4/16/23 Thomas: A Drought of Doubt
Thomas: A Drought of Doubt
John 20:19-31
1988 was a memorable year. The Soviet Union finally pulled out of Afghanistan, George Herbert Walker Bush defeated Michael Dukakis to become the 41st President of the United States, Nike came out with the slogan “Just Do It”, a gallon of gas was 91 cents, a postage stamp was 24 cents, a new Ford Taurus would set you back $10,000, Wrigley Field finally had lights installed, The Cosby Show and Cheers were the biggest shows on TV. Rain Man and Die Hard were on top at the box office and the Summer Olympics were held that year in Seoul, South Korea with Carl Lewis and Jackie Joyner-Kersee taking home gold medals for the USA.
But these events aren’t why I remember the Summer or 1988. For those of you who may have been on a farm that year or working outdoors in some capacity, you may remember that the Summer of 88 was dry – very dry!
In fact, 1988 boasted one of the worst droughts in Wisconsin history, causing over $900 million dollars in crop-related losses. I vividly remember seeing shriveled corn fields and brown lawns everywhere I went – it was a devastating year for many local farmers. My uncle, a retired farmer in his early 80’s, says that the drought of 1988 was the worst one that he can remember.
The 1988 drought was a physical drought, but there are times in our lives when we can experience spiritual droughts as well – those times when God seems distant – when our relationship with the Lord just doesn’t seem to come easy.
Today, we will be looking at someone who experienced a spiritual drought. A time in his life when he questioned what he believed, drought of doubt, if you will.
His name was Thomas. He was one of the 12 disciples of Jesus. He traveled with Jesus for 3 years. He was a firsthand witness to the miracles, teachings, and ministry of Christ. At times, along with the other disciples, he had been given the power to heal people, to convincingly preach the message of the Kingdom of Heaven….even to drive out demons!
Thomas was indeed a man of faith – and yet, he also experienced a great spiritual drought in his life in the hours and days following the crucifixion of Christ.
Our passage for today picks up where we left off last week. Mary Magdalene had encountered the risen Jesus in the garden tomb, then she hurried back to Jerusalem to inform the disciples of what she had seen.
Verse 19 describes the scene that evening (Sunday evening) as 10 of the disciples are gathered in the upper room. With the doors locked, they are undoubtedly bewildered as they try to process the events of the last few days…not to mention the empty tomb and Mary’s report that she had seen the risen Christ.
All of this would have undoubtedly been overwhelming.
If you noticed, I mentioned that only 10 disciples were present in the room on Sunday evening. Jesus’ betrayer, Judas, was not present since he had already ended his own life.
Then there was Thomas – Thomas was nowhere to be seen here in the upper room where all the other disciples had congregated.
Some speculate that he was not with the others because he had completely walked away from the faith – that his faith died along with his beloved Rabbi.
Personally, I don’t take this approach when looking at Thomas’ decision to not join the other disciples in the aftermath of these traumatic events.
People respond differently to negative life-altering events. Most people crave the security found through companionship during difficult moments such as these. But others, like Thomas, prefer to process hard times on their own. Not everyone copes with tragedy in the same way.
In the second half of verse 19, the text simply states that “Jesus came and stood among them.”
If you recall, the doors were closed and locked. The text makes no mention of Jesus knocking on the door….No tap, tap, tap,…telegram…candygram…none of that.
Jesus simply appears in the room. When I read this as a child I remember thinking to myself “The coolest part about having a resurrected body will definitely be the ability to walk through doors and walls!”….and yeah, I still think this scene is pretty amazing.
Somehow, despite having a physical body, Jesus had the ability to pass through physical objects! The transporter teleportation machine on Star Trek can’t even compare to this! 😊
What are the first words these men hear their resurrected teacher say after he suddenly appears in their midst?
Verse 19 tells us: “Peace be with you”
Has anyone here ever been to a Catholic Mass? When people greet each other during the Mass they will typically say ‘peace be with you’. Now obviously, we have many differences with Catholicism, but the act of reciting this greeting is indeed a good way to remember the words of Jesus from verse 19 of today’s passage.
Jesus used this greeting 3 times in our passage for today (Verses 19,21&26) By using this specific greeting, Jesus was also conveying the reality that if you are born again – if you are In Christ - you now have peace with God.
The word peace also contains an inherent calming element to it…and the disciples definitely needed to be calmed down after Jesus suddenly appears amongst them.
Luke’s account of this miraculous event tells it like this - beginning in chapter 24 verse 36 “While they were still talking about this, Jesus himself stood among them and said to them, ‘Peace be with You.’ They were startled and frightened, thinking they saw a ghost. He said to them, ‘Why are you troubled, and why do doubts rise in your minds? Look at my hands and my feet. It is I myself! Touch me and see; a ghost does not have flesh and bones, as you see I have.” (Luke 24:36-39)
Did you notice how Jesus addresses doubt amongst the disciples? Here is their resurrected teacher in their presence – complete with the physical wounds to prove it – and they are still doubting that it is truly him!....can we really blame Thomas any more than the others? Remember, he is not here amongst the other disciples to witness this resurrected appearance of Jesus.
In verses 42-43, Luke goes on to describe how Jesus eats a piece of broiled fish in their presence so there would be absolutely no doubt in the disciples minds’ concerning the physical resurrected nature of their rabbi…and again, Thomas is not present.
In verse 20 of our passaage, Jesus moves from verbal to visual. He shows his disciples the nail marks in his hands and the spear mark in his side. If there were any lingering doubts as to the identity of this man standing in their midst, they had now been removed. And again, Thomas is missing out on this reunion for the ages.
In verse 21, Jesus repeats his greeting of peace and also provides them with a mission – a mission to let the world know that he has indeed risen from the dead.
It was the aspect of his risen nature that became the emphasis and hallmark of the evangelism, teaching, and preaching of the early church.
If you look at Peter’s famous sermon in Acts chapter 2 immediately following the Holy Spirit’s arrival at Pentecost, of the 22 verses containing Peter’s sermon, 12 of these verses talk specifically about the resurrection of Jesus. Over half of Peter’s sermon – the first church sermon ever preached - over half of it dealt with the resurrection!
Let that be a lesson for us today as well. Doctrine, theology, biblical history, service, and worship are all vital to the mission of the church, but we must never forget that everything we do and proclaim must be based in the resurrection of Jesus Christ.
The fullness of the Gospel begins with the empty tomb!
Verse 24….enter Thomas.
Thomas was off on his own – dealing with Friday’s tragic event by himself.
The text also refers to Thomas as Didymus (It was a nickname meaning “twin”) Thomas obviously had a twin brother or sister that scripture never tells us about.
In the synoptic gospels (Matthew, Mark, and Luke) Thomas is only mentioned in lists of the disciples. It is only in the book of John that we learn a few things about Thomas’ character and personality.
Thomas seems to have been a pessimist. Does everyone remember the Winnie the Pooh stories from back in the day?
Do you remember Eeyore the donkey? Like Eeyore, Thomas had the uncanny ability to find the dark cloud in every silver lining.
Thomas perhaps struggled with sadness, depression, anxiety. Thomas was not unlike many of us today, is he not?
How many of us tend to focus on the negative? How many of us see our glass as half-empty much of the time rather than half-full?
Yeah, we are a lot more like Thomas than we sometimes think we are.
Verse 24 tells us that, like the consummate introvert, Thomas was off on his own processing his own thoughts.
Verse 25 tells us that some (or possibly all) of the disciples eventually find him. They have wonderful news…”We have seen the Lord!”
True to his Eeyore personality, Thomas answers them “Unless I see the nail marks in his hands and put my finger where the nails were, and put my hand into his side, I will not believe.”
Thomas is a realist. Thomas understands that it would have to be a miracle of grand proportions for Jesus to be alive after being crucified to death on a cross and buried in a sealed tomb.
Can we blame him for having doubts? Wouldn’t many of us have the same attitude?
Imagine a handful of your closest friends came to you and told you that they had seen Elvis alive in the flesh…he was gassing up his ‘55 Cadillac Fleetwood over at the West Side Kwik Trip in Reedsburg. They even spoke to him in the checkout line before he purchased a Big Buddy and a pack of Glazers.
What would you think? Would you believe it?...probably not, right? You would assume that your friends were mistaken about the identity of whoever the person was at Kwik Trip claiming to be Elvis.
In other words, you would have doubts….just like Thomas had doubts about his friend’s unbelievable story.
Now we fast-forward a week. At this point, Thomas had gone 10 days wrestling with his doubts concerning the stories about the risen Christ, the empty tomb, Mary’s story of encountering Jesus and Angels in the garden tomb. This time of doubt must have seemed like an eternity to Thomas – an extended drought of doubt.
The events from verse 19 are then repeated in verse 26. For the second time, Jesus miraculously appears amongst the disciples in the locked room, in the same house, and delivers the same greeting “Peace, be with you.” ….. BUT this time, Thomas is there to witness it.
First of all, why is it significant that Thomas is present in the room?
Well, despite his doubts, he is still congregating with the other disciples!! This is a very important observation that provides a lesson for us today.
Despite your questions, despite your hardships, despite your guilt, despite your sin, and yes, despite your doubts that you may experience from time to time concerning your faith, you are here this morning! That tells me that no matter where you are in your walk with the Lord, you want to serve Him and you want to grow to be more like Jesus.
It tells me that you are listening to the Holy Spirit more than to your own emotions – and that in itself is showing fruit of a genuine believer!
When times were tough, Thomas did not run away from his community of believers. When Satan was shouting in his ear to run from his faith, Thomas did not desert his post!
We can actually learn a lot from Thomas.
After Jesus makes his second appearance to all of the disciples, in verse 27 he intentionally singles out Thomas. Jesus knows the excruciating drought of doubt that Thomas had been dealing with over the last 10 days.
In his compassion, Jesus tells Thomas to place his finger in his nail wounds, to place his hand into his side. What an act of compassion on the part of Jesus toward one of his hurting disciples.
Then Jesus simply tells Thomas to “Stop doubting and believe.”
Thomas’ reaction in verse 28? Only one of the most impactful statements in all of scripture!
The five words that Thomas utters in response to seeing the resurrected Jesus in the flesh have sent reverberations of truth down through the centuries concerning the deity of Christ.
Thomas says: “My Lord and My God”
These 5 words near the end of John’s gospel make a beautiful bookend to the 17 words that begin John’s gospel “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” (John 1:1)
And if there was any lingering confusion over the identity of “the Word” referred to in John 1:1, the author puts them to rest in John 1:14 “The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen His glory, the glory of the one and only son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.”
Jesus Christ is God in the flesh.
Thomas sees the nail-pierced hands, feet, and side of the savior and his eyes are opened to the truth of Jesus’ identity.
Thomas’ drought of doubt was over forever.
Thomas’ drought of doubt was replaced by torrential rains of truth that would never cease for the rest of his life.
Thomas needed to see physical proof/evidence of the resurrected Christ in order for him to believe in the absence of any doubt.
Jesus responds to Thomas’ proclamation of his Deity in verse 29 “Because you have seen me, you have believed; blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.”
This verse is directed toward us!
Jesus is saying that exercising faith in the absence of his physical presence will result in God’s special blessing. Those of you who have a personal relationship with Jesus through the Holy Spirit know exactly what that blessing is….JOY.
We looked at Joy during our early service last Sunday. Joyful and Blessed are those who walk by faith in the Spirit.
I am convinced that there is no greater gift to mankind than the gift of Joy. Joy allows us to possess supernatural peace regardless of the circumstances surrounding our life. Whatever life deals you, IF you have JOY in your heart, you will endure anything this world can throw at you.
John would also write an epistle (a Letter) to a group of churches containing the following words: “You, dear children, are from God and have overcome them, because the one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world.”
The Joy of knowing God is the greatest power on this planet. Stronger than any animal, person, weapon, government, situation, disease, medication, condition, mental state, etc…..even stronger than a devastating drought.
Why? Because even death cannot defeat Joy!
In conclusion, through the centuries, people have referred to Thomas as “Doubting Thomas.”
I understand why he is so named, but I don’t exactly agree with that label. Yes, Thomas endured a season of doubt – but it would have been understandable, given the circumstances, would it not?
After all, Jesus encourages the other disciples to not doubt during his first appearance when Thomas was not in the room. Thomas really wasn’t experiencing anything different than what the other disciples had been experiencing – he was just going through it alone.
In fact, it could be argued that Thomas ended up with a level of faith and understanding that perhaps eclipsed some of the other disciples, evidenced by his foundational, timeless proclamation that Jesus is indeed….God.
When you experience weariness in your walk with the Lord – and you will - we all do. When you experience a drought of doubt, remember that (Just as with Thomas) God will find you out, and He will make himself known to you in such a personal way that it will cause you to look up to Heaven and utter those words that Thomas uttered: “My Lord and My God”!!...........Let’s Pray.