They call him doubting Thomas.
All because of this story. Jesus had appeared alive to the other disciples. Only Thomas wasn’t in the room at the time. And he found it just too hard to believe.
Personally, I’m rather glad he struggled. It makes the story real.
Lots of people find it hard to believe that Jesus really did rise form the dead. It’s all such a fantastic story. But Thomas struggled, and Jesus helped him to believe that he really was back. Which means there’s help for the rest of us who would have found all this a bit much to believe. It also means that, when we hear that Jesus is alive again, we see that little bit more clearly just how real it is.
Thomas is so helpful for us, as we seek to be certain that Jesus really did rise from the dead, and as we seek to see what good news this is. So I want us to look together at this little scene. It shows us three key things about Jesus’ resurrection.
Unexpectedly
Firstly, Jesus rose unexpectedly. Unexpectedly.
When the others told Thomas that Jesus was alive, he could not believe it. It was the last thing that he was expecting to happen. It was so unexpected, that when his friends told him that they had seen Jesus alive, he would not believe it, even though he knew them to be trustworthy.
Here is what he said: “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.” You don’t offer to go poking about in somebody’s open wounds, unless you are pretty certain that you’re not going to get taken up on the offer. It’s like offering to eat your hat. If you mean it when you say you’d do it, you don’t offer something like that unless you are certain it’s not going to happen.
Unfortunately for Thomas, it does. Actually, we should say fortunately. Jesus appears a second time. This time, Thomas was present. He is how John tells what happened: “A week later his disciples were in the house again, and Thomas was with them. Though the doors were locked, Jesus came and stood among them and said, ‘Peace be with you!’ Then he said to Thomas, ‘Put your finger here; see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it into my side. Stop doubting and believe.’”
We aren’t told what Thomas did with his finger or with his hand. But we are told what he said. “My Lord and my God!” Thomas can see that it really is Jesus. And so he reaches the only conclusion there is: Jesus is his Lord, and his God. And he worships him.
I think we go a bit hard on Thomas when we call him “Doubting Thomas”. It wasn’t that he was particularly doubting. It’s just that he was the one who wasn’t there when Jesus appeared the first time. If somebody else had been out of the room, we would have had Doubting Peter, Doubting Bartholomew, Doubting James, Doubting Thaddeus. It just so happens that Thomas was the one.
The point is that none of Jesus’s disciples were expecting this. They all thought that when he had died, he had gone for good. If they had written a list of things that they thought might happen next, Jesus coming back to life wouldn’t even be on the list.
When people today do not believe that Jesus really is alive, they have to find some other way to explain Jesus’s disciples seeing him alive. Some people say that the disciples were just seeing things. They saw what they wanted to see. It was just wish-fulfilment.
Nothing could be further from the truth. This was something that they were not expecting to happen; it’s didn’t even occur to them that it might. In spite of the fact that they thought it impossible, they all saw Jesus alive.
Jesus rose unexpectedly.
Physically
Second, Jesus rose physically. Physically.
Jesus wants Thomas to know that he really is alive. So he invites him to take his hands, his finger, and put them where the nails went, where the wounds are. Jesus is back. With a real body. That can be touched, felt, poked.
Some people today say that Jesus came back only as a spirit, as a ghost. This would be the official view of the Jehovah’s Witnesses. I’ve heard plenty of other people say it as well. Jesus deliberately doesn’t leave that option open to us. He really is back. And he invites Thomas to touch him, so that he can see that he’s back with a real body.
Later on in John’s gospel, Jesus shares a breakfast of freshly cooked fish sandwiches with his disciples. And Luke’s gospel records Jesus saying these words: “Look at my hands and my feet. It is I myself! Touch me and sees; the ghosts does not have flesh and bones as you see I have.” And then again, he ate a piece of fish, to prove to them that he was really alive, with a real body.
Jesus rose physically.
Publicly
Third, Jesus rose publicly. Publicly.
Thomas had to see Jesus in order to believe that he was alive. Fortunately for him, Jesus gave him the chance to see him alive. And so he came to believe. He got there – in the end.
Here is what Jesus said to him: “Because you have seen me, you have believed; blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.”
He believed because he saw. Jesus says it would have been better if he had believed without having to see first. He could have done this quite easily. All he had to do was take the word of the others who had already seen him.
But how about us? Jesus only stayed on the earth for 40 days after he rose to life. He then returned to heaven. Unlike Thomas, we will not get the chance to see Jesus alive. At least, not until he returns to this earth again. If we are to believe that he is alive, it will have to be without seeing first.
But how could we do so? The same way that Thomas did. By believing the testimony of those who have seen him. Jesus did not just appear to these 11 disciples. The Bible records at least 10 separate occasions when Jesus was seen alive, and on one occasion he appeared to more than 500 people at the same time.
Jesus was seen alive by many eyewitnesses. These appearances were then written down in the accounts of the life of Jesus that are preserved in our New Testaments. These are the most reliable historical documents that we have for any event in ancient history.
Jesus appeared publicly, so that we can believe it without having to see for ourselves.
Conclusion: That we may have life
The reading we heard from John’s gospel ends with these words: “Jesus performed many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not recorded in this book. But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.”
John did not record every miracle that Jesus did. But he recorded enough for us to believe for ourselves, to trust the person of Jesus. And if we do that, we come to have life in his name.
In John’s Gospel, life means knowing God, and knowing Jesus whom God sent into the world. By knowing Jesus, the Jesus who lives, we can know God himself.
Because even though we weren’t there to see it, even though the people at the time did not expect it, Jesus is physically alive. And this was witnessed and recorded for us, that we may trust him, and find life.