John 20:19-31
April 20, 2014
Message shared at Yosemite Weekend of the First Chinese Baptist Church in San Francisco.
We are usually in Yosemite the weekend after taxes are due. Next year, we’ll get back to our normal weekend in Yosemite. But this year, the weekend after April 15th is Easter so we couldn’t be away.
Reading today’s lesson from John 20 about Jesus appearing to his disciples and then to Thomas because he wouldn’t believe in Jesus resurrection until he could see it for himself is timely. With Thomas, we can get a closer look at the Risen Christ.
At Yosemite, we can only appreciate the grandeur of El Capitan or the majesty of Half Dome or the thundering waterfalls from a distance. If you came close, you would miss the main attractions. Even out here at the banks of the river, there are countless pebbles that we skip over the water and only when we can capture the entire scene would we enjoy coming to Yosemite. We don’t get to see too much of the details.
In the news last year there was this embarrassing news story of 47-story showpiece InTempo building in the Spanish coast town of Benidorm. The problem was that when the building was being constructed, they only built the elevator to the 20th floor, leaving the mistake for potential residents on the top 27 floors to climb the stairs. The building originally was only supposed to have 20 floors, but the designers fell in love with their work and decided to add the additional floors, forgetting somehow that people in the penthouse might actually not want to have a cardiac arrest every time they came home from grocery shopping. No elevator shaft was planned in the blueprints, no space was provided for it, and unbelievably, nobody noticed this until after the building was actually built. No one thought about the details.
We forget sometimes it’s the detail that really matters. Leaving out one important detail can cause the whole project to be useless. But what if the project is faith? What happens when we forget some of the important details of a faith where the spiritual elevators are supposed to go all the way up?
Thomas
The story of “doubting Thomas” is one of the more famous ones in all of the gospels because it speaks to a deep human condition. In the face of confusion, conflicting evidence and a world that requires empirical evidence before making a decision, doubt seems to be the norm for many people. Sometimes doubt can be useful. Had the architects on the InTempo project been skeptical enough to not get dazzled by their own designs, they might have discovered the flaws in their plans. But other times, doubt can lead us to emptiness and cause us to neglect the hope of faith in the risen Christ.
It wasn’t just Thomas who doubted, all of the disciples had doubts; otherwise they would not have been huddled together out of fear even after they heard Mary Magdalene announced, “I have seen the Lord!” It’s doubt that leads the disciples to temporarily be as useless as a skyscraper with no elevator. What did Thomas and the others forget that led them to hole up with their doubt?
There are three things that the disciples forgot tol include in their faith-building project; three things that if we don’t remember them ourselves, will lead us to spiritual bankruptcy and uselessness.
Peace of Christ
The first one is the peace of Christ. Jesus says this four times, “Peace be with you.” Jesus said to his disciples, “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled, and do not let them be afraid” (14:27). The peace that “the world gives” is peace that seeks to alleviate fear by relying on the security of wealth, the protection of armies or the isolation of a locked door. There is no peace in these things. The peace that Jesus offers is an eternal peace made possible by his resurrection from the dead.
When we forget the peace of Christ, we tend to become gripped with fear and doubt, and our sense of hope can’t access the top floor.
Presence of Christ
The second key in a faith-building project is to remember the ongoing presence of Christ. Just like the fresh Yosemite mountain air, Jesus “breathed” on the disciples and gave them the Holy Spirit, the very presence of Christ in their lives (v.22). The Spirit will give them the power to do “even greater things” than Jesus had done (14:12) and provide the comfort and peace that enabled them to carry out God’s mission in the world.
Person of Christ
The third feature that doubters like Thomas and us need to remember is that our faith isn’t in an idea, or a concept or a principle—instead, our faith is in the person of Christ. Jesus shows up in person a week later, when Thomas is present, and invites the doubtful disciple to touch his wounds. It’s a touch that is only possible if Jesus is more than a concept, but a person who was “in the flesh” like us; who suffered as we suffer; who was tempted like we are tempted; who dwelt among us and gave his life for us (1:14).
Thomas finally believed because he saw Jesus—not just on that day, but on all the days he spent following Jesus around Judea. He knew what kind of man Jesus was, that he was worthy of Thomas’ trust and faith; that he never backed down from a promise even when he was nailed to a cross. Now, with the risen Christ standing in front of him in the flesh, Thomas’ faith became so clear that he would never forget.
We come to Yosemite and we see the great effects developed by a huge glacier millions of years ago. We believe that El Capitan is really up there. We believe that “seeing is believing.” But Jesus is saying, “Believing is seeing.” When we come to believe like Thomas, we would say, “My Lord and my God!” and this becomes the foundation of our faith.
God has come to us in Jesus Christ, who continues his mission through doubters and misfits like Thomas and us. Faith is a willingness to follow him, even when we’re not sure where it will lead us. Faith is a willingness to build because we know the One who holds the blueprints of the world in his hands.
The InTempo building will require a super-expensive fix, like putting elevators on the outside of the building in order to make it useful. Our doubt can be fixed a lot less expensively—by remembering that Jesus offers us his peace, his presence, and his person.
Let us pray.
Dear God, you are patient with us. You have told us that if we have the faith of a mustard seed, we can move mountains and yet, even that seems impossible for our doubting hearts. We have seen your miracles, we have experienced your work in our lives, and we still question you and hesitate to believe you are always good. Let us not so quickly forget the celebration we had last week and the truth of the resurrection. Give us faith to believe you, dear God. Amen.