Welcome again to Harbor West. Great to see all of you guys and worship with you. My name is Justin. I'm one of the pastors here of our church, and we're going to continue worshiping Jesus by opening the Bible, studying God's word to us, and we're going to look to believe it together and live it out together. And so if you have a Bible, you can grab it now, and we're going to turn to John chapter 20.
And so if you're using one of those Bibles under the chairs in front of you, John chapter 20 is on page 963 in those Bibles. So man, to me, college was such an interesting time because in college, in my college years, I felt like I was using my brain for such incredible things. Like I was taking these really difficult exams. I was writing 30-page papers. Like I was doing all this really difficult stuff with my brain.
But I felt like it was kind of a brain that wasn't fully developed and ready to be an adult and make good decisions yet also. And this kind of exhibited itself one day my junior year. I was in the dorm room, and me and some of my buddies were, I was a Bible major, and so me and some of my buddies were studying Greek and Hebrew and diagramming verses and doing all this translation work.
And I had a roommate named Brian who was an early education degree major, and he was over in his cubicle cutting out bananas for a bulletin board. And so I remember looking over at Brian, like, just, hey, dude, how are those bananas coming as we're doing our Greek? We used to give him such a hard time. And then my first job out of college was to teach fifth grade at an elementary school. And I remember a couple months into it, I was sitting in my apartment cutting out bananas.
And I called Brian and I was like, I am so sorry. Like I repented in dust and ashes because no degree can prep you for 22 eyes looking up at you, 22 fifth graders looking at you saying, I dare you to teach me how to add fractions. Like there's no degree that can do that for you. But Brian was my roommate and he was early education. And one thing we bonded on was that we both liked football. and so he had a football and so he used to throw the football around this tiny dorm room and so I
used to play football. I was a quarterback for several years growing up and so I was really good at short passes. My teams would call a lot of slants and little button hooks and little short things. Anything within eight yards, I'm money. Anything over eight yards, hot garbage. Like I just can't throw far but if it's quick and short, I'm great. I'm super accurate and so Brian figured this out. He was like, dude, you're super accurate. And I was like, yeah, I got this as long as we stay
in the dorm room. And so he used to like pick things out of the room and say, hit that, hit that, hit that. And so we had these marks all over our room. Well, one day he was super convinced, I guess. And so he took an Arizona green tea thing and stood over by the door about from here to this wall and put it on his head. And he's like, I believe, do it. And that's where that brain kicked in. It's not ready to be an adult yet, you know? And I was like, yeah, I could do this. So I grabbed the ball.
I mean, it wasn't a lob. It wasn't a toss. I mean, I got into it. I planted the back foot and I threw it hard. And I nailed it. I nailed it. I didn't touch Brian's head at all. It knocked the can off and he turned around and ran at me and we hugged and jumped. And it was like we'd won the Super Bowl. It was the greatest thing. And so the legend started to spread. And so Brian started to tell people and like, man, you got to see Justin throw a football.
And there was one day where a bunch of people were in the room several weeks later. And Brian was like telling the story again. Justin was sitting there and I was over here. And one of the guys, our buddy Jeff was like, okay, dude, I'm sick of this story. I believe you. I believe. And Brian reached under his chair and pulled out an Arizona green tea can and said, okay, here you go. Put it on your head. And Jeff grabbed it and was like, no, I'm good. Like I don't, I don't.
And Brian was like, then you don't believe. And it taught me this really good lesson. We can say that we believe things. We can even be convinced in ourselves that we believe certain things. But when confronted with actually putting ourselves in the situation and owning it for ourselves, maybe we sometimes balk and sit back and say, oh, wait, I don't know. And it kind of shows that we can even say we believe and still live with some doubt.
And that's the story we're going to kind of be looking at here in the life of Jesus. We're going to look at a story after he rose from the dead, after many people have seen him. but some of his closest friends still have a lot of doubts, and one guy specifically doubts a lot. And so we're going to look at how Jesus overcomes those doubts and transforms doubt into deep faith. So let's pray and get into John 20. God, we know you are the God who works miracles.
And so we pray that you would work miracles this morning, that you would work miracles here in our church of overcoming some doubts that we've been wrestling through, maybe overcoming doubts that we've lived with for years about who you are and how you work and if you love us. And so we pray to you, the miracle-working God, that you would show up and work those miracles powerfully through your word today. In Jesus' name, amen.
Okay, John 20, verse 19. When it was evening on the first day of the week, the disciples were gathered together with the doors locked because they feared the Jews. Jesus came, stood among them, and said to them, Peace be with you. Having said this, he showed them his hands and his side. So the disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord. So this is the band of guys who've been following Jesus for three years.
The closest people to Jesus who've been watching him teach, watching him work miracles, watching him change lives. These guys are the guys who are now hiding behind locked doors, afraid for their own lives because they're Jesus' followers. But Peter and John, man, they've been to the tomb. They've seen that the stone was rolled. Mary Magdalene came back and told these guys their life-altering reality, that she talked with Jesus who'd been risen from the dead. But they're not buying it yet.
Their doubts are too overwhelming. Their doubts are controlling their actions rather than their faith. I mean, they've had someone preach the gospel to them, and they could have and really should have believed, But now Jesus shows up to them. And some scholars think that Jesus just kind of miraculously caused the doors or the locks on the doors to unlock. And he just walked in through the doors. The text doesn't say that. The text just says the doors are locked and then boom, Jesus was there.
And so I like to think that Jesus in his resurrected body, this isn't just me, others think this too. Jesus in his resurrected, 100% physical, but now divine new body has either the ability to walk through walls or to teleport or both. I'm here for both of them. Like I want both in my resurrected body. That would be awesome, all right? And so I'm hoping that that's a glimpse of what we see here. But regardless, by Jesus showing up, meeting them in this room, look at what their response is.
It says they rejoiced. They worship. You see, Jesus is now transforming them. The doubt, the fear, the despair, it's starting to go away or by now it's gone. And now they're just worshiping. And all of these guys, all of these guys who are locked, scared in a room, they would all go on to live so boldly for Jesus that almost all of them end up being killed for their faith. They went from overwhelming, crippling doubt to living for Jesus as boldly as you can. They've been totally transformed.
But not everyone just yet. Down in verse 24, But Thomas, called twin, one of the 12, was not with them when Jesus came. So the other disciples were telling him, we've seen the Lord. But he said to them, if I don't see the mark of the nails on his hands and put my finger in the mark of the nails and put my hand into his side, look at these words, I will, look, never believe. I will never believe unless Jesus shows up for me this way. Thomas didn't see Jesus for himself.
He's heard Mary tell him about Jesus. He's now got his 10 close friends telling him about Jesus. But he wants Jesus to call his name like he did for Mary. He wants Jesus to show up for him like he did for the other 10. And so he gets the name that a lot of us know him now by as Doubting Thomas. But now before we rag on Thomas too much, man, let's just look at it for what it is. They all doubted, right? Mary showed up at the tomb that Sunday morning filled with doubt.
the ten they were hiding behind locked doors and their doubts didn't go away until Jesus showed up all right so Thomas I mean think about John the Baptist John the Baptist in Matthew 11 is called the greatest man to be born of a woman that's what Jesus says about him and John the Baptist got to baptize Jesus I mean John had some faith but then when he's in imprisoned in jail John sent his followers to Jesus to ask the question wait are you really the Messiah or did I get it wrong you
know what that's called? Doubt. And here's what we see in the Bible. The Bible is filled with doubters and it teaches us this. We're all doubters. We're all doubters. We all have doubts. We all have low moments when we wonder if God is really there, if Jesus's life and death really mean anything to us, if any of this is really true or not. Maybe you've grown up in the church and so to be in this gathering and to hear churchy stuff is just kind of like you being a fish in water
and all this feels very normal. But man, if you sit back and really think about it, everything we believe hinges on the reality that there's a loving God who created everything and holds it all together and created us special, but in his sovereignty and love allowed us to rebel and the consequences separate us from him. But he promised to deal with those consequences himself. And so he promised to become a man and he did it.
The triune God, the one God existing eternally as three persons, sent one of those persons, the son, to be born completely and utterly as a human without losing his divinity so that that baby was the God-man. And he, Jesus, lived completely as a human just like we do, but in the power of God's spirit, never sinned at all. And so this first century homeless, miracle-working God-man Jewish rabbi murdered unjustly on two sticks.
But actually what was happening there was that he was willingly laying down his life in our place to pay the price for all of our rebellion and sin against God so that we could have life and forgiveness forever. And to prove that it worked, God rose him from the dead and now he is alive today and he's promised to come back and rescue us and make it all right again. That's a lot. That's a lot of stuff. And that's heavy stuff, right?
And maybe, maybe you're just in a space in life where you don't doubt any of that ever. And if that's you, praise God. He has given you an amazing gift of faith. But listen, be easy on others. Be easy on others who aren't there yet. This is some difficult stuff to think through, to figure out, to have faith in. none of Jesus' disciples believed it. None of even the heroic women at the tomb believed it. Doubt is so tied to the human experience. It's part of the fallout of our rebellion.
We are all bent to not take God at his word and try to explain the things of God in some other way. But here's the first thing I want us to see from our text. Firstly, Jesus pursues us in our doubts. Jesus pursues us in our doubts. Jesus knew Mary's doubts. He knows the disciples' doubts. He shows us that because when he shows up for Thomas, he knew Thomas' doubts. That's what we're going to see in a second. He knows exactly what Thomas asked for. Jesus knows the ways that we doubt and struggle.
Our doubts don't take God by surprise. If you're here this morning and you're doubting if Jesus is God or that any of this is real, man, that is not a surprise to God.
God isn't disappointed in you he's not ashamed of you he's not ready to write you off he's pursuing you because you see Jesus didn't wait on them to work through their doubts and figure out how to overcome their fear they aren't going out looking for Jesus these disciples they're in this room behind locked door but Jesus is pursuing them meeting them where they are at and here's what I believe, Jesus is pursuing you as well.
I mean, the fact that you're here this morning, do you know how amazing it is that you're here in church, gathered with a bunch of Jesus followers, especially if you're someone here who's wrestling through serious doubts about who God is and if he loves you and if Jesus can really rescue you, it is an absolute miracle that you are here. Just like it's a miracle that Thomas kept hanging out with these 10 guys.
Thomas kept showing up he kept hanging out with his friends who were now totally sold out on the risen Jesus Thomas kept coming and that's a miracle that shows me this that God was still pursuing him and now in verse 26 it says a week later his disciples were indoors again and Thomas was with them even though the doors were locked Jesus came and stood among them and said peace be with you then he said to Thomas just imagine him turning now and focusing on Thomas this one-on-one
conversation in this group of people and he says this put your finger here and look at my hands reach out your hand and put it into my side don't be faithless but believe now you see Jesus didn't show up for Thomas right away Thomas has these serious doubts and you got to think Thomas has been praying asking God to show up for him Thomas's friends they got nothing else to do. They've probably been sharing the gospel with him, praying, asking God to show up
for Thomas. They've probably been talking to Thomas every single day, begging him to believe. But day after day goes by a probably really slow week for Thomas, and God hasn't shown up yet. But here's what I love. The disciples didn't make Thomas feel bad or guilty about his doubts. They didn't kick him out of the group. They didn't say, okay, here's, we saw Jesus. You're not going to believe it? Okay, dude, then just stop coming. Go do something else. They didn't kick him out.
They made space for him to live with his doubts safely among them, and they trusted Jesus to show up and win Thomas over in God's timing. Guys, God knows exactly what he's doing in each of our lives and in the lives of your friends and family. God has his timing, and we can trust that his timing is best. And look, he does show up for Thomas, right? Which means this, here's our second point. Not only does Jesus pursue us, I think this shows us this, Jesus is undefeated in his pursuit of us.
Jesus is undefeated in his pursuit. The doors were locked again. Thomas's heart still filled with doubt. But Jesus says, man, I'm not going to let these locks stop me from getting to you. I'm not going to let your doubts stop me from getting to you. I'm not going to let seven more days drive you too far away from me. Jesus isn't letting anything stop him. He's the mover of mountains, the breaker of chains.
And listen, guys, if death couldn't stop Jesus in his love of winning you and I back to God, then our doubts aren't going to stop him. Your and my doubts are not stronger than death. And Jesus had victory over death for us, which means he definitely can have victory over our doubts.
maybe you always thought that you've gone too far that you've just lived too much of your life with too much doubt too much sin, too much running away and you're like I think at this point I'm kind of just too far from God my heart is too locked and I don't think God can get behind those locks God wants you to know this today nothing can stop his pursuit of you his love for you As deep as our doubt may go, God's grace goes deeper still. But why? Why?
Well, why would Jesus pursue doubters so relentlessly? Like, why not find people who are just eager to have faith? People who are easy and ready to believe and who aren't going to ask hard questions. People who are just like, man, I'm a follower of Jesus and I'm just not going to doubt it. I'm just going to go my whole life full charge, full sin for Jesus all the time. Why would Jesus spend his time on doubters? Why are there so many doubters in the church?
Because thirdly, and guys, listen, I really believe this is one of the most important sentences we could read, one of the most important sentences that is true, and one of the most important things we could spend our lives experiencing. Thirdly, because Jesus is on your side. Because Jesus is on your side. Jesus is on doubters' side. It's not Jesus against the doubters. It says that Jesus came to them behind these locked doors, and it says this, Jesus stood among them.
Now, I would think that if this were Jesus and he'd been teaching them about his resurrection, he'd been teaching them about his kingdom, been teaching them about eternity, been teaching them about salvation and all that he would do, that Jesus would likely show up at this time, look at them and be like, I told you guys so.
like here I am like why didn't you believe what is wrong with you why are you still fearful like he would just kind of lord it over them stand over them and they would need to kind of like bow at his feet and grovel and beg for forgiveness but this language that he came and stood among them this is the language of standing as a friend he just came and stood among them as a friend a couple verses above this back in like verse 22 or something it says he actually had an encounter
where each of them where he breathed on them and that's this intimate personal thing he had with each of them. Jesus came back and stood among them as his friend. And look at the first word he says to them, not I told you so, not what's wrong with you, but peace. Peace. He wants their hearts to be settled. He wants what's best for them. He wants them to be at peace. And what we see here is that
peace is not a set of circumstances, it's a person. Jesus gives them himself and says, you can now have real peace, the peace that you desperately long for. And then he invites them, look at this, he invites them to see his hands that were pierced for them, his side that was cut open for them. In his resurrected body, the other wounds must have healed, but Jesus decided to retain these scars. Why? Likely for this moment and all other moments like it. All the times when Jesus's followers
would doubt, would question, does God really love me? How much does God love me? And Jesus says, let me show you. Let me prove it again and again. Let me show you how on your side I am. I love you to death. The most incredible reality in the world is this. God is for you. He is not against you.
God is for you he is not against you Psalm 118 6 says this the Lord is for me and look at the follow up I will not be afraid that could also say I will not doubt the disciples were gathered scared but it was because of their doubts the fears feed the doubts the doubts feed the fears but what gives us courage what gives us certainty what allows us to stand knowing this Lord is for me, that Jesus is on my side. God is not against me.
And now that Thomas sees this and knows this and starts to feel this, look at what he says in verse 28. Thomas responded to Jesus, my Lord and my God. You see, Thomas is done demanding explanation. Now he's just submitting to revelation. When Jesus shows up and calls your name, if you still demand explanation, it shows that you don't really want to believe. When people don't believe, it's not because the evidence for Jesus' resurrection isn't strong enough.
It's because they have other reasons, motives, or questions that make them unable to believe. But Thomas here, man, he wants to believe. And so he doesn't pepper Jesus with questions. He doesn't say, okay, I see you, I see the scars, but why did you do it this way? What's going on? What's gonna happen next? He doesn't pepper him with questions. He just says this amazing statement, my Lord and my God. It's a statement of submission.
his submission to Jesus comes before a deep scholarly understanding of what Jesus has done he doesn't go get a seminary degree and then say okay I get it now he just knows Jesus is my Lord and my God right now this is surrender this is personal this is worship what he's saying here is I trust you Jesus and I don't have to understand everything I don't have to have all of my questions answered. I just know this, you're my Lord and you're my God. I heard a story this week about
someone in our church who's going through just a really difficult time. Like they're just, the kind of some stuff in their life is really strained and tough and difficult. And they were talking to someone else in our church about it, just kind of sharing and probably asking for prayer, different things, but they just kind of shared the thick of it, like what was going on in their life. but then they ended the whole story with this statement.
They said, you know, God knows what's best and that's good enough for me. There it is. My Lord and my God. God knows what's best and that's good enough for me. Thomas looks at Jesus and he says, man, I don't have to know all the ins and outs of everything that just happened. I just know that this is good enough for me. Jesus is here in my life. and he's alive. What's interesting is that it never says that Thomas actually reaches out and touches Jesus' scars.
That's what he said had to happen, right? He was nails on that. Unless I put my finger right there, what does he say? I will never believe. But it's not even recorded that he does that. It says Jesus shows up and invites him to do it and just instantly, my Lord and my God. And you know, I think that's kind of telling about us sometimes, right? We often tell God what has to happen in our lives in order for us to
believe. But here's the question, what are you going to actually do when Jesus just shows up? What are you going to do when Jesus shows up in your life? Maybe you're thinking, man, I wish he would. I wish he would show up for me just like he did for Thomas. If I could just see the real physical Jesus, then I would believe. Well, in Matthew 28, Matthew writes about how the resurrected Jesus showed up to some of his followers and it says this, many of them worshiped, but some still
doubted. See, not everybody who saw the physical resurrected Jesus believed right away. Some persisted in their doubts. And it might be that we tell God, God, here's exactly what I need in order to believe. And then that thing happens and we go, yeah, but that could have been chance or luck, or I could have been just dreaming. You see, if we dig our heels in on our doubts, Jesus may still show up in us still persist in our doubt if we're looking for reasons not to believe.
And so what do we need? What do we need in order to believe? God's told us what we need. And he said this, that we have everything we need right here. We have everything we need. Look at what 2 Peter 1 tells us. It says, God's divine power has given us everything required. That's everything we need for life and godliness through the knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness. We have everything we need. And where does it come from? From the knowledge of him. And where do we
get the knowledge of him, the knowledge of Jesus? It's in the Bible. It's in God's word. It's how God inspired faithful men to write down everything that we see in the Bible, all of the poetry, the wisdom literature, the narrative, the history, the apocalyptic literature, all that we see God inspired and wanted it to be this way so that we could have in God's word everything we need to overwhelm even our deepest doubts. If you're in the spot where you're like, no, I need more.
I need Jesus to show up in the flesh in front of me. You're saying you need more than what God said you actually need. God says we have everything we need. I think we need to be careful when we put conditions on God that go beyond what he said. And so man, as you dig into God's word, as you show up week after week and hear the gospel preached, as you go to community group and talk about the Bible
with others, we have everything we need for faith and to see doubt dissolve. So the question is this, are you going to surrender your life to him? Let him be your Lord and your God. Mary, the disciples, Thomas, they all had this amazing experience of seeing the resurrected Jesus with their own eyes. Last week, we heard a story of a lady at Harbor Honolulu, how she saw God's face in the clouds. God could show up for you like that. He could show up and he will show up, I think, in ways behind
whatever doors you've locked in your heart and deadbolted. But here's the question, what are you going to do when he does show up? Are you going to surrender your life to him and let him be your Lord and your God. That seems like a great place to say, let's go ahead and pray together, but I've
got more, right? Bonus material, because many of you have already done that. Many of you have had that experience of Thomas and you've wrestled through some doubt and Jesus has shown up for you in his word or as you've been praying or as you've been sitting in a church service and heard
God's word and you've said, yes, okay, he is my Lord and my God. And you've given your life to him, started following him, but something you've experienced over the last several years is that there's still some doubts. There's still doubts that creep up, even some intense doubts. Maybe you go through full seasons of doubt. And so the question is, as followers of Jesus, what do we do when doubts show up? What should we do in those times, in those seasons?
How can we experience Jesus transform our doubts into deep faith? I want to give us four quick ways we can respond when doubt creeps into the life of a Jesus follower. And the first way is this, we've got to identify the lie. We've got to identify the lie. Doubt almost always exists in our lives because we're currently believing something that's not true about God, something that's not true about who he is or how he works.
And so we need to identify what that lie is so we can start telling the truth to ourselves and rehearsing the truth in our own lives. Maybe we're believing that God isn't truly good or that God isn't really in control or that God isn't really on my side. When we first planted the church, this church, I was living way up in Makakilo and I liked going on walks back then, listening to podcasts and praying.
And so I'd walk through this neighborhood that was a bunch of new builds, a bunch of really big, awesome, amazing houses. And I'd walk through there and I just look at these houses and each one I would see, I'd walk to one, I'd just be like, oh, I'd see the next one. I'd be like, oh, I'd see this one. And they're like all my dream houses. And I'm like, I would walk it And I would get so covetous, sinfully covetous of these houses. And I remember like actually getting angry with God.
I had to stop going on walks, guys. I had to stop burning calories because I was angry with God. Because I'd look at these houses and think, man, God, you don't know what's best for me. Like I need to be in one of those. And I'd start to doubt God's goodness in my life and just different things. And so I started sharing this with another pastor I was on staff with. I think he noticed that there was some angst in my life. He was like, what's going on, man? Like, why are you so angry?
And so I was talking with him. I was talking about these walks and these houses and my desire for things that God doesn't seem like he's ever going to give me. And he was like, oh, so you've started to believe that God doesn't know what's best for you. And it just hit me like a ton of bricks. And I was like, yeah, I have been believing that. I have been believing that God doesn't know what's best for me.
And I was able to address that and bring that to God and say, God, this is what I've been believing, but I know it's not true. I know that you know exactly what's best for me. And I want to trust that. But listen, to identify the lie, a lot of times it takes being, most of the time it takes being in community with other people who are going to be honest with you and open with you. Because a lot of times in our own lives we put on blinders and we can't identify the lies that we're believing.
And so by being in a community group here at our church, by women's Bible study, men's Bible study, by calling someone that you have a relationship with and going out to coffee and opening yourself up to say, man, here's the things I'm struggling with. Here's the doubt that I'm feeling deep in my soul. That could give somebody a clear window into saying, man, here's the lie that maybe you've been believing lately. And when you identify that lie, the second thing is, man, bring it to Jesus.
Bring it to Jesus. In none of these stories that we read this morning is Jesus put off with his friends' doubts. He meets them gently, patiently, and gives them exactly what they need for their doubts to be transformed into deep faith. And so man, confess it, pray it. Jesus is never surprised or disgusted by our doubts. He always draws near to us when we draw near to him. And then thirdly, man, remember his love. That's what he invites his disciples to do, right?
When he meets with his friends, he invites them to see his scars, to remember how much he loves them, the price he paid for their rescue. He's inviting them to remember how blessed they are. And that's a great thing for us to do when we doubt, to remember how blessed we are, to remember how loved we are.
In the midst of doubt, the temptation is to withdraw, but we remember his love by pressing in, by showing up, by hearing of his love for us again and again, by singing it sometimes even when we don't feel it, by taking the meal even when we're struggling to feel that it's true. We experience it again and again and remember his deep love for us. And then fourthly, lastly, here's what I'd say.
If you're struggling with doubt, a good way to maybe jolt our hearts and have some deep faith woven into our lives is this. Get busy serving. Get busy serving. Right after Jesus meets with his disciples and confronts a lot of this doubt and then pursues them and shows up for them and makes sure they know he's on their side, you know what he tells them right after?
right after the resurrected Jesus meets with his friends, he says this, Matthew 28, now go, go into all the world, make disciples and teach them and baptize them. Go serve me. Go serve me and my kingdom. Listen, serving Jesus with your God-given gift for the building of his church is part of our new purpose as Jesus followers. Look how 1 Peter 4 says it. It says, just as each one, That's each follower of Jesus in here in this room today.
Just as each one of you has received a gift, use it to serve others as good stewards of the varied grace of God. So that God may be glorified through Jesus Christ and everything. Look, if you feel like you're in a season of doubt or struggle, I would say this. Get busy serving and you'll connect with community with others. Get busy serving and you'll experience God work through you. Get busy serving and you'll see other people blessed because you've been blessed.
And look, get busy serving because look at what it says. God will be glorified through Jesus Christ as you serve. Maybe you're here this morning doubting the existence of God. Or you're doubting that if he really exists, if he cares about you at all. Or maybe you're doubting here today the decision you made years ago to give your life to Jesus. if it was really real and if it really meant anything.
Whatever your doubts are here this morning, whatever doubts you have about God, about Jesus, whatever your doubts are, know this. They're safe here at this church. And your doubts are safe with Jesus. Bring them to him. He can handle them. he loves you he's on your side he's pursuing you and he is relentless let's pray together