Are You a Doubting Thomas?

Please read John 20:24-29

Just over a year ago I was involved in a weekend mission to the Yorkshire Market town of Ripon.  We set up a stall in the Market Square on Saturday afternoon with the intention of giving away free pancakes; reasoning that if we gave people food they might talk to us.  It was almost impossible to set up the stall because of the ferocious wind.  Remembering what Jesus said about those with faith being able to do even greater things than he himself, I shouted into the wind, “In the name of Jesus Christ, calm, be still!”  Immediately the wind dropped and this was witnessed by my fellow students.  A prayer of faith had an immediate result!

Some of you will be doubting that story or looking for a rational scientific explanation.  There were plenty of witnesses – it happened just as I described it, but I’ll bet some of you don’t quite believe it.

Thomas had trouble believing the other disciples.  They told him they’d met the risen Jesus but Thomas didn’t believe them.  He said, “Unless I see the marks 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.”  Thomas words are very plain, they make it clear that both he and disciples are talking about a physically resurrected Jesus.  The doubt Thomas had was that Jesus physically rose from the dead.

This doubt is fairly common today.  Many outside church dismiss whole thing saying that we know dead bodies do not come back to life, it is simply impossible.  Some inside church have the same view.  They say that what the early Christians meant by resurrection wasn’t that Jesus physically came back to life, but that in the days and weeks following his death they could still feel his presence and therefore began to claim that he was still alive.  The idea that he physically rose from the dead came when later generations misunderstood what the very first Christians meant by resurrection.  Those Christians who think this way are the doubting Thomas of the modern church.

The gospel account makes it clear we are talking about more than a spiritual experience, though it was certainly that as well.  Thomas had doubted the physical resurrection of Jesus, but Jesus appearing before Thomas and other disciples convinced him that Jesus was indeed risen.  That is why he cried out, “My Lord and my God!”

For a while I was a doubting Thomas, but not anymore!  I believe that Jesus of Nazareth rose from the dead.  I believe that resurrection was a physical one as well as a spiritual one.  I believe this because that is what the Bible says happened and because it is the only logical explanation.

Since the earliest days of Christianity the constant claim about Jesus was that on the cross he defeated death and that by rising to life he proved death a defeated enemy.  If Jesus did not rise physically from the dead then how is death defeated?

If Jesus did not physically rise from the dead, then where did the idea come from?  In the pagan Roman world the idea of physical resurrection seemed as ridiculous as it does to many people today.  Even in Israel there was no concept of individual resurrection.  Many Jews believed that all the dead would rise when God brought in his worldwide kingdom, but not that anybody would rise before that day.

There are many proofs offered for the physical resurrection of Jesus, but perhaps the most convincing is that suggested by the internationally respected scientist and Anglican minister John Polkinghorne, who wrote, “One of the strong lines of argument for the truth of the resurrection is the astonishing transformation of the disciples from the demoralised, defeated men of Good Friday to the confident proclaimers of the Lordship of Christ at Pentecost and beyond, even to the point of martyrdom.  Something happened to bring that about.  I believe it was the resurrection and that if Jesus had not been raised it is probable that we would never have heard of him.”

The gospel account has more to tell us, though, than the fact that Jesus was raised from the dead.  It has a lot to tell us about Jesus, but I’ll focus on two main points that seem to me to be important.

The first is that the passage tells us who Jesus really was and, indeed, still is.  If the fact that he was physically raised from the dead doesn’t give us a bit of a clue, Thomas spells it out clearly when he calls Jesus, “My Lord and my God”, a title Jesus accepts without protest.

Some people today, including the more liberal Christian theologians, would say that Jesus was a great teacher, perhaps the greatest teacher who ever lived, but nothing more than that.  Some would go further and call Jesus a great prophet and somebody who had a closer relationship with God than anybody else, but would still say he was just a human being.  Perhaps that was how Thomas had always seen Jesus.

If you read Jesus words though, take into account everything that he said, he does not leave this option open to us.  He did not intend to.  Jesus cannot have simply been a good teacher because of the outrageous personal claims he made about himself.  He accepts Peter’s confession of him as “the Christ, the Son of God.”  He tells the Samaritan woman at the well that he is the Messiah.   Jesus said, “I am the way, the truth and the life; nobody comes to the Father except through me.”  He said, “Anybody who has seen me has seen the Father.”  Nobody could be just a good human teacher a make these outrageous claims.  Jesus either was who he said he was, fully human and fully divine or he was a liar or he was mad.  All that we know from the gospels tells us he was a man with the highest integrity so Jesus clearly was not a liar.  Equally he clearly was not mad.  That leaves only one option left; that he was and is exactly who he claimed to be, the Son of God.

The second important point is that we do not seek out Jesus, he comes to us and meets us where we are.  Jesus knew of Thomas doubts, he knew what he had said so when he appeared before Thomas he made him the offer, “Put your finger here and see my hands.  Reach out your hand and put it in my side.  Do not doubt but believe.”  Thomas did not of course reach out his hand; the offer was enough to bring him to faith, as Jesus knew it would be.  Jesus met Thomas where he was in order to bring him to faith.

Jesus always comes to us where we are.  We see this pattern time and time again in the Gospels.  At the beginning of his ministry Jesus went down to the shores of Galilee and said to Simon and Andrew as they sat in their boat, “Come, follow me.”  Jesus saw Matthew the tax collector sitting in his custom-house and said, “Follow me.”

I’m sure that all of us can recall how Jesus came to us where we were and led us to faith, whether that was in a blinding moment of realisation or after months and years of consideration.

Are you a doubting Thomas?

Has Jesus met with you where you are and led you to faith?  Do you believe that Jesus was and is God, part of the Holy Trinity?  Do you believe that Jesus rose physically from the dead?

Are you a doubting Thomas?

Confusion on the Road to Emmaus

Please Read Luke 24:13-35

 

I don’t know about you, but there are moments in life when I am thoroughly confused.

My most recent moment of confusion was when I read a message on Facebook from one of my fellow students at college.  The message read, “Eek! I have been given a date to do my first ever sermon and in front of my college peers too, yikes! It will certainly help me to discern whether it is my call or not!!!”  This message confused me.  It is normal for Student Presbyters and Student Deacons who are also Local Preachers to preach a sermon at college.  This particular student is a Student Deacon who does not preach.  Try as I might I could not work out why she was preaching at college: I was thoroughly confused and ended up asking her what was going on.  She replied later the same evening, “Rick, my tutor thinks it will help my discerning a call or not to preach. I have been wrestling with it for a few years. I reckon preaching in front of you lot will help me know for sure one way or the other! Aldersgate day is a scary one to do though!”  My friend has been wrestling with a call to preach; which she has kept very quiet, and a tutor at college had suggested she preach at college as a way of testing that call.  I was no longer confused; it made perfect sense!

The account of Jesus’ encounter with the two travellers on the road to Emmaus is a very familiar one that e here read out in church every Easter.  As I was reading and praying over this passage one word jumped out very strongly, a word I’d never associated with the passage before, and that word was confusion.

One of the things that is blindingly obvious in this passage once you seen it is that the disciples were completely and utterly confused.

We join the disciples walking along the dusty road to Emmaus, talking to each other about the momentous events that had taken place in Jerusalem.  Jesus joins them on their journey, but they don’t recognise him.  We are told that “they were kept from recognising him” and the implication is that this was a deliberate act by God.

Jesus asks them what they have been talking about and their confusion becomes clear.  They begin to talk about Jesus and about who they thought he was.  “He was a prophet.”  That is how the two viewed Jesus.  They had recognised that he was somebody sent by God but they saw him as somebody like Isaiah, Jeremiah or John the Baptiser; a prophet and not the Messiah.  They said that they had hoped that Jesus would be the Messiah, “the one who was going to redeem Israel” but their hopes had been dashed by Jesus death.  They’d heard the reports that Jesus had been raised from the dead but obviously didn’t believe them.  Whether they realised it or not they were very confused people.

I was confused about my friend preaching in college because I didn’t know all the facts; the companions on the road to Emmaus were confused not because they didn’t have all the facts, but because they lacked the understanding that faith brings.

There was no need for the confusion of the companions on the road, as Jesus soon demonstrated to them.  He took them through the scriptures that they knew well, to help them perhaps to see those scriptures in a new way.  We don’t know exactly which texts Jesus used, but clearly the passages he chose and the way he explained their meaning made a difference.  As they were later to say, “Were not our hearts burning within us while he talked with us on the road and opened the scriptures to us.”

These were scriptures they knew, scriptures they had heard many times in the synagogue and yet they had failed to see the truth about Jesus contained within them: just as many people today fail to understand the truth about who Jesus was and is.  The difference here was that the two companions had Jesus, the Word of God made flesh, to explain the scriptures to them.  Without the living Jesus to help us understand, the scriptures can seem confusing, contradictory even, hard to understand.  When the living Jesus speaks to us, maybe through the words of ministers and preachers or in our minds and hearts as we meditate, the scriptures come alive in a new way.

John Wesley was a man who was confused.  He was confused by his failure in America and he was confused by his lack of success for Christ despite his rigid and disciplined dedication to Christianity.   Confused and not knowing exactly what he was looking for he went unwillingly to a society in Aldersgate Street.  He later wrote of that evening, “one was reading Luther’s preface to the Epistle to The Romans.  About a quarter before nine, while he was describing the change God works in the heart through faith in Christ, I felt my heart strangely warmed.  I felt I did trust in Christ, Christ alone, for salvation; and an assurance was given me that He had taken away my sins, even mine, and saved me from the law of sin and death.”  No doubt Wesley had read Paul’s Epistle to The Romans many times, he may even have read Luther’s preface to Romans many times, yet something that night was different.  It was through William Holland’s reading of Luther’s commentary John Wesley heard the voice of the living Lord Jesus and found in it salvation.

By the time they reached Emmaus the two companions may have found their confusion easing, but perhaps they hadn’t quite got there yet.  Sometimes our confusion doesn’t go away all at once.  I think that is why they invited Jesus, who they still didn’t recognise, to stay with them; they wanted to know more.  After Jesus exposition of scripture they were very close, but they hadn’t quite got there.

There are many people in our churches today who are very close, but haven’t quite got there.  John Wesley called them ‘Almost Christians’.  Wesley described an ‘Almost Christian’ in the most glowing terms, as somebody who is of good honest character, a charitable person who is outwardly religious, a devout person who prays and goes to church and is attentive throughout the service.  An ‘Almost Christian’, says Wesley, is sincere, they really intend to serve God and do his will, for His sake and not their own.  They sincerely desire to please God in every way, yet they are only almost Christians.  Wesley confesses that, before his conversion on Aldersgate Street, he himself was only an ‘Almost Christian’. 

So what changed for Wesley?  How did he go from being what he called an ‘Almost Christian’ to being what he called an ‘Altogether Christian’?  What is the difference?  The difference is love for God, a love for God that fills heart, mind and spirit; and faith in Jesus, faith that he is the way, the truth and the life; faith that Jesus died on the cross for the forgiveness of sins and that he rose from the dead bringing us the assurance of eternal life.  As John Wesley himself wrote, “an assurance was given me that He had taken away my sins, even mine, and saved me from the law of sin and death.”

Jesus sits down to supper with the companions and breaks the bread.  As he does this, the companions suddenly realise who Jesus is, and as they realise he vanishes from their sight.  On the brink of understanding, it is the breaking of bread by Jesus that ends their confusion and brings the final certainty of faith; they know that Jesus is their travelling companion and that he has indeed been raised from the dead: everything that he told them was true.

It is hard to accept, this idea of Jesus rising from the dead.  All kinds of theories have been suggested as to what happened on that first Easter Day.  The traditional Christian view is that Jesus’ physical body was literally brought back to life.  In Luke 24:39 Jesus himself says, “Why are you troubled, and why do doubts rise in your mind?  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!”   That physical body was changed in some way.  The risen Jesus could still eat food, as he demonstrated on more than one occasion; he could be touched and could cook fish.  On the other hand he could enter a locked room without opening the door; he seemed to be able to move from one place to another very quickly and even to vanish into thin air.  There was something essentially different about Jesus’ resurrection body.

Some Christians doubt a literal physical resurrection.  They would say that the resurrection of Jesus was a spiritual resurrection and that the meetings the disciples and others had with the risen Jesus were essentially inner spiritual experiences.  I have no doubt whatsoever that meeting Jesus was an intensely spiritual experience, as the account of the travellers on the Road to Emmaus proves; but I also believe that Jesus rose physically from the dead.

There are many proofs offered for the physical resurrection of Jesus, but perhaps the most convincing is that suggested by the internationally respected scientist and Anglican minister John Polkinghorne, who wrote, “One of the strong lines of argument for the truth of the resurrection is the astonishing transformation of the disciples from the demoralised, defeated men of Good Friday to the confident proclaimers of the Lordship of Christ at Pentecost and beyond, even to the point of martyrdom.  Something happened to bring that about.  I believe it was the resurrection and that if Jesus had not been raised it is probable that we would never have heard of him.”

The physical resurrection of Jesus is confusing for some people, even for some Christians, because they cannot accept the scientific possibility of a dead body being transformed and resurrected to new life; their view of science is too high to allow such a thing.  If only they would study the scriptures under the guidance of Jesus through the power of the Holy Spirit their confusion would fade away and they would realise that it is not their view of science that is too high, but their view of God that is too low.

Our passage from Luke ends with Cleopas and his companion sharing that intense desire to make known the reality of an encounter with the risen Jesus.  Despite the fact that it is evening, that it is going dark and that they risked attack from robbers on the road between Emmaus and Jerusalem, the two companions set of straight away to Jerusalem to tell then eleven remaining disciples that they had seen Jesus.

As Christians we should have a burning desire to tell others about Jesus; he himself told us to pass on the good news of liberation from sin and the promise of everlasting spiritual life.  The final words of the risen Jesus, as reported in Matthew’s gospel are, “go and make disciples of all nations, baptising them in the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you.”

Jesus does not call us all to be evangelists, any more than he calls us all to be ordained ministers, local preachers, church stewards or whatever.  But we can all be witnesses for the risen Jesus in the way we live our lives, in the love we show to others and by having the courage, if the opportunity presents itself, to be open and honest about our faith.  We never know, the risen Jesus could use us to bring that person to faith.

Like the two companions on the road to Emmaus we too may have, or have had, doubts about Jesus being the Son of God and rising from the dead.   Like those companions the risen Jesus comes to us and leads us gently to the truth of who he is; and like them we must be fired with enthusiasm to tell others about Jesus.  May the risen Jesus meet us and meet us again and bring us these blessings.

Jesus Stands Beside Us - Easter Reflection 1

Then the disciples went back to their homes, but Mary stood outside the tomb crying. As she wept, she bent over to look into the tomb and saw two angels in white, seated where Jesus’ body had been, one at the head and the other at the foot.
They asked her, “Woman, why are you crying?”
“They have taken my Lord away” she said, “and I don’t know where they have put him.”  At this, she turned round and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not realise that it was Jesus.
“Woman” he said, “Why are you crying.  Who is it that you are looking for?”
thinking he was the gardener she said, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have put him, and I will get him.”
Jesus said to her, “Mary.”
She turned towards him and cried out in Aramaic, “Rabboni!” (which means Teacher).
Jesus said, “Do not hold onto me, for I have not yet returned to the Father.  Go instead to my brothers and tell them, ‘I am returning to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God,’”
Mary Magdalene went to the disciples with the news: “I have seen the Lord!”  And she told them that he had said these things to her.
John 20:10-18 (NIV)

All of time and space is centred on the crucifixion and resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ.  There have been and can never be more important events in the history of the universe than the death and resurrection of Jesus.

Who was the common witness of both events, Mary Magdalene, a woman!  When all the disciples, except ‘the disciple whom he loved’, had fled; Mary Magdalene, together with Jesus mother and Mary the wife of Clopas, remained with him and stood at the foot of the cross as he died.  Mary Magdalene was the first to go to the tomb on Easter Day and find it empty.  She was then the first person to meet with the resurrected Jesus.  It occurs to me that those who doubt that women should be ordained or allowed to be consecrated as Bishops should remember that it was the women who stood at the foot of the cross when virtually all the male disciples fled and that it was a woman, Mary Magdalene, whom Jesus chose to appear to first.

Our account begins with Mary weeping in the garden because she thinks that somebody has taken Jesus’ dead body away, preventing her from properly preparing his body for burial.  She sees angels in the tomb who ask her why she is crying.  She turns away from the tomb and Jesus, who she does not recognise, asks her the same question, “Woman, why are you crying?”

She does not recognise Jesus.  Why?  Perhaps, as a Sunday school teacher suggested to me many years ago, it was because her eyes were clouded by tears.  Perhaps it was simply that Jesus had his back to her as he spoke (as suggested by the film King of Kings).  Perhaps it was that the resurrection changed Jesus appearance in some way or changed the way people perceived him.  Whatever the reason, Mary did not recognise the risen Jesus.

Jesus speaks her name, and Mary then knows who he is.  It may be the distinctive way he speaks her name (I am reminded of the way Tom Baker always said Sarah Jane Smith’s name in Doctor Who and how odd that same name sounded on David Tennant’s lips) or it may be that God granted Mary recognition, but at the moment she knew Jesus was alive!

Jesus lived!  The one who had been dead on a Roman cross, whose side had been pierced by a Roman spear bringing a mixed flow of blood and water (which any modern medical examiner will tell you is an indication of a body that is definitely dead) was now standing alive in front of Mary.  God had vindicated Jesus, his words, his actions, his mission and the cross by raising him to glorious new life.

That same resurrected Jesus stands by each of us, saying our name and calling us to him; sometimes he is acknowledged and recognised and sometimes he is ignored,  but he is always there, offering us a full and equal share in the glory of his resurrected life.

It’s Always Darkest before Dawn – Holy Week Reflection 6

No Bible passage today because none of the Gospels tell us what happened the day after Jesus died on the cross.

We know that on Easter Sunday Jesus rose from the grave, his body renewed in glorious resurrection life; but so far as we know his dead body lay cold and still in the freshly hewn tomb on the last day of Holy Week.  I find this a hard idea to get my head around, the idea of Jesus cold, dead body; probably because he was so gloriously alive before the crucifixion and after the resurrection!

What of the eleven remaining disciples?  What were they doing on the Sabbath Day?  They certainly wouldn’t have been in the temple worshipping God.  My guess is that they were in hiding, terrified that they would soon be arrested and crucified, just as Jesus had been.  They were probably also completely demoralised.  The one they had put all their trust in had, in their eyes, failed.  All their hopes were dashed!

From their perspective all was hopeless.  They had every reason for despair and no reason for hope.  

We can often find ourselves in situations like that in life; when things seem dark and hopeless and we can see no way that we will ever be happy in life again.  Often it’s because we don’t know what is coming just around the corner.

Just around the corner for the disciples was resurrection….. but more on that tomorrow: for liturgically the disciples are still in despair and Jesus is still dead in the tomb!