I wonder if that was a chorus that was sung as the early church met in worship on that Sunday evening after Easter when Jesus appeared. You know there was one apostle who was missing that night, wasn't there? That was Thomas. He missed the gathering, and had he been there, he likely would have avoided a week of inner pain and doubt, as well as 2,000 years of being known as Doubting Thomas. Sometimes it doesn't pay to miss a service, and that was the case with Thomas.
In fact, I think very frankly we can say that missing a service may result in a loss that all of us would regret. In Hebrews 10 we are exhorted with these words, Let us consider how to stimulate one another to love and good deeds, not forsaking our own assembling together, as is the habit of some. Those are good words of reminder for all of us. Whatever our practice may be, that we not get into a habit that some have of forsaking the assembling of God's people together.
I believe it's important to make gathering for worship as the church gathers, whether it be morning or night, that we make that a priority. That we determine it to be a commitment for ourselves and for our homes to be gathered with the Lord's people as the Lord's people gather for worship. What I'm going to say I want to say gently, but I want to say it also firmly.
If parents allow their children to determine their regularity or their schedule of attendance at church, they destroy something that is very priceless. And that is an example of faithfulness. It is very easy in the culture in which we live today to excuse ourselves from being faithful. But in doing that we are doing more than just missing church once in a while. We are saying to our children, don't worry about consistency. What parents do shapes the values and the priorities of their children.
When we consider the irregularity of so many it seems in this day, and I speak not only of our own congregation, but generally, when we consider the irregularity of attendance, I wonder just what the level of commitment will be in the next generation. Because the tendency is for each succeeding generation to be less committed than the preceding one.
And so when we see the pattern as it is today, I wonder 20 years, 40 years from now, just what the pattern is going to be among those people who profess to be gods. Jesus chose to appear at a gathering of his people. And where two or three are gathered together, there he is in the midst of them. Whether he appears physically or not. The text that we have read this morning from John chapter 20 deals with another gathering of the disciples.
The Sunday after Easter, just a week later, Jesus chose to appear again in that gathering of his disciples. This time it would seem just for the sake of Thomas. Thomas was not a bad person. He was not a poor apostle. Indeed, as we read about him in the Gospel of John, and John is the only one that gives us very much about this man, we see some fine qualities in his life.
Thomas, who was also called Didymus, which means a twin, so whether he had a twin brother who was one of the apostles as some people think, or a twin brother or twin sister, otherwise we're not sure. But Thomas, who was also called twin, was a man of great loyalty to the Lord Jesus Christ. In fact, he testified that he was willing to die with Jesus. He was a man who was devoted to the person of this one with whom he had walked these years. Thomas was also a man willing to speak out.
He was rather outspoken, perhaps coming behind Peter in that natural trait, but nonetheless one of the apostles who was unafraid to speak out when he felt it was right to do. But then we also learned that he was a man of some pessimism. He was uncertain about the future. On one occasion he said, if Jesus is going to go back to Jerusalem where they're waiting to kill him, then let's all go back with him and all die. Now he was willing to die, but he expected to die.
Rather pessimistic in his outlook. He struggled with believing when he had no tangible proof to support his weak faith. Now Thomas had had the promise of Jesus himself that he would be raised from the dead. Furthermore, he had the witness of Jesus' power to raise others, for he was present, for example, when Lazarus was raised. And thirdly, Thomas had the testimony of ten other men whom he loved and trusted, the other apostles. And they kept on saying to him, the Lord has risen.
Thomas we saw him. He appeared in our midst. He was here. He has risen. And steadfastly, Thomas refused to believe. He could not find within himself the faith to accept the resurrection as a fact. Perhaps he had etched on his mind one solitary scene. That was a cross on which hung the beaten, bloodied, and still body of his Lord.
The Lord that he had followed, and so powerful was that scene in his mind, so shocked were his sensitivities by the events of recent days that he had been unable to join the others that Easter Eve, overcome with grief, unable to reconcile what had happened to the life-giving Christ. Therefore he stayed at home, or he hid somewhere else. Perhaps he wept by himself. You know, there are some people who grieve with others. There are some who can only express their grief by themselves.
Maybe that was the way Thomas was. And therefore he did not gather with the other apostles on that first Easter Eve. And now eight days have transpired. Another Sunday has rolled around. Another first day of the week. And though he has repeatedly heard the witness that Jesus was raised from the dead, he doubted. What I learned from this text is this, that weak faith can never serve Christ with blessing. That's putting it negatively. Weak faith can never serve Christ with blessing.
Doubt must be answered and replaced with mature faith if we would know the blessing of God. There are four observations drawn from Thomas' experience, which I think will encourage those of us who struggle, as he did, with faithlessness or with doubt. The first observation that I see in our text is this, that doubt is not an uncommon problem. You see, Thomas was not alone as the doubter. As a matter of fact, all of the disciples struggled with doubt. None of them was a shining example of faith.
Isn't that right? Look back in Luke chapter 24, where Luke reminds us of their attitudes. A number of the women had seen Jesus and were telling the apostles these things. In verse 11 of Luke 24, and these words appeared to them as nonsense and they would not believe them. So dear people, when we talk about doubting Thomas, let's remember to talk about doubting Peter, and doubting James, and doubting John, and doubting Matthew, and doubting all the rest of them, and doubting you, and doubting me.
Because you see, doubt is not an uncommon problem. The struggle with doubt was not limited to those early disciples. Every generation has faced doubt as an enemy of the spiritual life. The roots of doubt go all the way back to the Garden of Eden, when Satan said to Eve, has God said and created in her mind doubt regarding the trustworthiness of God? Doubt might be defined as uncertainty, as hesitation, or mistrust. Doubt is unsettledness of mind and heart. James pictures it this way.
The one who doubts is like the surf of the sea, driven and tossed by the wind. I am talking to some today who are just like that. There is doubt within your soul and the result of it is that your life is driven and tossed. Back and forth you go because of doubt in your mind. Doubt itself is not necessarily fatal, but it is progressive. I would compare it to pneumonia. If you get a healthy dose of antibiotics, it can be licked, but if you don't, it may eventually kill you.
If left unconfronted, doubt will eventually suck the very life out of your soul. Doubt begins with a question mark. The question mark then grows into a doubt, which if not checked will develop into unbelief, which finally leads one to despair. Doubt is the progression. Doubt is but one step of that. There are some within my hearing at this moment who are doubting the existence of God and doubting even the very story of the resurrection of Christ that we have been looking at for a few weeks.
There are others who are doubting the trustworthiness of God because you have experienced some disappointment in your life. Perhaps you have taken a step of what you thought was faith and obedience, and the result of that has been calamity in your life, not blessing. And the very thing that you thought was going to bring blessing from God has instead brought to you deep disappointment and hurt, and you're doubting, can God be trusted?
A friend of mine was the director of one of the historic Bible conferences in the United States, and it was just going downhill year by year. They had to infuse new life, new excitement, he felt, into that ministry. And so he sought God's direction, I'm sure, and tried to put together some events that would draw people to the grounds and which would get them enthused about being there and being a part of this conference and helping to support it.
One of his ideas was to bring in an illusionist entertainer, or some people call him a magician. And he did a number of tricks which impressed the crowd, and they all enjoyed it. They were having fun on that day. And the final trick that he had, he would lock himself into handcuffs and have chains put about him, and then he would allow himself to be dumped into a body of water. And within a few seconds, poof, he would appear at the surface of the lake free.
And so on that afternoon, they put the handcuffs on him, they chained him, took him out in a rowboat into the lake at the conference grounds and dumped him overboard. And seconds went by, and then a minute was gone, and he still hadn't appeared. And so they dove in, only to find that he had swallowed the key he had hidden in his mouth and drowned. What do you do when you try something that you believe God wants you to do and the end result of it is disaster?
One thing you may do is doubt the trustworthiness of God. Then there are some that may doubt God's purposes. Why? Why, God? I have poured myself into this job. I have given my employer the very best of my life, and now here I am closing in on retirement years and I'm laid off. God, why is this happening to me? There may be someone who is doubting the justice of God. I spoke recently with a young lady who has been in her life the victim of abuse.
She has become a Christian, but one of the things she struggles with is that the one or ones who have abused her might become Christians and should be forgiven. She said it's easy for them. All they do is confess it and accept Jesus, and their guilt is gone. But she said, I deal with it every day of my life. She says, does Christianity offer any justice for the victim? I thought that was a pretty good question, an honest one anyway.
In the heart of it was that she was doubting the justice of God. Doubt is not as uncommon as we sometimes think. All of us, from time to time, struggle with doubt. How do we handle it? In the first place, I think that we must not be afraid to admit it, that we are doubting, that there is a question mark that has grown larger and not smaller in our lives. Secondly, we must not be slow to address it.
Because if it's not addressed rather quickly, it can lead on to unbelief and despair, and that can bring ruin. And finally, we must not be embarrassed to drop it, to drop our doubts. There are some people who are, because of intellectual pride or because of peer pressure, unable to release their doubts.
Even though they have satisfactory answers, which have convinced them, in one side of their minds, on the other side of their minds they hang on to the doubt, afraid to let go of it or embarrassed to let go of it. For if they did, then what would others think? So I would exhort you, don't be embarrassed to drop it. Drop the doubt once you have it answered. Doubt is not uncommon, but I notice also that doubt does not deter the Lord's love and faithfulness. Jesus came to the room that evening.
His first words, like the week before, were, Peace, Shalom, be with you. And then immediately, so the text seems to read, he turned toward Thomas, and he read Thomas the riot act. Is that what it says? He reached out and got a hold of Thomas by the scruff of the neck, and he said, Listen, fella. Is that what it says? No. I want you to notice the love of our Lord for Thomas. I want you to notice the gentleness. I want you to see the faithfulness that Jesus has toward the doubter.
He came to Thomas, but he did not attack him, nor did he shame him, but he gently erased the doubt. That reminds me of 2 Timothy 2.13 that says, If we are faithless, he remains faithful, for he cannot deny himself. God is faithful. That is his nature. He will always be faithful, even when you and I doubt. He is faithful. Jesus was patient with Thomas the doubter, and he is still patient today with the one who doubts.
The wounded, the weak, and the weary are special objects of our Lord's concern and care. He faithfully and lovingly meets his own at the point of their need and their weakness. Why did Jesus appear to Thomas? Well, I believe in the first place he knew the potential within Thomas for a dynamic witness. And church tradition says that Thomas went on to another continent as the apostle Thomas, and there was responsible for the establishment of the church in that continent of Southeast Asia.
Jesus knew the potential in that man, and I want you to know if you are a doubter here today, Jesus loves you. He is patient with you, and he desires to come to you faithfully because he knows the potential in your life too. He does not want doubt to destroy that. But I think also Jesus was desirous of keeping all the sheep which had been given to him by his father. Not one of them would he allow to stray too far away, and so he sought out that sheep, in this case Thomas, that was straying.
Just as our Lord is out searching today for some sheep, and as a tender loving shepherd is calling you back to the place of faith and obedience, though now you are straying into doubt. Doubt is not uncommon, nor does doubt deter the Lord's love and faithfulness. But a third observation I would make is that doubt finds its answer in trustworthy evidence. This is evidence that God makes clear in his own time and in his own way. In Thomas' case, he had to wait a week.
Have you ever wondered why Jesus didn't go to wherever Thomas was on that Easter evening and appear to him? Jesus made Thomas wait a week because there was something about that wait, there was something about that struggle within Thomas during those days that was important. I don't know what it was, but Jesus had a reason for waiting those eight days. But when the time was right and his purpose was ripe, he appeared.
You may wonder why it is that you have been in doubt, or you have lived with this question mark as long as you have. Well, it may be that you've missed the evidence somewhere along the way, or it may be that God's time for that evidence just hasn't come yet. But there is a time when he comes with that evidence that you need. In Thomas' case, the evidence involved a repetition of Thomas' own words to him.
Notice what Jesus says in verse 27, and compare that to what Thomas himself had said in verse 25 a week earlier. Jesus simply repeated to Thomas basically what Thomas himself had said, showing that he had been present when Thomas made that statement. He knew what Thomas had said, though he was invisible to Thomas' eyes. There was some evidence for Thomas. He recognized those words. They had a, shall we say, a certain ring to them.
And then Christ came in a supernatural manner, just appeared in their midst, the doors being shut. That was evidence. But the greatest evidence was the wound, or the wounds in Christ's body, wounds that were tangible and substantive, wounds that were visible. The language here suggests that those wounds were not scarred over, but they were open wounds and remain so. The body of Jesus does not depend upon blood, as our bodies do.
Consequently, it technically would be feasible that his body could have open wounds and the existence of that supernatural body not at all be endangered. Indeed, he said to Thomas, here, reach here your finger. See my hands. Reach here. Your hand. Put it into my side. He actually exposed the wound in his side and invited Thomas to stick his hand into that spear wound. Jesus was touchable. This was convincing. Whether he actually touched Jesus, the text does not say. My guess is that he did not.
He simply exclaimed, my Lord and my God. The honest skeptic can find evidence to answer his doubts. The preeminent evidence, the one that God gives us above all others, is this written declaration of his, propositional statements of truth, the Word of God. This is evidence for us. This has become the resting place for our faith, the written and the living Word of God.
Evidence will not always be visible or material or miraculous, as was the case of Thomas, but the Lord will always provide convincing evidence to the sincere skeptic. There are many who are insincere skeptics, who do not believe because they will not to believe. They don't need more proof. They need a new will that's willing to believe the proof they have. But the honest skeptic, of which Thomas appears to be one, will respond to the convincing proof that God gives to answer the doubts.
I don't know what kind of proof you may need to answer the doubts within you, but I know who can give that evidence. Are you looking for it? The final observation I want to make is the doubt that is answered matures faith. Merrill Tenney wrote regarding Thomas' experience, quote, faith comes to maturity and changes the entire direction of an individual life, close quote. We have here in these verses the climax of the Gospel of John.
When Thomas cries out, my Lord and my God, and Jesus responds to him in verse 29, because you have seen me, have you believed? Blessed are they who did not see and yet believed. That is the pinnacle, that is the mountaintop of the Gospel of John. Thomas' reply was one of wonder and delight. He was overcome with the realization that this was indeed the one whom he loved. His reply is further one of repentance and change.
He had come to that room with a heart filled with doubt and skepticism, but he would leave differently, dynamically, because his doubts were answered. His words were ones of confession. Jesus is called deity, and notice that he does not rebuke Thomas, rather he accepts these words. He says, my Lord, my God, a belief in the deity of Jesus Christ, my friend, is essential for salvation. One cannot be saved and doubt that. And finally, these words were ones of worship.
These are words that reflect the word spoken by the hosts of heaven, who perpetually and continuously speak of the deity and the glory and the majesty and the honor of God, my Lord and my God. The doubt that is answered matures faith. Doubt is not necessarily the enemy of faith, for doubt that is honestly answered actually causes faith to increase. The natural doubter is the more credible witness when he's convinced. He is suspicious. He is critical by nature.
But when convinced to believe, he is all the more believable and convincing. And his worship of the truth that he has discovered is much deeper, even more constraining. I want you to notice that the words that Thomas used on this occasion go far beyond any of the words of his colleagues when they saw the resurrected Christ. This man struggled with doubt longer and deeper than any of them.
But in the end, when his doubt was answered, his faith seems to have been stronger, his understanding deeper, his devotion more keen. As he said to the resurrected Christ, my Lord and my God. Then Jesus mildly rebukes him in the question that is asked in verse 29. And following that gives a beatitude, a blessing. It is a blessing to all who come to faith in him without the aid of physical manifestations. You and I are not deprived because Jesus does not appear physically to us today.
Indeed, because he does not appear in that way, we have the greater blessing, the one that he speaks here. Those who do not see and yet who believed. And everyone who has believed since that apostolic generation in the first century share in this beatitude of our Lord. More blessed are those, indeed, who believe him, whose faith is firmly fixed in him and who have not seen him than those who have had the physical manifestations. Weak faith will never serve Christ with blessing.
The doubter, the one with small faith, puts God into a box and demands that God prove himself by doing certain things. In Thomas' case it was, unless I can put my fingers in the holes of his hands and my hand into his side, I will not believe. He put God into a box. And still today when you and I doubt God, often what we are doing is making him small. We're putting him into a box.
We're saying, God, if you're real, God, if this is you, God, if this is your blessing, then this is the way it must be. That is small faith. Mature faith agrees in advance with whatever God does, trusting God's way, trusting God's time, making no demands upon God, but yielding and surrendering to him. God wants your faith and mine to mature. God does not condemn your doubts, but God does confront them. God confronts your doubts with circumstances.
He confronts your doubts with personalities that he puts in your way. He confronts your doubts with problems that expose the doubts and the faithlessness that question God as God in your life. God confronts the doubts that you struggle with. He does that so that you might bring to him your questions, your doubts, that you might look honestly at the evidence that he provides, that you might believe that and your faith might mature through your doubt being answered.
Some of you who are doubting today, who are questioning God, who are wondering about God, will you come on bended knee before Jesus Christ on this morning and say to him, Lord, I give to you my doubts. And you provide the evidence, you provide the answer in your way and in your time. I make no demands. You are my Lord and my God. Without seeing and without touching, without having the tangible proof, I bring my doubts and my questions and I lay them at your feet.
And I declare you Lord and God for my life. Will you pray with me? Our heads bowed and our eyes closed. Dear doubter, beloved questioner of God, do you understand his patience? Your doubts do not threaten God, nor do your doubts deter him from loving you and faithfully seeking you to come back to that place of full confidence in him and also full obedience. And this morning he has put his arm around some of you who have strayed in doubt. He has confronted some of you who have questioned him.
Can you sense within your heart being drawn to declare him Lord and God of your life? Will you tell him that right now? Before we close in prayer, will you at this moment tell him again your doubts and questions and declare that you are trusting him without demands on what he should do for you? Weak faith can never serve God with blessing. Doubt must be answered and faith must mature if we would know the blessing of God in this life.
Father, there are many of us here, indeed if we are honest, all of us, who from time to time in our lives have struggled with doubt. And many of us can testify that you have been faithful in those times to eventually bring us back. Some need to make that step this morning of coming back. I pray that you will embrace them, that they might sense the warmth and the tenderness of your heart for them.
I pray that they will be able to lay at your feet the questions that are unanswered, the doubts with which they struggle, and simply cry out with Thomas, my Lord, my God. In Jesus' name, amen.