April 18, 2004

Second Sunday of Easter

John 20:19-31  

"Believing Is Seeing" 

     So what’s the difference between an atheist and a Christian?  For an atheist, doubts stagnate.  For a Christian, doubts motivate!   The author, Frederick Beuchener, says that doubts are the “ants-in-the-pants” of faith!  Faithful people aren’t comfortable sitting still with their doubts but get up and try to find the answers.

     That’s why I think “Doubting Thomas” should have his name changed.  Call him “Ants-In-The-Pants Thomas” or maybe “Faithful Thomas”, the disciple with insatiable curiosity, the one who wouldn’t rest until he found the answers.

     I think poor Thomas has gotten a bum rap.  I really don’t understand why he’s been looked down upon all these years - he’s the only disciple with enough courage to express what they were probably all thinking.  The idea that their teacher, dead for a couple days could get up and walk out of the tomb was simply unbelievable.  You might remember from the resurrection story read in church last Sunday that when the women ran to tell the disciples what they had seen, the response was that the women were telling an “idle tale”.  In other words, the disciples called them liars.  Later, of course, most of the disciples had the privilege of being visited by the Lord personally, so that sort of quieted the “idle tale” accusation.  And I hope the women were then quick to say something like, “See, told you so!”

     You might also remember that the disciples were behind locked doors when all this happened because they were scared out of their wits that what happened to Jesus would also happen to them.  They imagined signs in the post office with their pictures on them and the words, “Wanted, crucified or alive!”

     So why wasn’t Thomas there?  Did they send him out to Dunkin Donuts for coffee?  Or was he the only one brave enough to go outside?  Was he the only one faithful enough to get out there and look for the answers?  That’s what I think. 

     Thomas was a really curious guy.  He wanted answers to everything.  In John 14, for instance, Jesus speaks to his disciples about his Father’s house having many rooms or mansions and going there to prepare a place for them.  Thomas is the one who stops the Lord and asks for answers.  He says something like, “Whoa…wait a minute!  Just what are you talking about?  How can we get to this place?”  Jesus answered him, “I am the way, the truth and the life.”  You can bet that’s what Thomas was searching for the day he left the other disciples safely behind locked doors – the way, the truth and the life.

     Is this what you are searching for?  Do you have the ants-in-the-pants of faith?  Do your doubts stagnate or motivate?  Doubts can be a good thing.  They can inspire us to seek the truth.

     In a few minutes we’re going to do something really important – we’re going to have a Big Coffee!  After that, we’ll have a congregational meeting, too.  At that meeting, we’ll vote on whether or not we want to overhaul our administrative structure and adopt the Inspiration-Based Ministry model.  Notice that I didn’t say it is the Now-I’ve-Got-All-The-Answers Ministry model.  It’s an ants-in-the-pants model of ministry.  It’s for people seeking the truth, not those content with sitting behind closed doors, holding on to what they once knew. 

     Inspiration-Based Ministry, by its very nature, makes a statement about how we see faith – it’s a work in progress.  This will be a way for us to seek Christ’s answers together and allow our church, our lives to be directed by what we find.  Inspiration-Based Ministry doesn’t shame us for our doubts – it welcomes them and encourages us to do something with them.

     What I really like about the Doubting Thomas story is the way Jesus handles him.  Jesus doesn’t chastise Thomas, but welcomes him, beckons him to come closer, close enough to touch the resurrection, to touch eternity with the tips of his own fingers.  I don’t see anywhere in the story where Jesus made the same invitation to anyone else.  Even when Mary Magdalene fell at his feet in the garden to worship him, he told her not to touch him because he had not yet “ascended to the Father”.  Why not?  Had she not doubted enough yet?  Had she not sought him enough yet?  Was she not ready?  Evidently, Thomas was ready.  Jesus brought him closer than anyone else had been.

     That’s what doubts can do for you.  They can ready your spirit.  They can bring you close to Jesus.  They can make you uncomfortable with what you do or do not know and if you’ll allow them to stir your heart, can lead you to greater truth. 

     Never thought doubts were such a blessing, did you?  They’re a gift before it is unwrapped.   

     I forget who said it, but I don’t mind repeating it: “Heaven is one of those places you can only get into heart first.”  I like that.  We tend to think we can think ourselves into every place we need to go.  In fact, one of the great hallmarks of the Congregational tradition is that it is an intellectual faith – we’re supposed to use our heads!  But even so, even for Congregationalists, there is that place where a leap of faith is required, that place we can’t think our way through.  We just have to trust the way, the truth and the life.

     It’s like the cartoon where several men in white lab coats are standing around another scientist at a chalkboard.  The board is filled with numbers and mathematical symbols and there’s an equals-sign at the right hand side and an answer at the end of the equation.  But one of the scientists is scratching his head and saying, “Um…Flanders…about your central calculation…”  And there, in the middle of the blackboard between two long strings of numbers, Mr. Flanders has written into his equation these words, “And then, a miracle happens!”

     Christians don’t have a problem with equations like that.  There’s that place where we trust God to fill the gap, where we trust that the Lord is the way, the truth and the life.

     That’s where we’re heading with Inspiration-Based Ministry.  We’ll have to trust the Lord and we’ll have to trust each other and I guarantee you, there will be plenty of times where we’ll step back and scratch our heads and wonder how in the world we get from here to there! 

…By seeking the answers, searching for truth.  Jesus said,

“Ask, and it will be given you; search, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened for you.”

     If you have doubts about this Inspiration-Based Ministry thing, then I say, “Good for you!”  What you do with your doubts will make all the difference.  If in the end you find yourself closer to the Lord, then be thankful for those ants in your pants!