 |
| Doubting Thomas - Artist unknown |
TO CHEW ON: “Then He said to Thomas, ‘Reach your finger here and look at My hands; and reach your hand here, and put it into My side. Do not be unbelieving but believing.’” John 20:27
Skeptics - we all have them in our lives. These are people whose response to our incredible good news is a sarcastic, “Yeah, right.” People whose questioning attitude leads us more gullible types to parts of the issue we hadn’t thought of or cared to face: “Are you sure they’re legit? So how much time is this going to take? And they’re going to pay you what?”
I can just see Thomas after hearing the account of the Emmaus disciples, his voice high with incredulity, “And you believed it was Jesus just because of the way He looked when He prayed?” Here he responds to the report of a Jesus sighting with “Unless I see the nail prints in His hands, the hole in His side and touch them, I will not believe.”
Belief is an interesting thing, in that built into its very definition is faith.
1. To accept something as true or real.
2. To credit with veracity.
3. To accept the truth, existence, worth etc. of something.
4. To have confidence or place one’s trust in something.
Thomas wanted a very tiny leap of faith. He wanted very little space between what his senses assured him was true and his belief system. Jesus complied and appeared to the disciples when Thomas was there. He invited Thomas to assure himself of His identity with his own eyes and hands. In His invitation, Jesus also chided him, “ 'Do not be unbelieving, but believing.' ” It’s as if He was saying, “Even with this proof you will need some measure of faith. It is your choice to believe.”
All of us, whether people of religious faith or not base our lives on beliefs. All of us have to some extent insisted on a measure of touching and seeing before we accept something as true. If we have chosen to believe the God of the Bible, whether we’ve seen Him at work close range or second-hand, the challenge to us remains “ 'Do not be unbelieving, but believing.' ” It’s a matter of informed and deliberate choice. In what or whom have you chosen to believe?
PRAYER: Dear Jesus, I believe in You – in Your word, the Bible, in Your death and resurrection for me, and the hope of a future with You. Amen.
MORE: Charles Price in his television program “Living Truth” gave a 45-minute lecture on Thomas and doubt based on this very incident. The You-Tube below is a teaser for that talk. Below that are instructions on how to get the entire talk as a transcript.
Struggling With Doubt That Leads To Life In Jesus Christ - Charles Price Truth Bytes
Download a transcript of Charles' Price's entire message on doubting Thomas HERE (pdf file).
The Living Truth website also offers the possibility of selecting weekly telecasts to watch online HERE.
Do your 8-12-year-olds have daily devotions? Point them to Bible Drive-Thru.
