What do you know about Thomas? The writer of John’s gospel features Thomas three times.
- Firstly when Jesus get news of Lazarus’ death there is hesitancy to go to him because it means going through the hostile region of Judea. It would be a dangerous journey, but Thomas urges the disciples, “Come let’s go so we can die with him.” Bold stuff.
- Then in John 14 Jesus talks of the way to God, “There are many rooms in my Father’s house. I am going there to prepare a place for each of you. You know the way to where I am going”, but it’s Thomas who boldly pipes up saying but how can we know the way? Good question.
- Then there is today’s reading with Thomas refusing to believe Jesus is alive. Doubting Thomas he’s called and with it his reputation hits the floor.
I want to stand up for Thomas. Frankly I feel for him because my response would also be, “you have to be joking”, if I was told by friends that someone who was beaten, then crucified, and was buried in a rock tomb was now somehow alive just a couple of days after the brutal events. I think it’s quite reasonable to say I need to see evidence for myself. I wonder how we read those words of Jesus “stop doubting and have faith” … are they a rebuke or are they said with compassion, arm around his shoulder and maybe the word “bro” added at the end. And why do we not highlight the resolute response of Thomas, “my Lord and My God.”
I must be getting older because I like to reminisce! I was thinking back 40 years to my first ministry in St David’s Palmerston North the other day and remembering some of the journey. They were good years with a thriving youth group and a sense that the church had a real place in the community. One of my tasks as the new assistant minister was starting up a home group for older women who would regularly get together every two weeks to look at a Bible passage and discuss it. It was hardly revolutionary stuff and my main job as a young minister was keeping them sort of focused on the passage we were looking at so they didn’t spend the whole time on other topics that a group of women might like to talk about. It took a while to build up levels of trust and for the participants to feel they could be honest with each other, but I will always remember Vera who one day beamed and proclaimed to the group, ”you know I enjoy coming to this group because this is the first time I’ve ever been able to ask questions about God, my faith and the Bible.” It wasn’t so many months later that Vera died suddenly, and I would like to think she died just a little happier and fulfilled because of our little group and her discovery that we could ask questions together.
I suspect Vera had been brought up in a faith that frowned on asking questions. I suspect in her younger days you were expected to listen to the minister, the expert, and soak it up without question. I also suspect the model didn’t work very well because she felt a little inadequate when it came to matters of faith and the easiest way to deal with that was to keep your mouth shut until the focus of attention was on something she did feel confident in talking about…. The kids, food, craft. Asking questions was frowned on because asking questions somehow indicated that you doubted, and doubt wasn’t good. But she did have questions.. just like Thomas. The sadness and consequence was that her faith and the importance of her faith remained largely hidden to her children, and those around her.
Faith isn’t having all the right answers or being an expert. Faith is about trust, and a real faith asks questions. A real faith is honest about doubts and a real faith is open to the possibility there is more to learn.
One of the key images of faith that we find in the Old Testament is that of the journey. Things never stay as they are. Abraham and Sarah leave their home town of Harran in modern day Iraq to find a new future with God in another land. Along the way they are constantly in dialogue with God, questioning, listening, pondering, learning. Moses and the people of Israel continue this tradition. Forty years of questioning and journeying in the desert. We see the same thing in the Psalms of David. We like to think of these as wonderful affirmations of praise, but actually as we look deeper there are many songs in a minor key. Questioning and lamenting the unfairness of life are part of many of the psalms. Crying out to God “why?”, ”how long?”, and “are you there?” litter the poetry as the writers give witness to an honest faith. The story of Job is a classic with questions posed by Job and by God.
We used to have a church building where the pews were lined up and the minister stood at the front, the expert. Thankfully we have changed that. My understanding of worship in the Jewish synagogue that Jesus was brought up in was that often one of the leaders or elders would deliver a sermon on a topic and then the assembled congregation would discuss and question and argue about what was said. Judaism has never been about a passive listening people but is about debate and questions. As the early Christians moved out of the synagogues and met as small groups they would often argue and question together as they searched for the truth and the way of Jesus. Jesus asked questions often, both of others and also from deep within. From the cross comes the anguished cry, My God, My God, where are you?
Paul’s letters are full of issues as those early communities buzzed with deep debate, conflict, and questions. A community that does not encourage questions stands still. A person who knows it all and has no doubts will not grow. In their certainty they will often become obnoxious and arrogant. Faith is not about certainty. The opposite of faith is not doubt but fear, the fear of stepping beyond the known, the fear of admitting, “I don’t know”..
I believe religious faith has suffered hugely in the modern world by being cast as naïve and unquestioning. It has suffered hugely from the perception that you have to ditch your rational questioning mind and give assent to things which frankly are are not possible or at least need to be interpreted as metaphor… the seven days of creation for example.
Thomas dear Thomas has much to teach us and challenge us in his open and honest questioning and doubting.
He also has something to teach us and challenge us in his boldness.
If you visit India you will see many Christian communities feature the name St Thomas. I volunteered for a few months at St Thomas School in Jagadhri, Northern India working with Doreen Riddle. The local Christians were proud of the name St Thomas and told me Thomas the disciple brought Christianity to India. Some 20 years after Jesus’ death Thomas is believed to have arrived in southern India, in Kerela which is still a Christian stronghold today. There he established little Christian communities. I wish John England was still with us because he would no doubt throw some light on this mysterious journey.
What is clear is that a fire burned in Thomas. He was the one to say let’s risk death to go with Jesus. He’s the disciple who proclaimed when seeing the resurrection for himself “My Lord and My God” He had seen Jesus. He had touched the wounds. The resurrection wasn’t some funny belief in his head, but a realisation that all Jesus stood for was true and Thomas saw that the way or path of Jesus was the way of life for all the earth. This Jesus truly was of God and opened a door to the way of life that human beings long for, and that was good news that needed to be shared.
I imagine Thomas’ love of questions served him well. He sat and talked with locals in marketplaces and under banyan trees. He asked questions. He listened and observed. No doubt people observed him and saw something in him. He tried to answer their questions honestly. He no doubt encountered people who were deeply religious, as anyone who has travelled in India will still attest to. As he engaged in conversations he told them of Jesus who spoke of forgiveness for those crippled by alienation and mistakes, unconditional love and compassion for broken, and a way of justice and respect for all, men and women. No matter what caste you belonged to, Brahmin or Dalit, you were welcome to sit around a table and break bread as equals. This God revealed in Jesus brought new life.
Some were attracted, others found this new Way too revolutionary and Thomas was eventually martyred like his master. But not before something had taken root. The story of Jesus who had been put to death on a cross, killed by the powers of evil, but then raised by God, spread. Small communities of followers grew, living the Way, guided and empowered in the living presence of the Holy Spirit. They gathered to break bread, and began to share and live the story themselves. They gave witness to heaven on earth. A small spark of faith had leapt across an ocean and taken root. Thomas the questioner had become Thomas the planter. Thomas the doubter had become Thomas the bold gardener of faith in others.
I think his example shines a light for this congregation. If we are to have a future we are going to have to engage with the wider community of which we are part and become like Thomas, gardeners helping others grow in a journey with God. And it’s not really about the future of this congregation, but it’s about the future of life on this planet as we hurtle down a path of chaos, ignorance, and the worship of ourselves.
You don’t need to sail to India. You only need to walk across the street, listen carefully to a friend at a café, pray with a neighbour, answering a question, asking a question. Sharing openly, honestly, admitting we don’t know it all. Acknowledging in whatever way you can that there is a power beyond us in this earth, that is bigger than us on this earth, calling us to build a different future. We don’t have all the answers, but we do have something desperately needed in our chaotic me centred world. God needs your voice. Particularly if you’ve doubted, and particularly if you’ve struggled. Our local community needs the hope you’ve found.
I think I’ve heard some of you say ahh but that’s why we employ a minister. Minister centred churches are the fastest dying ones. What we need are authentic disciples who don’t know it all, but who have discovered what matters in their lives. What is it that gives us hope and enables us to navigate through the complexity of life? What we need are people who don’t try to make others conform to be like us, but who welcome diversity and difference. I love the message from the recent and now very pertinent movie “Conclave”, Cardinal Lawrence played by Ralph Fiennes addresses the assembled Cardinals on the sort of faith needed in the sort of person to be elected to be the Pope and example to us all. ‘Our faith is a living thing precisely because it walks hand in hand with doubt. If there was only certainty, and if there was no doubt, there would be no mystery, and therefore no need for faith.’.
Thomas…. A doubter to be shunned. No, a shining light who calls us to be honest with questions and bold to engage others with their questions.
Hear what the Spirit is saying to us.