Column: Doubting Thomas’ Twins

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By Drew Williams

can’t put an exact date to it, but somewhere along the way, someone (maybe a teacher) or something I heard in church (in the rare times I showed up and was listening) implanted the idea that doubt—in so far as it related to my faith—was bad.

The message I internalized was that doubt was essentially tantamount to sin. Therefore, the only way to walk through the doors of a church and be accepted by God (and the people sitting in the pews) was to walk in already believing! I think on one level, we all struggle. Maybe we don’t believe anything and feel that religion is, as Karl Marx said, “…the opiate of the masses.”

Or possibly we think that the only way to get there at all is to take a blind leap. Maybe we had faith and it is not so much that we don’t believe in God but rather we doubt the goodness of God. C.S. Lewis wrote, “Not that I am (I think) in much danger of ceasing to believe in God. The real danger is of coming to believe such dreadful things about Him. The conclusion I dread is not ‘So there’s no God after all,’ but ‘So this is what God’s really like. Deceive yourself no longer.’” So where do I go with my doubt? I so often felt stuck on the outside of faith, looking in and wondering what all the fuss was about.

And then, in my late 20s, I was encouraged to pick up a Bible and actually read it for myself. It was at a time when God had invaded my life with people who talked about Jesus like they knew Him personally. (I had decided not to hold that against them.) They gave me a Bible and suggested I look at the account of Thomas meeting the risen Jesus (John 20: 24-29). I was astounded that such doubt had even made its way into the Bible. More important, I was not prepared for Jesus’ response to Thomas’ legendary doubt.

“Doubting Thomas” was one of the twelve disciples, Jesus’ closest followers, and they were in the midst of an uncertain and confusing time. Jesus had been crucified and buried on a Friday—shattering their all their hopes. Then Mary Magdalene had come to them on Sunday morning with the astonishing news that she had just seen Jesus, alive and in-person, outside of the tomb. That evening, Jesus “came and stood among them” (John 20:19). We’re not told where Thomas was, but evidently he missed Jesus’ visit. To their declaration of “We have seen the Lord” his response was, “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” (verse 25).

As I took in this scene, I began to wonder if there were not perhaps several kinds of doubt in my heart and in Thomas’ heart. The first sort of doubt had an element that felt like plain stubbornness—the kind of doubt that is more interested in proving itself right than finding the truth. That was certainly true for me and I recognized something of the same resistance in Thomas. Another kind said, “maybe I could believe, I might even want to believe… I just need something more.” Underneath all its rhetoric and posturing, this doubt seeks relationship. This doubt I also understood and it seemed to me that Thomas had this kind of doubt too.

How do we know this? Thomas is still in the room with the other disciples eight days after the resurrection. He could have dismissed their bizarre testimony and never come back. But eight days later, here he is, still waiting with them. He is hanging in there—maybe by a thread—but he is leaning in (just). I could also identify with Thomas a bit here. There was a small part of me that was open to the real and vibrant faith these new friends experienced—but still far from convinced.

I wonder if that is not true for many of us. Perhaps you’re open, but unconvinced. Or maybe you once had faith but life has given you quite a beating, and after so much disappointment and heartache… You haven’t completely given up, but truly, you need something more. As it turns out, in Jesus’ response to Thomas’ doubt, there is more. Let’s take a look.

Jesus meets Thomas’ doubt with extraordinary kindness. We’re told: “Eight days later, [Jesus’] 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” (verse 26). Can you imagine the sheer terror of that moment? No ghost or “magic” trick—the real Jesus showing up in the flesh! Incredible!

So when Jesus says “peace” the word that is used here is Irene, meaning “chill, relax, ‘We’re good!’” The British translation would be “Keep calm and carry on!” Now notice that Jesus appears to have overheard Thomas’ demands. He knows all about Thomas’ doubts. But most important, He sees a man who is hanging on by a thread. So His first word is peace. No rebuke. No castigation. Not even an interview. Just a word of kindness… “Peace—I know about the ‘more’ you asked for, so here I am.”

In kindness, Jesus comes to Thomas, doubts and all, and in kindness, He reaches out to the part that is still hanging on, the part that has not quite given up, and says to him “Peace.” What did we expect Jesus would say to Thomas? What did we ever expect to hear from God? As a child, I never heard anything from God and I certainly never heard the word “peace.” All I ever heard was “Believe, or you’re out.”  I just never expected God’s kindness or thought He’d ever come alongside me in all my doubt and struggle to believe. Is it possible that in all our doubt, His kindness is waiting for us—doubts and all?

Jesus’ second response to Thomas is a remarkable word of mercy. Having spoken a word of peace, Jesus now turns to Thomas and says, “Put your finger here, and see My hands; and put out your hand, and place it in My side” (verse 27). Why does He point Thomas to His wounds? On the one hand, it was exactly what Thomas had said he’d need if he were to “believe” Jesus was truly risen as the others had claimed. On the other hand, he was getting so much more than he had asked for. He was looking at the very marks of Jesus’ mercy for him. Up until this moment Thomas may have had no idea that he even needed mercy. But now, with the evidence he had demanded right in front of him, he could only have recalled his heart-breaking abandonment of Jesus in His worst hours.

Now, his stubborn insistence for forensic evidence must have felt utterly wretched. But in the same instant that he recognizes his own desperate need for forgiveness, he also experiences the power of Jesus’ sacrifice on his behalf: that the same wounds that speak of his guilt and shame also declare God’s unfathomable mercy for him. It is always this way. Whenever we feel convicted of our need for God’s forgiveness and mercy, that is the exact same moment we can also know we are already standing in it. Did it ever occur to you that it was the mercy of God that made you aware of your need for mercy? That is the presence of the risen Jesus. He did not, and does not, come with a word of condemnation or shame, but with a word of boundless mercy. Jesus meets us with kindness and mercy—and grace.

Jesus says 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.” Thomas answered him, “My Lord and my God!” (verses 27-28). There is an exclamation from Thomas—a confession that issues up from the very depths of His soul. And it’s deeply personal. Notice the personal pronouns: MY Lord, MY God! The biggest doubter now makes the greatest profession of faith. It is also a word of profound repentance—renouncing his prior skepticism and committing himself to Jesus as his Lord and his God!

In 1601 Caravaggio painted in oils an extraordinary rendering of Thomas before Jesus. Although it is clearly an artistic masterpiece, there is, however, arguably something wrong with this painting. Caravaggio has taken the license of showing Thomas touching Jesus’ wounds. The text in the Bible, however, does not record that Thomas ever touched Him. I would argue that he did not need to. When Jesus says “believe,” what He means is “Thomas, accept the fullness of God’s kindness, the boundless mercy of the Father and the assurance of your eternal sonship—a son (or daughter) of the living God!”

Jesus concludes, “Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed” (verse 29). What Jesus means is there is an even more reliable way of overcoming our doubts than physically placing a finger in Jesus’ open wound. Jesus is referring to the gift of the Holy Spirit that is available to us—the Holy Spirit who shares the same heart as Jesus; who with the same kindness, mercy and grace leads us to confess and turn from our own willfulness and, like Thomas, receive the risen Jesus as our Lord and our Savior.

Thomas was a twin. I only noticed that detail in verse 24 recently, and I wondered what happened to the other one. And then it occurred to me that in a way I am that other twin—we all are Thomas’ twin. We all have doubts, and some of them are not very pretty. But nobody who was ever open to the possibility of a relationship with Jesus (albeit ever so slightly open) will ever be disappointed or overlooked. In kindness, mercy and grace, Jesus longs to draw close to the smallest part of our heart—that part that says “I just need something ‘more’…”

The Rev. Drew Williams is senior pastor at Trinity Church in Greenwich.

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