Doubt and Faith

Intro

This morning we consider probably the most famous passage in the Bible on the topic of doubt. We don’t get to know too much about Thomas in the Bible, but in the little bits where he does show up, we usually see him as this pessimistic doubter.

And if I were to ask you which Apostle you were most like, probably nobody would want to say Thomas. But there’s a bit of Thomas in each of us, and perhaps more than we would sometimes like to admit.

The battle is looking different in each person. For some, faith might be conquering in convincing fashion. In others, faith might be holding on by a thread while doubt seems to consume them.

In Thomas, we see someone who is badly losing the battle against doubt. His faith is clinging on by a thread.

Faith involves:

accepting Christ (head)

receiving Christ (heart)

resting in Christ (hands)

In other words, we might say that faith involves an intellectual agreement, an emotional reception, and a lived-out resting in Christ. When all three of these components are aligned and healthy, we see faith bloom brightly and life become truly sweet, even when our circumstances are difficult.

And when one of these elements begins to fade, the others can usually carry you along. If your intellect is challenged, a healthy heart and hands can carry your faith through that difficulty. If your heart is challenged by something you don’t like, a healthy mind and hands can carry you through it. If your hands become unhealthy and you don’t want to follow something, a healthy heart and mind can help carry you through that trial.

But what happens when two of these three begin to fade, or even if all three of them are smoldering out? What happens when your intellect has trouble accepting the claims of Christianity, your heart is cold towards Christ, and your life is out of line with his teaching all at the same time?

This is when the frigid winter of doubt blows into your soul, the sun is blackened by unbelief, and everything that used to feel so alive slowly seems to be very dead.

This is the Apostle Thomas as we are introduced to him in John 20.

Faith and Doubt are at war in us

John 20:24–25 “Now Thomas, one of the twelve, called the Twin, 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 in his hands the mark of the nails, and place my finger into the mark of the nails, and place my hand into his side, I will never believe.””

First we notice the “hands” of Thomas, that his living is out of alignment. Notice that he was not with the other disciples when Jesus appeared to them. He had separated himself from the community of believers, causing one of the three pillars of faith to grow weaker. We’ll circle back to this observation in a little bit, because this is more important than it might seem at first.

Next we notice the “head” of Thomas. It seems clear that Thomas had a very difficult time mentally assenting to the good news that Jesus was risen and had appeared to the disciples. The others had just come to him rejoicing over the good news of Jesus’ resurrection, but Thomas couldn’t look past what had happened to Jesus. Jesus was crucified by the Romans — nobody has ever survived that. He had a spear put through his side. Blood and water came out! Thomas’ lived experience taught him that people don’t come back from that.

Finally, notice the “heart” of Thomas. It isn’t just that Thomas has come to an unfortunate but logical conclusion that Jesus must be dead. His language is charged here — He says “I will never believe.” In Greek, he uses a clause that is the strongest possible negation someone could use - “ou me.” He speaks not just as someone losing a debate in his head, but as someone who is deeply hurting in his heart. He doesn’t just say he’s having trouble believing the disciples when they say Jesus rose from the dead, he makes sweeping statements about his faith and even future-dates his doubt.

Apply:

Thomas has caught quite the scandalous reputation because of this — he is infamously known as “doubting Thomas”

Sometimes we can tend to make the subject of doubt a taboo in church culture. And I want to be careful here — doubting God is not something that we should celebrate in the church, and it certainly isn’t something we should strive for, but it is something that we should be realistic about. Doubt creeps into the hearts of all people at some time or another to varying degrees. When we try to pretend like we never struggle with doubt, we can end up doing more harm to one another than we may realize.

Especially in the age that we live in, with all of the access we have to information, both good and bad, doubt seems to always be creeping around every corner. It’s become a fear for many parents that their kids will fall away from the faith when they go away to college and learn to doubt the faith that they were brought up with.

And this doubt creeps in through the same channels that it always has.

Head- The world of science today has largely made it their mission to ridicule the worldview of Christianity and paint it as a ridiculous fantasy. Many honest Christians have struggled thinking about how their worldview can be reconciled to what the scientific experts are saying about the world.

Heart- What we call the problem of pain is maybe the number one thing that keeps people in doubt about the existence of God. They struggle trying to reconcile how God could be good if they have been allowed to experience so much pain and suffering.

Or for others they just have a hard time accepting what the Bible teaches about homosexuality or transgenderism.

In either case, they are struggling to reconcile the God of the Bible with their notion of what “good” is.

Hands- Some people are trapped deeply in sin, and it makes them wonder if God is there at all. In some cases, it even drives them to hope that God isn’t there so that nobody can sit in judgement over their guilty consciences.

And as I mentioned earlier, almost everybody struggles with some degree of doubt in one or more of these categories at some point.

But when you begin to struggle in 2 or 3 at the same time? Well that’s when you start to feel a lot like Thomas felt.

But my hope is that you will come to learn what Thomas learned when he was in the winter of doubt.

Jesus is abundantly gracious to doubters

John 20:26–27 “Eight days later, his disciples were inside again, and Thomas was with them. Although 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, and see my hands; and put out your hand, and place it in my side. Do not disbelieve, but believe.”

Notice here that a week passes. I know it says eight days, but that’s just how they counted back then. Today, if I meant to tell you I would see you next Sunday, I would probably say ill see you in a week, or i’ll see you in seven days. That’s because we don’t count today in our counting — but they used to.

Quick fun fact — have you ever been confused about why we remember the crucifixion of Jesus on a Friday and celebrate his Resurrection on a Sunday, and yet we say that he was dead for three days? That’s because of this counting method they used to use — they counted both Friday and Sunday in that count.

Back from that quick detour, we once again find the Disciples gathered together on the first day of the week, the second Lord’s Day post resurrection. Quickly notice that Thomas is now with the disciples gathered on the Lord’s Day — I promise we’re going to come back to this.

For now, I want us to focus on what happens on that day.

And specifically, I want us to consider how gracious Jesus is to a doubter like Thomas. While we might want to vilify a person like Thomas — so outspoken in his doubt concerning the resurrection of Christ — Jesus wants to draw near to a person like Thomas.

And notice the manner in which Jesus draws near. He doesn’t do it to gloat over Thomas, to prove him wrong, or to win the debate. He draws near to Thomas and condescends to his unrealistic expectations of Jesus. He comes with the same blessing of peace that we discussed in more detail last week.

Thomas said he needed to see the wounds - to touch the wounds or he would never believe. Jesus had no compulsion placed upon him to satisfy those requests. He did it anyway, and he did it in such a tender manner. Even bitter, doubting Thomas is met with the tender mercy of Jesus. Here we learn that just as Jesus draws near to the sinner that he might forgive and heal, so also he draws near to the doubter to reestablish him in his faith.

How wonderful is our Lord! We do not have a God who is merely high up and far away, unapproachable in his majesty. We have a God who condescends to meet our needs, one who invites us near, one who draws near to us himself.

It makes me feel as though Thomas himself could have uttered the words from Hebrews 4:15–16 “For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.”

Apply:

Perhaps you are a doubter yourself. Perhaps you wear your doubt proudly, or perhaps you hold your doubt close to your chest, afraid of what people would think of you if they knew.

Friend, you don’t have to worry about what Jesus would think of you. Consider his tender mercy, his deep love even for those who struggle to believe. He sympathizes with your weakness as well, and he bids you come to him at the throne of grace, that you may receive mercy and find grace to help in your time of need.

And we also learn in this passage that Jesus has given us means to strengthen our faith here and now.

God has given us means to strengthen our faith

John 20:28–29 “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 believed.””

It is without question that Thomas received a very special gift from Jesus that none of us will receive in this life. We won’t be presented with the opportunity to put our hands on the wounds of Jesus — his body is in heaven at the right hand of the Father, and he isn’t coming back until he comes to bring an end to this age.

But there’s still something very interesting happening with Thomas’ restoration here. Some might complain that Thomas isn’t actually recovering faith here, because he’s not being asked to believe in something that he cannot see.

I disagree. While it is true that Thomas is allowed to see and touch the body of the risen Jesus, his confession goes beyond what his eyes can see. Thomas says, “My Lord and my God!” and while Thomas could clearly see the humanity of Jesus in front of him, he could not see his divinity with his eyes.

In other words, it becomes clear to us that Thomas is restored to faith, even believing about Jesus that which he cannot see with his eyes.

And while Thomas had a special gift of a physical encounter with the risen Lord, Jesus has not left us without our own means to be strengthened in our faith. He has given us the church, and within the church he has given us his Word, Sacraments, and Prayer as means to receive and grow in faith.

The Church

I promised I was going to go back to it, and now I’m going back to it. It is obvious that the gathering of believers on the Lord’s Day plays a very important role in everything that happens here. We don’t have an explicit description of what exactly they were doing, but based on other evidence we have from their other gatherings, it is very likely that they are gathered together to pray, to consider the word of God, or some other form of intentional fellowship amongst themselves as believers.

Jesus first appears to them on the Sunday that he Resurrected from the dead. Surely the disciples themselves didn’t intend to invent Sunday as a special day for worship, but Jesus definitely did intend that to be the case, and so he appeared to them on that day.

And then, the next Sunday when the believers were gathered together, Jesus once again appears to them as they gather.

And notice that at the first gathering Thomas was absent and enduring the chilling winter of doubt in his heart, head, and hands.

But even in the midst of that doubt, its significant that Thomas came back to the gathering of the disciples on that next Sunday. And it is certainly significant that it was in that context that Jesus drew near to Thomas.

If the first Sunday was a time of deep darkness as he suffered in his isolation, the next Sunday was a bright spring day in the presence of God’s people as Jesus drew near and melted away all of his doubt.

The church, God’s people, plays a vital role in our walk of faith today as well.

This is in part because it is to the church that God has committed his means of grace to grant and strengthen us faith.

Again, these are Word, Sacrament, and Prayer.

Word

John 20:30–31 “Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this book; but these are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.”

Sacrament

Physical signs and seals of the promises of God to us.

When we are baptized, we make an appeal to God for a clean conscience. It is a picture of God washing us clean from our sin

When we partake of the Lord’s Supper, he is present with us through his Holy Spirit, and we become partakers of his body and blood through faith.

Prayer

Anchors us to the Lord

Hearing our brothers praying over us and for us is so helpful

Jesus draws near to sinners, even to doubters. He meets us in our weakness and grants us faith through the ordinary means he’s given to us. By those same means, we come back to the wellspring of our faith time after time, day after day, week after week, year after year, until Christ comes once again in the flesh and our faith becomes sight.

FCF: We have difficulty seeing the world as it really is. Because of this, we are at risk of believing lies about God, leading to spiritual suffering

CFC: Christ regenerates our hearts and minds, enabling us to believe the truth, leading to spiritual life

Doubting Castle: by going off the way, Christian and Hopeful found themselves in doubting castle. They were imprisoned in darkness, helpess, beaten by Giant Despair. Tempted to despair themselves, that nobody is coming for them and they may as well just give up now. Death must be better than the torture they experience now.

But on Sunday morning, Christian remembered that he had in his coat pocket a key called Promise that could open any lock in doubting castle.

So forgetting the promises of God can lead us to despair and doubt, but recalling those same promises give us the key out of that pit, that we might walk in the light of day again.