[Read John 20: 24-29]
When We Doubt
John 20: 24-29
If you reach in your pocket, your purse or your wallet, and pulled out a coin or paper money, and you looked at it, it wouldn’t take you long to find the phrase “In God We Trust” printed on the face of it.
But you don’t have to believe that phrase to use that money, do you? I understand they are supposed to be producing a new $1 coin that doesn’t have it printed on the front or the back, but has it on the edge. I guess that’s an attempt to be politically correct, or to satisfy those who cry out about separation of church and state, without actually getting rid of it—yet.
So you don’t have to believe in God to use that money. As a matter of fact, many people trust in technology. How many of you have ever been typing on the computer at work, and the computer just froze up, and you had to turn it off to clear the memory, so you lost what you were working on? People trust in medical science, but, as advanced as our medical knowledge as care has come, it simply cannot deal with every circumstance. Some people trust in human counsel—we’ve all read the “Dear Abby” and “Ann Landers” columns in the newspapers from people looking for advice. We trust in social programs, They have grown tremendously over the years. There’s a lot of people who need help, some who abuse them, and some who need help, but can’t legally get it. Some people trust in their own intuition or abilities to face life. I was recently reminded of a man who built his own floating island off the coast of Cancun, Mexico, out of empty, plastic bottles. He put the bottles in bags and tied them together, and spiraled them around, tying them together. He could keep adding to them. He put poles across the bottles, and laid down plywood, then, he started bringing dirt in, and he planted different kinds of plants and vegetables, and bushed and small trees. He built a house, and raised chickens, and became self-sufficient. It was so sturdy, it lasted through a couple of hurricanes. It was finally destroyed in a hurricane, but he’s back at it again.
We trust in any number of things and people, and many times, we’re let down, aren’t we. We can even put our trust in God, and sometimes we believe that He let’s us down, don’t we? All you have to do is go to the book of Psalms, and you will find David himself, a man after God’s own heart, cry out things like:
How long, O Lord, until you restore me?
O Lord, why do you stand so far away? Why do you hide when I need you the most?
He’s so frustrated one time, he said, “Wake up, my God, and bring justice!”
The disciples experienced the same thing with Jesus. Here’s the Messiah—the One who’s supposed to deliver them and make them a free nation again. And he’s arrested, beaten, hung on a cross to die, and buried in a tomb. This wasn’t supposed to happen!
So when the women brought back word that Jesus was alive that Easter morning, they thought their story was nonsense. They didn’t believe it. Peter went to the tomb, saw it was empty, and went home wondering what had happened. Of course, Jesus appeared to them that night, and they believed. Thomas wasn’t with them that night, though. They began to tell Thomas, “We’ve seen the Lord!” And Thomas acted the same way toward them that they had acted toward the women. He said, “You’re talking nonsense. I don’t believe it!” He went so far as to say, “Unless I see the places where the nails were in His hands and touch them, and feel the place in His side where the spear went through, I’ll never believe it!”
Thomas doubted. The disciples had doubted. David in the Psalms doubted.
God came to Moses and said, “I’ve heard the cries of my people, and I’m going to deliver them from slavery in Egypt. So, Moses, I’m going to send you to deliver them.” And Moses said, “Wait a minute, Lord. Who will I say sent me? And What’s Your name? and What if they don’t believe me? And I don’t speak very well.” Finally, Moses just said, “Lord, I think You’ve got the wrong guy. You need to pick somebody else.” He doubted God.
God came to Abraham and Sarah and said, “You’re going to have a son,” and Sarah laughed at God. It’s like she was saying, “God, do you really know how old I am? You’ve got to be out of Your mind!” She doubted.
Having doubts is not a sin. Doubt is the natural response to certain circumstances or statements, based on the information that we have or don’t have. For example, there are people that I’m sure you know, and it doesn’t matter what they say, you don’t believe them; you don’t trust them. You doubt what they say to be true. Then, you may have times when people who have been pretty reliable, but the news that they’re telling you seems unbelievable. This is where Thomas is, I think. I mean, he’s been with these guys for three years; he could trust them. But I’m sure he was probably thinking, “If Jesus died the way John and the women who were there said—that He’d been beaten to a bloody mess, nailed to a cross to die, a spear stuck through his heart. Nobody’s coming back from that. I just can’t believe it!”
The next Sunday night rolled around, and Thomas was there with the disciples behind locked doors. And Jesus appeared, and spoke to him, using the very words he had said to the disciples. “Come here, Thomas. Touch where the nails went through my hands. Put your hand where the spear went through my side. Don’t be faithless anymore. Believe!”
And Thomas believes. ”My Lord and my God,” he says.
The story about Thomas that has been passed down through the years is that he went as far away as India, telling people about Jesus, who died for their sins, and was raised from the dead. And the story goes that he died because of his faith in Jesus.
So, here we are 2000 years later, and everybody in this room would probably say, “I was raised in church all my life. I’ve been taught that Jesus died on the cross for my sins and rose from the dead. I believe it. I don’t doubt it a bit. Thomas’ doubting the resurrection has nothing to do with me.”
Well, if that issue is settled for you, that’s great. But you remember I was talking about all those things we put our trust in, and they let us down? People-husbands, wives, children, grandchildren, parents grandparents, bosses, coworkers. Organizations—where we work, schools, government, church. Things—medicine, technology, cars, stocks, and so on.
Well, when things and people and groups let us down, there’s the potential for us to begin to ask the question: God, why did You let this happen to me? Or more directly, God, why did You do this to me? Or God, if You really cared, this wouldn’t have happened.
When Lazarus died, what did both Mary and Martha say to Jesus when He arrived? “Lord, if You had been here, our brother would not have died.” This can begin the doubting of what God is doing. (John 11)
I’ve told this before, but in Montana, I was working at a ranch. I was called in one day and was told I was being laid off THAT day. “God, if You had been here and cared, this would not have happened.”
A couple years later in South Dakota, the phone rang at about 6 in the morning, and in a minister’s house, when the phone rings that early, it’s almost never good news. It wasn’t that day. Beverly’s (my wife) mother was on the other end of the line telling me that Beverly’s brother had been killed in a trucking accident during the night. “God, if You had been there, this would not have happened.”
I’m sure you probably know someone who has turned away from God, because something happened in their lives that either God did not stop from happening, or God didn’t make it happen the way they wanted it to happen.
You see, THAT’S where Thomas is. “God, if You had been here, Jesus wouldn’t have died, and would have been the Messiah we were looking for, to lead us against the Romans, and give us back our freedom.”
And THERE is the problem—when what WE want is NOT what GOD wants.
You see, God didn’t want them delivered from the Romans; God wanted to deliver them from their sin, which is what He’s wanted ever since the Garden of Eden.
What they wanted was not what God wanted. And THAT is when doubts can come. When God begins to DO something that’s contrary to what we want Him to do, or He begins to do it in a way that is contrary to the way we think He ought to do it, doubts can come.
Those kinds of things are going to happen, so the question for us is this: How do we keep from allowing the doubting questions to pull us away from God?
1. We need to love God. We throw that word and that phrase, “I love God,” around so much that it doesn’t really mean what God wants it to mean. Our love for God needs to be more evident than the love we have for any other person in this world. When we love someone, we trust them, don’t we? When our love for God is more evident than our love for anyone else, we will trust Him when things happen that we don’t understand. We may still have the questions, but we will trust that God is in control, and knows what He’s doing, and is doing it to accomplish what He wants to get done.
2. We need to know God better. Folks, if the doubting questions come because what we want is not what God wants, then, we need to get to know what God wants, and we need to get to know how He works to bring about what He wants. So, when something happens that we aren’t expecting, we can begin to look at it the way God looks at it. When we know God and what He wants, and how He works, we will trust Him when we don’t understand.
I’m sorry, but there is no excuse good enough for someone in this country today not to be able to get to know God better. There’s free education to teach us how to read. Bibles are in abundance, and can be purchased or obtained freely. If a person can’t read, they never learned or they’re blind or something, there are audio Bibles available. We can get to know God better.
And it’s those two things-loving God and knowing God-that will help us to trust Him when things happen that we don’t understand.
