Sermons

We may think that doubting was a big sin committed by Thomas. We may criticize him for not being with the other disciples in the upper room when Jesus appeared for the first time.

Thomas simply wanted to examine the facts for himself. He said, “Unless I see with my eyes, touch with my hands, I just can not believe Jesus is alive.” But it did not just stop there. Thomas did not walk away because he had not experienced what the other disciples had experienced. Thomas stuck around to investigate. He wanted to know.

There are some skeptics in the modern church today who say, “I grew up in the church, I know all the Bible stories, but I just don’t know if I believe.” Then they walk away. They don’t bother to read and study to find out.

I am always worried when I hear an adult say, “Sunday School? I don’t need to go to Sunday School. I learned all those stories when I was a child.”

The faith we had as a child must grow as we grow physically, mentally, and emotionally. We need to investigate the stories of David and Goliath, Daniel in the lions’ den, Jesus feeding the five thousand, and all those stories we learned as children. Studying those stories as an adult brings a whole new meaning and joy.

A child can believe on the level of a child. We need to keep studying and applying those lessons to the lives we live today. There are some who go to church every Sunday and don’t know what they believe, or if they believe.

In our society with so many religions, we have a tendency to say, “Well if that is what they want to believe, that is fine. We are all working to get to the same place anyway. I suppose one way is as good as the next.”

This attitude relieves us of the responsibility to study our own faith perspective and compare it with other world religions. If we don’t know what we believe, we have no idea how it compares with other systems of beliefs.

Thomas was absent when Jesus appeared. The other ten disciples were now way ahead of Thomas in believing that Jesus was alive, back from the dead.

Although Thomas bravely stated his lack of faith, he stuck around to give his faith an opportunity to catch up. Thomas had been the disciple, the learner, and he had not quit learning. He stayed with the group, giving his faith the opportunity to grow.

When Jesus appeared to the disciples again and invited Thomas to go ahead and touch the wounds in his hands and feet and the hole in his side, Thomas just fell to his knees and declared, “My Lord and my God!

Jesus said, “Thomas, you haven’t touched me! Have you believed because you have seen me? How happy are those who will believe but haven’t seen with their eyes.”

Then John adds an editorial note explaining his whole purpose in writing these things down.

Now Jesus did many other signs and 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. (John 20:30-31)

The whole reason for John writing down this Gospel was to convince the reader that Jesus and no other is the Messiah.

Where do Presbyterians stand on the issue of Jesus being the only way to salvation?

Before we get to that question, we need to answer the question, “What is the Bible?” In the beginning of the John Gospel he wrote that the Word of God, the creative ability of God, was present in Jesus. Jesus was part of God in the beginning when the world was made.

Presbyterians believe that the Bible is God’s written word inspired by the Holy Spirit both when it was originally written and when it is read by God’s people. The Holy Spirit was not only there when the writer was penning the words, but the Holy Spirit is also with us when we are reading it, so we can get God’s message for us.

Yes, the writer was speaking to the early church when he wrote, but because the Word of God is always alive, by the power of the Holy Spirit, it speaks to us, in our generation, as well.

The Gospels were certainly written in a pluralistic society. There were many religions in John’s culture that were calling for the attention of the people. There was Judaism with its system of laws and sacrifices. There were the religions of the Egyptians, the Greeks, and the Romans, with their plethora of gods and goddesses.

In all those religions, with all those gods, the humans were required to act to gain salvation. They had to obey laws, make a sacrifice, or go through a ritual to appease the gods. The humans lived in constant fear that their gods were going to be unhappy and do something to them.

But the Good News brought to us by Jesus is based on the mercy of God. The initiative lies with God. God reaches out to us. There is nothing we can do on our own to earn the favor of God.

God is so in love with his creation that he is constantly calling us back to himself.

We are not required to make sacrifices, perform rituals, or obey laws to appease the anger of God. We are called to respond to God’s love. God loves us more than we can comprehend and desires most just to know us and be a part of our lives.

All the world religions are about searching for something that is missing: a higher state of consciousness, being reincarnated up the latter toward paradise, total enlightenment, even world domination.

Some worship their ancestors and believe the dead can influence life on earth if enough candles are lit, or prayers are said.

Only Christianity begins with God’s love for the human race. Only Christianity teaches us to love one another because we are loved by God. We are to forgive one another as God forgives us, to be merciful to others as God is merciful to us.

Our faith is about responding to what God has done. We understand we can do nothing to earn favor with God. We are invited to respond to God’s love, at which point we begin to enjoy God’s presence in our lives.

We catch a glimpse of the holiness of God, and understand we need God’s forgiveness. God presents us a Savior, Jesus the Christ, as the perfect payment for our sins. When we accept him as God’s offering to us, we are forgiven and immediately we begin wanting to respond to such love by listening to God’s word and following it.

Is it possible to find God through some other means? Can’t we find God by being good and following the Ten Commandments?

No more than we can find God by only eating green beans. We cannot do anything to find God. God is the one who has found us.

What about the people who believe in God but call God by some other name? We hear so much about the Muslim religion. What about the Muslims, who call him Allah?

No matter how much we would like to make a bridge between the religions and the cultures, there is a great divide: Jesus Christ.

As Christians we celebrate Jesus as the one who died on the cross as payment for our sins, the one who rose from the dead and conquered death, opening the possibility of anyone who trusts in him having a relationship with God that lasts for eternity.

Six hundred years after Christ, the Muslim religion began. Muslims agree that Jesus was the son of Mary, not the Son of God. There is division among the Muslims about what happened to Jesus. Some Muslims believe that Jesus didn’t die, but was taken to heaven and someone else Allah made look like Jesus died and was buried. Maybe it was Judas, or one of the other disciples, or maybe a Roman soldier.

One sect of the Muslims say that when everyone thought Jesus died he had fainted (swooned) on the cross and was placed unconscious in the tomb, later to revive and join the disciples.

This would be after Jesus had been beaten by professionals, a crown of thorns crammed into his head, slapped around by authorities, forced to carry a heavy cross, then nailed through his wrists and feet to the cross, hung there for six hours, then stabbed deep enough in the side to have his heart pierced, and laid in a tomb covered with spices that would have not only burned like fire but aided infection.

With no food or water or anyone to attend his wounds he would have to lie there until the third day, when he regained enough strength to get up, remove the stone from the entrance with his wounded hands, walk on those sore and infected feet, overcome the combat-trained Roman guards, and escape to rejoin his disciples.

Another sect says that Jesus was not crucified but that the Jews made up the story. He died later of a natural death.

Some Muslims say they believe the story the Roman guards told was true: Jesus’ followers came and stole the body while they were asleep. The question: If the soldiers were asleep, how did they know it was the disciples who stole the body?

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Muslims believe parts of the Koran, written six hundred years after Jesus, and certain interpretations and opinions of certain religious leaders.

Christianity has the New Testament, written within the first hundred years of Jesus. In Christianity, Jesus is the Son of God. Because of God’s love for humanity, Jesus died on the cross as payment for the sins of humanity and rose again from the dead on the third day. The teachings of Jesus are based on loving one another in response to God’s love for us.

Jesus said,

“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, Love your enemies, and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be children of your Father in heaven; for he makes his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the righteous and on the unrighteous.” (Matthew 5:43-45, NRSV)

While other religions say, “By your bravery, by your might, by your power, by your intelligence, by your dedication, by your giftedness, by your determination, by your ancestry, by living in peace, by blowing yourself up in a suicide bombing, by your status, you have God’s favor,” Jesus said,

“I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.” (John 13:34-35 NRSV)

What about those who have never heard the Gospel? They haven’t believed in Jesus. Are they automatically turned out of God’s kingdom?

What about those who can’t mentally comprehend the idea of God’s love? Are they not a part of God’s Kingdom? Shouldn’t we be baptized for them since they can’t decide for themselves?

First we should be careful about our motive in such questions. Do we want to know those who don’t hear the Good News are safe so we can be released from our responsibility to tell them? Then our Mission giving is misspent. I know this about those who can’t comprehend the concept of being loved by God: God loves them and God’s plan is big enough to include them just as surely God’s plan includes our taking care of them.

What about those who don’t believe in God? They reject the whole idea that we even need a Savior. They believe they are here by accident and there is no God to whom we are accountable.

I may not believe in you, but that doesn’t mean you don’t exist. It just means I don’t see things as they really are. You know you are real. Just because I don’t believe in you doesn’t make it so.

Just because someone believes God does not exist doesn’t make it so. God doesn’t disappear because they can’t see and touch God, or don’t want to understand God. God was, is and is yet to come.

John tells us clearly in the 14th chapter of his Gospel that Jesus said, “I am the way, the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father but by me.”

Now we may claim to be more sophisticated and inclusive. We may claim that while Christianity is important to us, it is two thousand years old and these are different times.

We may even go so far as to say, “Jesus probably didn’t really say that. John just stuck it in there for effect and to make the Christian religion look like the best way or only way to get to know God.” This allows them to walk away.

My point is this: Thomas didn’t believe, but he didn’t walk away. He did not remain in his doubts. He stuck with the believers and later was willing to declare the resurrected Christ, “My Lord and my God.”

Ultimately the decision is ours. In the end what stands between us and knowing God is not God, but us.

The Bible, what we call the written word of God, tells us God has done God’s part. God has made a way for us to be forgiven, and to live beyond the grave. It comes to us not as a demand, but as a gift. That is the reason we believe and no longer doubt.