Sermon by Reverend Dr. John W. Mann | April 7, 2024

John 20:19-31

Last year I served on jury duty. At the start of the trial, the case seemed fairly straightforward. Then the attorneys for the prosecution and defense got to work by presenting two very different versions of the events that led to a trial. Who does one believe in that situation?

There were eyewitnesses and character witnesses who told conflicting stories. One witness for the prosecution switched to a witness for the defense. It seemed clear that some people were just outright lying; under oath at that. How do you figure out who is telling the truth, and what the truth even is? That’s where when it’s all said and done, twelve people get together around a table and talk it over and reach a decision which is called the verdict.

The verdict in that case was, “guilty.” Guilty as charged, but I wondered why the charges even led to a jury trial. The defendant never testified, which was his right. At the end when the verdict was read, he began to cry and that made some of the jury members feel bad and even to question their judgement of the case. Did we reach the right conclusion, the truth of the matter?

The state bought us lunch and the judge joined us afterward to talk about the case. He revealed a few facts that didn’t come out in the trial that would have been prejudicial to the outcome. Since we reached the outcome we did, in light of what we didn’t know, we didn’t feel so bad about the defendant’s reaction.

What is the truth of the matter? That’s a big question for the world we live in today. Artificial intelligence, deep fakes, fake news, conspiracy theories abound. It’s not a bad idea to be somewhat skeptical and to ask questions. Do we end up finding the truth or do we end up missing the truth?

Which is why, I guess, I can appreciate Thomas. No matter how many times he comes to the “My Lord and my God” conclusion, he always shows up in the week after Easter like the guy with his fishing pole at “yesterday lake.”

I’ll believe it when I see it. I know, I know, ‘blessed are those who believe without having to see.” John’s gospel was written for all of those people who were trying to make sense of events long after they occurred. It’s the old, “if you want to see Jesus then act like Jesus,” onus that falls on his followers in every time and place. “So send I you,” as it were.

Why was Thomas singled out for his doubts? All of the disciples left Jesus in his hour of need. Peter, who had been so bold in his faith even cursed and swore that he never even knew Jesus. Sure, they all believed in the resurrection once they saw the risen Christ; who wouldn’t? So why pick on Thomas because he wanted the same kind of proof that they already had?

There are many types of people who never experience doubt. If they were on a spectrum, they would fall within two types. At one end of the never experiencing doubt spectrum is a person we call the “fanatic” type. The fanatic is a person who moves from being a fan, an enthusiastic devotee, to being one who always exhibits excessive enthusiasm and unquestioning and uncritical devotion. Fans will invite you along for the pleasure of your company. Fanatics will invite you because they want to convert you into being one like them. Fans enjoy what’s happening; fanatics like to fight about it.

Fanatics are a challenge to be around. They live such a narrowly focused life that nothing else but the fact of their devotion matters. It’s not about the object of their devotion; a fanatic really doesn’t care about the god they worship. It’s about the devotion itself. And of course, no one is as devoted as the fanatic, even other fanatics. The slightest deviation from the cause is enough to cast doubts on the commitment of other fanatics.

Fanatics will go to great length to prove their devotion. Even violence; even murdering innocent people. But to the fanatic no one is innocent. Religious fanatics think God will do the dirty work of destroying the less than true believers. Even though they say their hearts are breaking and that causes them to want to spread the message before it’s too late, you catch a little gleam in their eye, a hope that when Armageddon is unleashed, they will have a seat in the “I told you so” viewing section.

Someone opposite of the fanatic, yet who also never experiences doubt is what we call the “fool. “As the opposite of the fanatic, the fool is care-less. Harboring a feeling such as doubt would mean caring more than the fool cares to care. The structure of the fool’s belief system is careless, whatever happens to feel right for the moment. It really doesn’t matter because they’re all the same. There’s no doubt in the fool’s thinking that all belief systems lack underlying substance.

The fool is not an atheist or an agnostic, because being an atheist or an agnostic means having convictions about things that matter. To the fool, nothing matters, so what’s to doubt? If you want to believe that Elvis is really alive and working at a car wash somewhere in Texas, or that the holocaust never happened, then you go right ahead. Because it is the opinion of the fool, we’ll put that belief system right up there with all the rest.

Yet, at the heart of the fool’s lack of doubt is a very painful reality. Despair. Despair, because the fool says in his heart, or her heart, ‘there is no God.’ And if there is no God, then nothing matters. Not life or love, not laughter or enjoyment, not joy or sorrow. Because if there is no God, then when we die, we just wink out and cease to exist. At least in hell one would have some sense of awareness.

The common ground of the fanatic and the fool is denial. In order to never experience doubt, one has to be so completely sure or so completely indifferent as to deny the slightest possibility of anything that might run contrary to one’s own opinion or perspective.

The writer of Ecclesiastes might have added, “there is a time to doubt and a time to trust.” Faith is simply trust in the face of doubt. You can have faith and doubt and live with trust and experience hope all at the same time. As human beings where we run into trouble is when we start putting ourselves into belief systems that demand absolute consistency. My reading of the Bible tells me that God makes a lot of room for human error and inconsistency; which is a good thing for us.

What kind of a doubter was Thomas and why did Jesus tell him to stop it? On the surface we could say that Thomas was a scientist. The empirical evidence of the resurrection was lacking. Just because other people said they saw Jesus was not proof. Science is not based on anecdotal evidence. It’s not about what people say, it’s about what you can measure through structured testing.

Thomas was like a scientist who said, “I need some solid facts. I might believe what my eyes tell me, but I need to need to put my finger in the nail hole in his hand and my hand in the spear gash in his side. I saw what he looked like when they killed him. He was as dead as dead can be. I require proof.”

That’s the surface reading. Thomas got the proof he needed, so he believed. Jesus told him to stop doubting and believe. But if it were just the surface reading then it would seem that Jesus was setting up a formula of fanaticism. My reading is that he wants faithful followers and not fanatical devotees.

One way to read this story of doubting Thomas is to go beyond the doubt, or the proof that would dispel the doubt, and to see that the heart of the matter was that Thomas required something from God before he would believe. In other words, he felt himself to be entitled. God owed him an explanation.

Jesus was saying, “God doesn’t owe you an explanation. Blessed are those who believe without such a sense of entitlement, because faith isn’t about what God owes you, it’s about what God freely gives you.” Grace, mercy, love, hope and all the other qualities of the kingdom of God are not things that we can merit or earn. We experience God’s intended life as a gift, or we don’t experience it all.

I used to admire folks who seemed sure of their faith. I still do, but now it tends to be for reasons having to do with them being decent human beings more than for their ability to possess a sense of certainty. If certainty doesn’t result in decency, then it isn’t good for much. Which is to say that my faith journey has always been one that has had to muddle along in a perpetual state of trying to figure out what the questions are rather than one where the answers are always at hand.

It’s the difference between taking the leap of faith like Peter was always doing and taking the more round-about route. Peter walked on water, but only for a little while and he needed to be a good swimmer in the end. I’ll take the slow road on solid ground and maybe someday reach the mountaintop. At the least there might be something interesting up ahead. One thing I know for sure, one way or the other, I’ll find out when I get there. Amen.