

Thomas, has in seems like forever, had the title of “Doubting Thomas.” Sermons have been preached all over the globe criticizing Thomas for doubting that Jesus had risen from the dead.

I think his reaction was a normal human reaction. After all, on Easter, according to the different Gospels, the women came early to the tomb to find the stone rolled back and Jesus gone. They were told to tell the disciples that Jesus was risen, yet they were not believed. Poor Mary Magdalene, according to John, believed that his body had been stolen, and in her grief she mistook Jesus for the gardener. It wasn’t until he spoke to her that she realized he was alive.

The point is, doubting is a very human failing. One would think after all the time spent seeing miracle after miracle, including the raising of Lazarus, that the disciples would accept something as wonderful and amazing as resurrection. Unfortunately, it is very human to want to crawl back to normalcy. We tend to explain away anything out of the ordinary, especially if it makes us feel uncomfortable. After Jesus was crucified, the disciples were despondent. They hid, because having followed what the rest of the Jews termed a “false Messiah,” they were in danger themselves. As Jesus said, “Strike the shepherd and the sheep will scatter.” One thing that stands out about Thomas is the level of his need for proof. He wants to make sure the appearance of Jesus to the others is not an apparition of a ghost. He insists he must feel the nail holes and the wound in the side. No ghost would be substantial enough to provide him with this kind of proof.

For the sake of Thomas, Jesus appears a week after everyone else has seen and believed, and urges him to feel the nail holes, the wound in His side, and believe. He remarks that there will be those who believe without concrete evidence. I don’t think this is a rebuke. It was a comment on the faith of those who would follow. I think Jesus acted from love for Thomas, who had been so decimated by his death that he could not accept the miracle of his resurrection without proof.

If faced with this kind of situation today, how many of us would be even as trusting as Thomas? I have heard persons claiming to be Christian, but unable to believe in miracles. These people do their best to explain away every little detail of the writing in the New Testament to fit their pet theories of modern thought. While I agree with Bible scholars who say that some of the Bible we have today is allegory, not historical fact, I cannot help but accept that miracles do happen.

This is not to say I think we should believe everything we hear. I believe in having an open mind but not so open that my brain falls out. A little healthy skepticism keeps us from joining cults and giving all our life savings away to false messiahs. We need discernment. The disciples either truly saw miracles, believed they saw miracles, or were liars. If they believed they saw miracles and were wrong, or were liars, upon what is our Christianity based? If we are to call ourselves Christians, does this, or does it not mean that we follow Jesus and believe in his teachings? If we believe Jesus, then should we not also believe in miracles, since they occur in every Gospel? If the disciples were misled, or were liars, then our faith is indeed on very shaky ground.

If the writers of the four Gospels and all the epistles were liars, why were they willing to die in order to foster their beliefs? The disciples would have been the first to disappear to a safe place, and stay there, had their stories been lies. What person in his or her right mind makes up a lie and then marches forth to die for it?

God knows we are fallible creatures. We cannot turn belief on like a faucet. It would be so much easier if we could simply decide we were going to believe something and then do it. Wasn’t there a character in Through the Looking Glass who claimed to believe something impossible each day before breakfast, as if it was a desired quality?

None of the disciples believed Jesus when he told them he was going to be crucified in the first place, even when he told them plainly without parables. Peter even at one point told Jesus “Heaven forbid” he would die, and received a rebuke for it. None of the disciples were brave fearless warriors come to rescue Jesus from his fate. They weren’t meant to be. They were all afraid. They all hid after he was crucified.

This contrast is also what makes the miracle of Pentecost so spectacular when it happens. These unpromising frightened doubting disciples in a few weeks-only fifty days after Easter-will be completely transformed by the power of the Holy Spirit. They will go out and completely change the world.

When Jesus breathes on them and says, “Receive the Holy Spirit,” he gives them their great commission. The whole reason they have been called to be apostles is about to come to fruition. From the time Jesus called them they have been educated and groomed for their real mission: To proclaim to the world the good news of the death and resurrection of Jesus the Messiah, and the salvation of those who follow Him.