Transcription
Good morning. It's good to be in the house of the Lord. Amen. Right, turn with me in your Bibles to the Book of John. We're going to be in John 20 this morning, as we learn about our friend Thomas.
So, as we're going through this series on the 12 disciples, we have now reached Thomas. Thomas gets a bit of a bad rap for his famed nickname—they know him as Doubting Thomas—because of the scene we're going to read here this morning. And I feel like it's a bit of an unfair nickname to give him, for his entire life to be known from this story. I mean, he had three and a half years of ministry with Jesus where he was actually pretty faithful. You see, in John 11:16, he actually said, "Hey, let's go follow him, even to death." He was a man of faith, but he is well known for this interaction. So what happens is this: this is after Easter morning. He has been crucified; he has been risen; and they begin seeing the appearances of Jesus to the women at the tomb and to various Apostles. And we're going to read the story of when Thomas encounters him. So turn with me to John 20:24 through 28.
But Thomas, called Twin, one of the 12, was not with them when Jesus came. So the other disciples were telling him, "We have seen the Lord." But he said to them, "If I don't see the mark of the nails in his hands and put my fingers into the marks of the nails and put my hand into his side, I will never believe." A week later, his disciples were in doors again, and Thomas was with them. And even though the doors were locked, Jesus came and stood among them and said, "Peace be with you." And then he said to Thomas, "Put your finger here. Look at my hands. Reach out your hand and put it into my side. Don't be faithless, but believe." Thomas responded to him, "My Lord and my God!" And Jesus said, "Because you have seen me, you have believed; but blessed are those who have not seen and yet believe."
So, like I said, Thomas—we don't know much about him. There is some—you know, he's nicknamed the Twin. So, even though we don't have a Biblical answer to that nickname, there's some church history and tradition that says he had a twin. And there's some different variations of that, but we don't really see much of Thomas until this story, and that kind of is his defining story for what we know him for.
And as we've gone through all of these Apostles over the last few weeks, we've kind of learned a small trait from their encounters, their life as modern-day disciples, how we can live after God, how we can be disciples today as they were the first disciples today. But before you can become a disciple, before you can become a Believer—you were not a Believer. There was a moment where there was faith, but before then, there was doubt, and there was question, and then you didn't know. And even though everyone gives Thomas a hard time—it's the Sunday school answer—"Oh, doubting Thomas, how could he doubt?"—and yet, at some point, we were all doubters. At some point, every one of us, before we knew Christ, we did not know Christ.
So, as we see this morning, as we're going to dive into the text, we're going to see not only in ourselves when we went through that journey, but how other people we know who don't know Christ—you know, we are going to see them become a disciple; how that happens; how do they get pulled from doubting Thomas to believing Thomas? So here we're going to take this text apart. So verses 24-25, it says this: "Now Thomas, one of the 12, called the Twin, was not with them when Jesus came." So what happened before this story? Just verses before, Jesus appears to the other Apostles. They are all there in the same room, and Jesus has this appearance to them. Here, I'll read this in John 20:19-23: "When the evening of the first day of the week, the disciples were gathered together with the doors locked, because they were feared the Jews. Jesus came and stood among them and he said, 'Peace be with you.' And having said this, he showed them his hands and his side. So the disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord."
So, at this point in the Good—the Holy Week—story, Jesus has already been resurrected. We've seen him at the tomb with Mary Magdalene and the other women; they've encountered the resurrected Jesus. We've seen the disciples on the road to Emmaus; they've encountered the resurrected Jesus. And now here—we—we've even seen John and Peter rush to the empty tomb and found the discarded grave clothes of the Risen Jesus. So they've already begun to see signs that Jesus is alive: the tomb is empty; it's stirring the city, like there's already been appearances to some of his disciples; and there's been the stories among them from the women and from these other disciples, like, "Hey, we've seen the resurrected Jesus." But as of yet, the 12 have not seen him.
So here, though—even though I love this—even though the doors were locked, he appears to them. I love that. We'll get more into that a little later. But Jesus appears to the 12—at this point, it's really the 10, because Judas is gone, and Thomas is not with them—and he appears to them, and it says that he showed them his hands and his side. He showed them, and they rejoiced. Now they immediately tell Thomas when Thomas comes back into their gathering. And the question there is going to be, as we dive in a little later, where was Thomas? But they tell him this story, and Thomas has his response: "Unless I put my hands in the mark of the nails and my hand in his side, I will never believe."
So there were two very different things here. First, when Jesus appeared to the other Apostles, they never asked, but Jesus showed them the marks of his hands and the wounds of his side. They never asked, but he showed them. But for Thomas to believe, he said, "I need to put my hands in the wounds in his hands and feel the wound in his side." They were shown that; he said, "For me to believe, I have to touch." They—Thomas was looking for an experience over evidence. It's like I said, he's had the women at the—at the tomb's testimony, and these are people who've been with Jesus and the disciples for years. You know, I know we don't give them as much Biblical recognition, but they were amongst Jesus's disciples more so faithfully than the 12. They went to the cross with him; they went to the empty tomb. He has those testimonies; he has the testimony of Peter and John, who ran to the empty tomb themselves and saw that it was empty. They have the testimony of these two disciples who went on the road to Emmaus and saw the resurrected Lord. They have all—he has all of this evidence, and now he has his brothers, the other Apostles, saying, "We just saw our Lord; he showed us his hands and his side; he was right here; we saw him." And his answer was still, "Unless I put my hands in the wounds and in his side, I will never believe."
Even though there was all this evidence, there were firsthand accounts from people who were respected and known and knew the Lord, and there was definitely—they weren't lying to Thomas, like, "Hey, you know, it would be really funny when Thomas leaves to the grocery store, I'll tell them that we saw the resurrected Lord; he'll be great." That's not what happened. He knew these people; he trusted their testimony; and yet he couldn't believe until he put his hands in the wounds themselves. He didn't want their evidence, their reasoning, their testimony; he wanted his own experience. And that is something that, for many people, is what it's going to take for them to go from doubt to faith.
Over the past few weeks, we've talked about the disciples; we've seen—you know, one of my—one of my preferred expressions was, "Come and see." You know, we've seen Andrew and Philip and Nathaniel, and all of these people have the story begin where they said, "Come and see." They brought them to the evidence; they brought them to Jesus; and they—they shared the—"Hey, the prophets and Moses and all of this is being testified here; he is—come and see"—and they came, and they believed. And for some people we know, and for some of us, that's what it took to spark that—that faith, that relationship with God. We came to the word; we—we sat under Gospel teaching; we had a conversation with a Bible-believing friend or family member; and—and we came, and we saw, and we heard, and we believed in God. And for some people, that's how the seed is planted. But for some other people, the door is locked, and there's a heart of hearts, and there's—"I will never believe unless I can see, unless I can touch it."
We talked a couple of weeks ago about the testimony of a man named Lee Strobel, a man who was an avid atheist. He said his wife came to know the Lord, and he was a reporter, and he said, "I will disprove Christianity; I will prove it is false; I will prove it as a fake; and I will never believe in Jesus." And he became now an avid Christian and Advent apolog—because he came and he saw; he put his hands in the side of Jesus; he came and he—he went face to face with the evidence, and he—he—he did what Thomas needed to do. And for some people we know, and for some of us, maybe that's our story: God had to encounter us in a very dramatic and personal way. We had to see and experience something that just the "come and see" wouldn't do for us. There is rocky soil; there are hard hearts. Now, for some of us who know the Lord and want to share our faith and plant those seeds, that becomes hugely discouraging. Say, "I want to see people come to know the Lord; I want people to come to know him," but we have no say over how the seed grows. At one point, it says—"in First Corinthians 3:6—I plant"—this is Paul talking—"I planted, Apish water, but God gave the growth." Jesus tells a story about a sower, someone who plants seeds, and there's all different kinds of ground the seeds land on: some was rocky soil; some was the path, and it was swooped up and eaten by birds; rocky soil, it grew, but it had no roots, and it died; fell on thorny soil, it grew, but it was choked out and had no fruit; and then some landed on good soil. And there's no condemnation to the sower in that parable; nowhere in Jesus said, "How dare that foolish—sower scatter his seeds and—and not see all of it grow? How woe to him!" None of that happens in the parable, because we are called to plant seeds; we're called to water them, but we have no say in, no control of how they grow. Only God is in control of that.
When we see Jesus encounter Thomas in the scene, we never see him say, "How dare you not believe? You—so you needed to come and put your hands in my side? Woe to you, Thomas!" We don't see that. He doesn't condemn his doubt; he shows him his wounds inside; said, "Come and touch them; believe." Jesus understands doubt, because doubt is what is the beginning of your relationship with God. Like I said, we all at some point didn't believe; at some point, some of us were all—we were all unbelievers; we were all doubting Thomases until we—we can't start a faith journey if we don't first sit in doubt. We were all in that place; it's just human nature; that's our lost nature. So Thomas wanted that ex—that ev—that experience over their evidence and their testimony. In Matthew—sorry—so this is—this is comparing the first scene we see the apostles meet Jesus, and we see Thomas meet Jesus. But now we have to ask the question: where was Thomas? He was not in the room with the other apostles; he was gone somewhere. We do not know where. And that could be a frustrating thing: "Hey, tell—where were you when Jesus came? Where were you when we encountered him, and we knew he was alive and he was risen? Where were you, Thomas?" And we don't know where. We don't know if he was still in hiding from Jesus's arrest; we don't know if he was just out simply going and buying groceries or something as simple and mundane as that. We don't know. But when it comes to this conversation of us seeing people go from doubt to faith, there is that frustrating reality of where are they, because they feel so far away; they're distant and unreachable; you can't—you can't—you can't get to them. In Matthew 18:12, it says, "If a man had 100 sheep and one wanders away, will he not leave the 99 to look for the one?" You and I have no control of how people are lost; how far they have wandered from God. We, like I said, we have no say in how the plant grows; we have no say that people are lost, but Christ loves lost people. Christ would leave the 99 to search for the one. We talked about that a lot last week about Elroy, the God who sees me. We are not just a God who generically—he loves; he's a God who personally loves us and will hunt us down and pursue us and rescue us. You were not here by mistake; you were not here because you happened to be in Sunday school that day; you happened to go to that Bible Crusade; you happened to make friends with that Christian. Christ pursued you; you were the one he was searching for. Even though Thomas isn't here, Jesus comes to find him; he searches for him; he doesn't abandon him and say, "Well, he wasn't in the room; I guess he missed the boat." He leaves the 99 to find the one. And at some point, you and I were all the one. And that friend, that coworker, that daughter, that niece, that nephew—you're like, "They're so lost; I just—I would pray they come to know Christ; I pray they would go from unbelief to belief; from—from darkness to light. I—I'm praying, but just—I don't see it; they're lost." Christ finds lost things; he finds the one and leaves the 99. Even though Thomas wasn't in the room, Christ would find him; and that person that you're praying for—you too—he found you, and you'll find them too. And our job is to plant the seeds; our job is to pray; our job is to tell them about the Risen Lord and come and see; our job is to do that. He is the one who finds. So even though Thomas wasn't there, he finds him. And then he says this—when they told him that they saw the Lord, he said, "Unless I put my hands in his side, fingers in the marks of the nails, I will never believe." Like I said, there's the people who think we will never believe that their hearts are—are stoned and so far from God and that we had never ever reach through them. But there's this con—there's this conversation in wonder where it's like, "Why doesn't God just show up and do something miraculous? Why doesn't God just do signs, do miracles, do wonders? Why—if—if there's a God, why doesn't he just show up and do something amazing, and everyone will believe in him, right?" Let's read the Bible, and time after time after time after time, we will see people encounter the miracles and wonders of God and still harden their hearts and still not believe or still doubt and struggle. Thomas, for three and a half years, walked with Jesus; he saw dead men come back to life; he saw lepers healed; he saw miracles and wonders; he saw Jesus walk on water. I imagine that's not something you quickly forget, but yet he still said, "I would never believe unless I put my hands in his sight." Thomas encountered the wonders, and yet still that couldn't break through his heart until Christ came personally to him. So some of us fr—are frustrated; even atheists and agnostics will say to our face, "Hey, if God's real, why doesn't he just show up?" Because that wouldn't change your hard heart. God has done that time and time again, and people still doubt and still turn away and will still say that's not real; that's not God. He did it with the Israelites when he—he got them out of Egypt, parted the sea, fed the manna, had a tower of cloud and a tower of fire, and the second Moses walked away—"Where's the God that saved us from Egypt? Let's build a golden calf." People can see wonders and still have nothing to do with their relationship and their faithful God. For faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God. Wonders are not going to solve the problem. You wonder why Thomas needed that experience and why didn't he just—why did he have—why did he not believe? He saw all of that stuff because people's hardens hearts—God has to work on them differently. Miracles aren't just going to be the answer, all evangelism tool, because time and time again people still will find any reason not to believe in God.
So this is where we see Thomas here in—those verses 24 and 25. He—look at 26 and 27 as he encounters Jesus. He says—a week later, his disciples were indoors again. It's a week later. A week later. So often times we wonder, "God, what is taking so long?" I believe I—a story—I don't remember if it was in church or Sunday school about a man who had friends who did not know the Lord, and he prayed for them for years to come to know the Lord. One took about a year; another, five years; another, 10 years. And then he had one other friend who—he told him, "I will never believe in your Jesus, no matter how much you pray, no matter how much you share with me, I'm never going to believe," for 40 years. And that man came to know Christ on his friend's deathbed, at his funeral. For so many of us, we wonder, "Why is it taking so long, God? Why was it a week before you showed up to Thomas? Why didn't you just turn right back around? It's like, 'Oh, hold on, I do head count: one, two, three—oh, Thomas isn't here; I'll wait for Thomas.'" Why did it take so long? Why does it take so long for your friends and your family, for yourself? Sometimes you wonder, "God, what are you doing? You forgot us; you ignored us; you—I must not be that important." And yet the promise of the word of God says, "God is not slow to fulfill his promise." Our perception of what in his time is—is what is off. If we watch the—if you ever watch the Christian television program called The Chosen, there's this ongoing joke through the entirety of the TV show about the word "soon," because it is the most open to interpretation word in the Bible. "Soon" could be tomorrow; "soon" could be 2,000 years from now. "Soon." So they have this whole running joke through the show, like, "I'll see you soon," and they just giggle, because you just—it's so open to interpretation, because God's time is just—he doesn't play by our schedule. But there's some frustrations and struggles of God: "I've been praying for my spouse; I've been praying for my coworker; I just keep hitting against a wall; the ground is so hard; I'm planting seeds; I'm praying, God, why aren't you moving? What's taking so long?" But God is never slow to fulfill his promise. And since he has never lied to us up to this point and never will, we need to continue to have faith that he won't break his promise here for you, that person you're praying for, that person you're pursuing and sharing the word of God with.
So eight days, he then goes on and says his disciples were indoors again, and Thomas with wisdom, and even though the doors were locked—I love that—the door is locked, and yet Jesus walks in the midst of them. Like I said earlier, only God can cause the growth. Sometimes we're walking against stone hearts, closed doors; we're knocking; we're sowing; we're trying, and it's just busting against stone. And yet Christ walks through locked doors and encounters people where they are at. At some point, you and I were all hard-hearted; we were all lost; we were all heading towards death in destruction; and yet Christ walked through our barricades and our borders and our boundaries, every shield we put up to keep him out. And at some point, he encountered us, and he found us. Locked doors don't keep Christ out. When he's ready, he comes in; he prepares that heart; he prepares that person. But none of those door—the locked door can't keep them out. In Isaiah 43:16, it says, "The Lord—you make a way where there was no way," referring to the Red Sea. He makes a way where there was no way. When we look at an impossible task, we say, "That person will never come to know Christ; I can't do this thing you're asking me to do, God; I'm in a circumstance where it's impossible." And over and over and over again, the promises of the word of God is—"He makes a way where there was no way." It says in—in Luke 1:37—"With God, nothing will be impossible." That locked door, that stone-hearted heart, that—that thing that looks impossible—God—it is possible with God. He makes a way where there was no way. There's a reason why God's in the miracle business, because the thing that's impossible with man is just possible with God.
So even though Thomas was far from him, even though the door was locked, here he is. And even though that person you're praying for, or even maybe it was you, so far from God, had every defense lined up against you—say, "I will never believe in your Jesus; I'm glad that religion works for you, but that's a crutch; it's not for me; it's foolishness"—and yet at some point God encountered you, and maybe that'll be for you, for your—your nephews, your—your sisters, your brothers, your coworkers, that person who you're like, "This door just won't open." God walks through locked doors; he makes a way where there was no way. And what's amazing to this whole story is that Jesus knew where Thomas was, and Jesus knew he didn't believe. We don't see Jesus on the streets of Jerusalem saying, "Hey, has anyone seen my disciples? I'm just trying to look for him; have—I'm—I'm trying to have a—a coffee with one who missed me at the last meeting." He knew where Thomas was, and he—right there—he says, as he enters into the room, he says, "Don't be faithless, but believe." He doesn't go and say, "Hey, Thomas, how you doing? I—I missed you last time; what do you mean you don't believe? Well, here, put your hands here." He doesn't have any of that conversation; he instantly walks up to Thomas and has this—he knew he didn't believe; he knew where he was, and he found him. We don't have to hope God figures out the solution or the situation of the person; he knows where that person is and how to find them. He doesn't have to do a manhunt; he doesn't have to get directions; he knows where they are, and he meets them where they're at; he walks through those locked doors, and he encounters them where they are; he leaves the 99 to find the one. That is amazing, incredible.
We go on, and then we're still in 26 through 27, these verses, and like I said, Jesus never—Jesus knew his doubt. In Psalm 139, if you want to hold your finger where we're at—I didn't write this one down because I figured it was so worth reading together—on Psalm 139, verses 1 through 10, we read this: "Lord, you've searched me and known me; you know me when I sit down and when I stand up; you understand my thoughts from afar away; you observe my travels and my rest; you aware of all my ways before a word is on my tongue, you knew all about it. Lord, you have encircled me; you have placed your hand on me. This wondrous knowledge—knowledge is beyond me; it is lofty; I am unable to reach it. Where can I go to escape your spirit? Where can I go to flee from your presence? If I go to heaven, you are there; if I make my bed and shol, you are there; if I fly on the wings of the dawn and settle down on the western horizon, even there your hand will lead me, and your right hand will hold on to me." God knows it; God knows you; he knows where to find you. You couldn't reach to heaven or down to the depths of hell, and you could never escape the love of God. He finds you; he knows where you are; he knows where those people are, and he will encounter them; he will find them; he will leave the 99 to find the one.
Verses 28 through 29, as we're wrapping up this text, back my—my spot, we see Jesus—we see—Thomas's reaction to Jesus as he talks to him, and this is what he says—when he said—he never condemned; he never condemned Thomas for his doubt. We see Jesus encounter people with doubt all the time throughout the scriptures, and never do we see a condemnation; never do we see the text, "Woe to you for your unbelief." We'll see, "Oh, you have little faith; why did you—did you say—did you not know I must be in my Father's house?" We'll see those interactions, but never do we see him condemn people for their doubt, even though he encounters—it so much—for doubt is the base of our separation from God and so forth; we must be—so by faith is the cure. You look all the way back to the Garden of Eden, and that's where sin entered the playing field, because Satan laid seeds of doubt that God was holding back something good from you, that God lied to you, that—"Why shouldn't you eat from the tree? Why?" And that was the beginning of the separation from man and God was the seeds of doubt. So to have a faith walk, you start in doubt, and it's birth in faith. Faith is the cure for doubt. But so Jesus never condemns that; he understands that; he encounters people there where he is. We look at all the stories throughout the scripture of people who doubt: Abraham and Sarah; he was told, "Hey, a promise is coming," and he doubted. You know, after decades of not having an answer fulfilled, there's some doubt leaking in, so he tries to make an answer for God's solution—God's promise—and that goes horribly around. We even see John the Baptist doubt—someone who literally knew Jesus in the womb—and yet he sends to his disciples in prison, he's like, "Should I be looking for someone else?" Even John the Baptist doubted. We don't see Jesus condemn the doubt; he encounters it, and he engages it, because he comes to doubting people and brings them to faith walks. He—he ends this section when he talks to Thomas where he says—"Please said, 'Because you have seen me, you have believed; but blessed are those who have not seen and yet believe.'" Hebrews 11:1 says, "Faith is the substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things not seen." In 2 Corinthians 5:7, it says, "For we walk by faith and not by sight." Our relationship with God is birthed in faith, out of doubt. We're not going to always be able to see. We sit here in a room 2,000 years later, worshipping the Living God, and yet not a one of us has met him in person. If you have, we'll have to have a side conversation and probably some other things, but not a one of us has walked hand in hand physically with Jesus, and yet we know so much that he is alive, that he walks with us, that he is alive in us. And that was born in faith; that was the cure for doubt; that is—
How we live in him is through faith. Thomas says, "My Lord and my God." What started in personal experience? He was looking, he said, "Unless I touch him with my hands, unless I put my finger in the marks of his hands." It ends with a personal relationship: "My Lord, my God." For Thomas, it was personal. Like I said last week, our God is a personal God. And here was Thomas, in his whole doubt and all of his struggle, wanting to say, "I, I, I need to encounter him myself. I need to experience him." And this story ends with Thomas saying, "My Lord and my God." And notice how never once in this story do we see Thomas walk over and touch his hands and touch his side. But he encounters him, and he says, "My Lord and my God." When he came to know Christ, he knew him wholly. He didn't still have to put him on the measuring block and say, "Well, you look like Jesus, but let's just make sure. Let's do the litmus test." No, none of that. He encounters him. Jesus met him where he was. He walks through those locked doors. He says, "My Lord and my God."
At some point, every single one of us was a doubting Thomas, and come to a place where he is now, "My Lord and my God." And for those people, you know, who don't know, who are still in their doubting Thomas season, he's going to walk through locked doors. He will answer in his time, but he will find them, and they will say, "My Lord and my God." Thomas teaches us that before we can walk by faith, we start in doubt. But God doesn't leave us there. He will find us and encounter us and bring us back to life. Let's pray.
Heaven our Father, I just thank you for who you are, that you encounter us, that you find us, Lord, that you don't leave us in our doubt, but you bring us the faith in you, that you would be our Lord and our God. Lord, I just pray for those who we know who are still in their doubting Thomas season, that you would find them where they are, walk through locked doors and encounter their hearts, bring them from doubt to faith. Let us be a part of that. Let us tell them, "Come and see." Let us plant the seeds, Lord, but ultimately remind us that you are in control and you are not slow to fulfill your promise. Thank you, Lord, that you found us, that you took us out of our doubting Thomas season and brought us to faith, to know you, to call you our Lord and our God, as in your Son's precious and holy name I pray. Amen. Amen.