LC BLOG SIDENOTES
3/1/24
“Sidenotes” are those reflections you personally receive while someone is giving a message. They are the whispers from Holy Spirit that aren’t direct note taking from the preaching, but worth noting from the Teacher. They are side sermons, if you will.
Doubting Thomas - or was he?
One of our pastors, Jonathan Parisot, gave a fabulous sermon in our current series called “FOLLOW” recently. Here’s the link:
But I’m not going to CNN this by telling you what he said when you’re smart enough to find out for yourself.
But here’s my little offroad journey as a result of where he took us.
We were reading the familiar story in John 20.
Here’s what it says, just in case it’s not familiar to you.:
Jesus Appears to the Disciples(Luke 24:36–49; 1 John 1:1–4)
19It was the first day of the week, and that very evening, while the disciples were together with the doors locked for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them. “Peace be with you!” He said to them. 20After He had said this, He showed them His hands and His side.
The disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord.
21Again Jesus said to them, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent Me, so also I am sending you.” 22When He had said this, He breathed on them and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit. 23If you forgive anyone his sins, they are forgiven; if you withhold forgiveness from anyone, it is withheld.”
Jesus Appears to Thomas
24Now Thomas called Didymus,d one of the Twelve, was not with the disciples when Jesus came. 25So the other disciples told him, “We have seen the Lord!”
But he replied, “Unless I see the nail marks in His hands, and put my finger where the nails have been, and put my hand into His side, I will never believe.”
26Eight days later, His disciples were once again inside with the doors locked, and Thomas was with them. Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you.”
27Then Jesus said to Thomas, “Put your finger here and look at My hands. Reach out your hand and put it into My side. Stop doubting and believe.”
28Thomas replied, “My Lord and my God!”
29Jesus said to him, “Because you have seen Me, you have believed; blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.”
Jonathan made the point that maybe Thomas got a bad rap when someone decided to label him “doubting Thomas” back in the day. Jonathan said “Doubt is not a feeling to fear, but an invitation to follow.”
(Love that.)
Then the download happened. I wrote in my sermon notes, “Jesus, doubt is inevitable. I have a brain. (It doubts what it doesn’t understand.) I only ask that you rise up to be more real than my doubt.”
I also noted that doubt is a lack of peace.
Jonathan made the point that Thomas was not WITH his fellow disciples when Jesus appeared. Again, listen to his sermon for yourself, but that made me go back and read it again while Jonathan continued on.
Thinking about what Thomas missed out on when he wasn’t with them when Jesus showed up unexpectedly had me reading this passage through different eyes. Talk about FOMO. But seriously, I think maybe that group of friends weren’t as hard on Thomas as we might think. After all, they’re the same guys who didn’t believe the women who ran back from the tomb saying Jesus was risen, right? We could, in all honesty, label them the Doubting Disciples.
But there’s this one crucial detail I had seriously never seen! Actually two. They are both right here in this verse. So here it is again.
19It was the first day of the week, and that very evening, while the disciples were together with the doors locked for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them. “Peace be with you!” He said to them. 20After He had said this, He showed them His hands and His side.
First of all, it would be extremely hard to believe this apparition was the real Jesus. Jesus went beyond any sense of reality they had available to them up that point. Fear keeps us from recognizing things as well. Especially when there is no frame of reference for your brain to use. None. Your mind would go into doubt/fear mode immediately. And that would be an understatement. So the very first thing Jesus, The Prince of Peace, says is, “Peace be WITH you!” He was giving them - HIMSELF! He IS our peace, right?
In my notes, I wrote
Doubt = lack of peace. Prince of Peace, take authority in this area of my life.
So there’s that. Who am I to point fingers at a man who had just watched his idol, his hero, his literal savior die. Really die. Beaten to a bloody unrecognizable pulp and hung up in public to go through the slowest, most humiliating death imaginable - all because he was falsely accused.
Yeah. I’d want proof.
My word for the year is “peace.”
I don’t mean the whimpy passive lack of difficulty peace. I mean the powerful, still waters run deep, Jesus the Prince of Peace kind of peace. The kind of peace He offers as the first thing out of His mouth as the resurrected miracle that he is.
I could write so much more about that. Maybe later. But I’m itching to get to the “ah hah” that made me want to blog this post.
Read vs 20 yet again. What do you notice that nobody talks about?
The disciples were hiding in fear of real danger. Hiding from the authorities who had rolled a stone over the grave in their own fear. So at this moment in both physical and spiritual history, the world’s atmosphere was charged with the enemy’s presence which always smells like fear.
And into that fear, Jesus appears. He doesn’t knock. He doesn’t have to.
The first thing he says is Peace be WITH you.
AND THEN!!!
He shows the disciples his hands and his side!
What?!
How have I missed this?! And why is it so riveting to me, you might be asking.
Well, the truth is that when the disciples were relating their first hand meet up with Almighty God, their hero, their best friend, the restorer of all dead hope, can’t you just imagine at least one of them would say, “No, Tom. It was really him! He showed us His hands and his feet! The scars are there! “
And then - in that context of being told something the world had never ever seen before - it would be perfectly normal to think your friends had smoked something. It would be perfectly normal to say, “Well unless I personally touch his hand and feel his side so I know for myself what you saw wasn’t something fake, then I won’t believe it.” I other words, unless Jesus showed up the same way for him as He did for Thomas’ friends, he was having a hard time swallowing the impossible.
Then, Jesus shows up again only this time Thomas was there. It’s very natural to stay in the place of encountering something amazing, just in case it happens again. We go back to that perfect sunset viewing spot. We revisit the park where the light came through the trees in a magical way. Apparently they all stayed close by, including Thomas. Maybe they were afraid they would miss out again. They hadn’t yet been filled with the Holy Spirit. They didn’t yet know that Jesus would dwell in them from now on.
I don’t know. I can only wonder. But when Jesus did show up again, the one thing that is clear is that Jesus doesn’t accuse Thomas.
He easily could have said, “Hey. I don’t repeat myself. You should have been here, but you’ll just have to get over it.” Or instead of saying, “Peace be with you,” Jesus could have said, “Be afraid. Be very afraid. I’m all powerful now.” But He didn’t.
But no. Without being asked, Jesus offered the same Peace to Thomas. Himself. Jesus showed Thomas his hands and his side and said, “Go ahead, touch me. I’m real.” Approachable. No censure, only a proclamation of blessing over those who would believe without being able to see. That blessing was spoken over - well - me! Over YOU as you read this right this minute. This blessing was spoken with you in mind!
Sorry, I’m all excited and I’m overusing exclamation points, I know.
As we drove home from church after this sermon, I was telling Rich about what I was beginning to see. I said, “It makes me have more grace for people who haven’t seen Jesus yet. It’s like so many of us when we’re so excited and we gang up on someone with all the best intentions and testify of what we’ve seen of Jesus. We desperately want them to have this great experience like we did. But really, the changing factor is that moment when they see Jesus for themselves. We have to ask for that on their behalf. We have to allow the time it takes for Holy Spirit to meet them for their own “close encounter.”
But we all need the same thing, to see Jesus in a way that pierces through our walls of doubt and fear - of which I have many. We all need to experience how the authority he carries overpowers death itself. We need for Him to show up multiple times until we get - He’s within us. Everywhere. Always. We can exhale and not hold our breath in tension all the time.
***1 Cor overcame death
So please be patient with me if I’m a step behind you in this experience. Jesus will continue to come for me. He is just that loving and patient.
And then, with Thomas, I’ll be undone with the revelation that Jesus is more than just the man with the answers. I’ll fall on my knees beside Thomas with a brand new revelation of who He is.
“My Lord and My God!’
I’ll close off this post now with a tune that is running through my head. Of all his great music for the church, this Chris Tomlin song is one of his more obscure pieces. For the life of me, I can’t understand why it’s not his most famous one. It’s my favorite.
Why? Because Chris is showing us who Thomas saw after he waited in his doubt and fear, wondering if God would show up for him like He seemed to have done for all his friends.
“This is the one we’ve been waiting for.”
Love,
Lydia