John 20:19-31
When it was evening on that day, the first day of the week, and the doors of the house where the disciples had met were locked for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you.” After he said this, he showed them his hands and his side. Then the disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord. Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.” When he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.”
But Thomas (who was called the Twin), one of the twelve, was not with them when Jesus came. So the other disciples told him, “We have seen the Lord.” But he said to them, “Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands, and put my finger in the mark of the nails and my hand in his side, I will not believe.”
A week later his disciples were again in the house, and Thomas was with them. Although the doors were shut, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you.” Then he said to Thomas, “Put your finger here and see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it in my side. Do not doubt but believe.” Thomas answered him, “My Lord and my God!” Jesus said to him, “Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.”
Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book. But these are written so that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name.
In the Diocese I have become known as a Curmudgeon. My Diocesan nickname is… Grumpelstiltskin. This is largely because I have an aversion to “going along to get along.” That’s actually not entirely accurate. The truth is… I’m physically incapable of going along to get along! But the thing that has genuinely cemented my reputation as a Curmudgeon is that I am completely incapable of hiding it! I do NOT have the face of a politician or a poker player. Whenever I get even the slightest whiff of an individual or systemic demand to “go along to get along” my face shows it! But it’s even worse than that. I also can’t help myself but to say it… out loud… to others… “No! I will NOT just go along to get along!”
Thomas is also known as a Curmudgeon in the Church. He too has a nickname… Doubting Thomas. What did he do to get this nickname? He also refused to “go along to get along.” He refused to settle for the shallow, easy, cheap, certainty the other disciples offered him. Even with ten other disciples staring him down, he refused to budge… for a whole week! To the world that made him Doubting Thomas. To me though… that makes him Steadfast Thomas! Unflinching Thomas. Resolute Thomas. True-blue Tried-and-True Thomas!
You see, he wasn’t stubborn for stubborn’s sake. He was resolute, because I think to Thomas, his Faith genuinely mattered. Believing… really, deeply, genuinely mattered. And when it came to things that mattered that deeply, Thomas was unwilling to take shortcuts. Faith was serious business… FAR too serious to just copy answers off your friends! To Thomas, the business of “Believing”… THAT wasn’t the place to fudge it! Thomas took Believing… he took the Faith… he took Discipleship… very, VERY seriously.
At this point we need a quick aside. Because when you and I think about the word “believing” in our modern/post enlightenment minds, we immediately think about it as an intellectual accent… being convinced of something or wrapping our minds around some thought, idea, or doctrine.
NO ONE in Thomas’ day thought about “believing” that way. Before 1600, the word “believe” did not mean agreeing that creeds, ideas, teachings, or doctrines were true in our heads. In Thomas’s day, “Believing” always had a DIRECT OBJECT and that DIRECT OBJECT was ALWAYS personal. Believing was about WHO you were following… WHO you were committing yourself to… WHO you hooked your wagon to. When the ten disciples told Thomas “we have seen the Lord” they were offering him a cheap impersonal shortcut… a vision without substance… a disembodied hope. What Thomas needed, however… what Thomas Curmudgeonly insisted upon, was the PERSON… not a shortcut! Nothing short of an encounter with the PERSON of Jesus, complete with the wounds from the nails and the spear, would do. Short of that, Thomas was determined to sit, however uncomfortably, however long, in the uncertainty and unknowing and endure whatever pressure his friends brought his way.
After a week of waiting in uncertainty, Thomas was given what he needed… an encounter with the Risen Christ… the PERSON… “My Lord and My God!” That encounter didn’t iron out the doctrinal kinks of Christianity. It didn’t harmonize the contradictions in Scripture. It didn’t give even the tiniest sliver of absolute certainty to his Faith. It actually just called Thomas more deeply into the mystery. But for Thomas, the ideas, doctrines, and certainty meant NOTHING compared to the transformational encounter with the PERSON. The PERSON to whom he could hitch his wagon… the PERSON in whose footsteps he could now follow… the PERSON who would be the direct object of his belief and his life… the PERSON he could walk through life with, through times of both clarity and confusion.
I think that’s what Thomas hopes for us today. That we not sell ourselves, our belief, or our faith, short. That we not settle for cheap, easy answers… tidy doctrines of certainty, or claims about the Divine that can be wrapped up neatly and made to do our bidding. I think that Thomas is hoping that we too embrace our inner Curmudgeon and hold out for more! Much, much, more. Not settle for the easy, the plastic, the impersonal, the inauthentic! But hold out through uncertainty and discomfort for nothing less than a transformational encounter with the Risen Christ, wounds and all.
What will an encounter with the Risen Christ, wounds and all, actually look like for you or me? How long will we need to wait? Honestly? No idea. But if you, like Thomas, are serious about your Faith… if you, like Thomas, do not take “believing” lightly, then wait for it. Wait for a transformational encounter with the Risen Christ… no shortcuts… no cheats… no going along to get along. And when it comes… and I believe it does come, over and over and over again throughout our lives… don’t worry… you’ll recognize it just like Thomas did, and in that moment you too will exclaim, “My Lord and My God.” Amen.
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