So that those who have not yet seen…

Job 42:1-6 Psalm 35:22-28 Revelation 1:4-8 John 20:19-31

So that those who have not yet seen…

Have you ever spent some time reflecting on the wonder of sight? It is a marvellous gift, isn’t it? It is so multi-faceted and multi-dimensional. But the gift of sight goes beyond the physical ability to see with our eyes. We instinctively know that there are more dimensions to our existence than the tangible world. Even our speech indicates our understanding regarding the scope of the word “sight”…we speak of things being insightful…of someone exercising foresight…of neglect as being an oversight…of a re-evaluation brought on by hindsight…as someone who doesn’t think things through as being short-sighted. And so on…

But the one thing that unites all thought on the word “sight” is that it demands a response. What we see…whether physically or intuitively…cannot be ignored. We must act on the evidence before us. Whether sight elicits a gasp of wonder at the beauty of a spectacular sunset, or a cry of anguish at the sight of a bloody accident…there is always some form of response.

Years ago, an author by the name of Josh McDowell wrote a book entitled “Evidence that Demands a Verdict”. You may have read it. He also published a more popular version by the name of “More Than a Carpenter” using the same evidence. Whatever you may think of the book – as you can imagine it is rather controversial depending on where you place yourself on the scale of atheist to believer – the title is…dare I say…insightful. Just for interest’s sake, an American author by the name of Lee Strobel also wrote a book along the same lines called “The Case for Christ”. 

But the reason I have referred to the title of McDowell’s book is because if you witness an event personally, you are what we call an eyewitness, meaning you actually saw the event with your own eyes. This gives you a certain authority as you are directly linked to whatever it is that you observed. But depending on the nature of the event, someone may ask you to tell them what you witnessed, and then there is a certain level of obligation. The fact that you saw it, demands some sort of response…a telling or an explanation.

Now, there are many biblical characters who saw God, either physically with their own eyes, or intuitively through theophanies, visions, dreams, or an inner-sensory experience. Adam and Eve, Cain and Abel, Enoch, Noah and his family, Abraham and Sarah, Hagar, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, Moses, Joshua, Manoah and his wife, and many more…including Job.

We all know about the sufferings of Job, but for the sake of today’s talk, I want to focus on what Job said in response to the Lord’s challenge to his demand to know the reasons for his ordeal. “I know that you can do all things,” Job said, “and that no purpose of yours can be thwarted…I have uttered what I did not understand, things too wonderful for me, which I did not know. I had heard about you…but now (and listen carefully) now my eye sees you…and I despise myself and repent in dust and ashes.” In effect what Job was saying is that God’s self-declaration or self-revelation (although not an answer to Job’s many questions about the purpose of his suffering), caused him to “see” God…to comprehend God on a completely higher level than before…and to respond appropriately – with humble repentance. Before his ordeal, he knew about God in a theoretical sense…but now, after his ordeal, he knew God through personal experience…a knowing that transcended logic…reason…understanding. This was a knowing that I know that I know kind of knowing. 

In many ways, it's the kind of knowing that is required of followers of Jesus. We walk by faith, not by sight, Paul wrote to the Corinthians. For this reason, poor old Thomas has borne the brunt of many a scathing rebuke aimed at those who demand tangible proof for belief. Down through the ages, red-faced, spittle flying preachers have accused him of having a “seeing is believing” attitude. But I would like to sound a voice of caution here. 

“Seeing” Jesus was clearly not the problem here as Mary Magdalene and the other female disciples had seen him, Peter and the nine other male disciples had seen him, the Emmaus disciples had seen him…and they believed because they had seen him. Remember, Peter and John were eyewitnesses to the empty tomb…they had also heard the testimony of the women and the Emmaus travellers who had seen Jesus…but according to Luke, when Jesus appeared to them in the Upper Room, they were terrified because they thought they were seeing a ghost. It was also not even the seeing and touching of the wounds of Jesus that seemed to be the problem with Thomas as Jesus allowed the others to touch him to prove that He was flesh and bones. 

So, what was Thomas’ error? Well, I think Thomas’ unbelief was more than a simple need for physical proof. Bear with me as I walk you through my reasoning. 

Firstly, where was Thomas when Jesus met with the others? Why was he not gathered together with them in the Upper Room? Where was he? Why was he not locked away for “fear of the Jews” like the others? Could it be that he had capitulated following the death of Jesus? Was he perhaps trying to put the past three years behind him…time he may have viewed as filled with nothing more than idealistic dreams…and was he perhaps trying to reconnect with his old life, seeking out old friends, attending the synagogue, and confessing his errors to the Rabbis? Was he being bullied by family and friends to recant what they would have perceived as madness? Did he perhaps believe the lies of the Sanhedrin? The lies spread by the guards…that Jesus’ disciples had come in the night and had stolen the dead body? He clearly doubted the testimony of his believing friends, not so? Did he think that they were hiding something from him…that they were lying and not the soldiers? 

Now, of course, this is pure speculation on my part, but I have a reason for taking you down this path. The First Century readers of the Gospel of John would not have missed the clear reference to Psalm 35:23 in Thomas’ declaration. In Psalm 35, David cried out to God for deliverance from those who were threatening him. “You have seen, O Lord,” David wrote. “Do not be silent! O Lord, do not be far from me! Wake up! Bestir yourself for my defence, for my cause, my Lord and my God! Vindicate me, my Lord and my God, according to your righteousness, and do not let them rejoice over me.”

Was Thomas being hounded by those who demanded an explanation for his loyalty to a dead messiah? Was his cry of confession in the Upper Room also a cry for vindication? You were asleep! You were dead! I cried out to you throughout the arrest, trial, crucifixion…but I saw them embalm your dead body and lay you in a tomb. You were dead. How could I defend myself? All my questioning remained unanswered. My friends accused me…they told me I had been duped for three years! Even Judas did not believe you to be the messiah! What could I say? That I believed in a resurrection? Look, I said, there is no body in the tomb. Your so-called friends, Jesus’ disciples stole him at night, they retorted. But the women said they saw him, I objected. Women? Who believes the words of women? But the disciples said they saw him, even Peter. But of course they would say that…what else could they say? Do you think they would have shown you his decomposing corpse? 

But there Jesus stood…as large as life. Thomas could see him with his own eyes. And what he saw demanded a response. Either he was hallucinating together with 120 other people gathered together in that Upper Room…or this was an imposter…but he wasn’t…he looked like Jesus, talked like Jesus, had wounds like Jesus…He was Jesus. 

A Scottish Preacher by the name of John Duncan famously said that Christ either deceived mankind by conscious fraud, or He was Himself deluded and self-deceived, or He was Divine. “There is no getting out of this trilemma,” he said. “It is inexorable.” C. S. Lewis popularised this trilemma on a BBC radio talk when he stated that either Jesus was a lunatic, a liar, or he was who He said he was, the Divine Lord. When fairly examined, Lewis pointed out, the evidence contained in the Gospels cancelled out the possibility of him being anything other than the Lord. He said, and I quote:

“I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: I'm ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don't accept his claim to be God. That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic — on the level with the man who says he is a poached egg — or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God, or else a madman or something worse. You can shut him up for a fool, you can spit at him and kill him as a demon or you can fall at his feet and call him Lord and God, but let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about his being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to. ... Now it seems to me obvious that He was neither a lunatic nor a fiend: and consequently, however strange or terrifying or unlikely it may seem, I have to accept the view that He was and is God.”

Thomas was not the first and certainly not the last to grapple with the overwhelming evidence that supported the claims of Scripture. But as far as he was concerned, before this appearance of Jesus, the evidence pointed in the opposite direction. Jesus was very much dead. He had seen that. He believed that. But what he believed was a lie and that is what I believe was Thomas’ error. He backed the wrong horse, so to speak. He trusted the wrong evidence. He listened to the wrong advice…and, unlike our friend Job, he succumbed to the pressure. 

He should have believed what Jesus had taught them…that He would be murdered and buried but that he would rise again on the third day. He should have believed the witness of those whom he had come to know as trustworthy friends. He should have believed the Scriptures as expounded by Jesus. But he surrendered to the clamouring voices of the world. It’s not possible. Prove it. Show me. I want to see. 

A W Tozer once said that “You can see God from anywhere if your mind is set to love him and obey him.” Perhaps it is not the lack of sight that hinders us in our own personal witness to Jesus as much as the lack of will. “Seeing” is not really the problem, is it? All will see him, John said in Revelation…even those who killed him…and they will mourn as they see him coming to judge their misjudgement.

John concluded his Gospel by saying that he had written what he had seen for those who had not yet seen. In other words, what he had witnessed demanded a response…he was obliged to tell others what he believed to be true. I am entrusted with a responsibility, Paul later wrote, to preach the Gospel. In spite of the hardship I endure, in spite of the persecution, the ridicule, the humiliation, I must witness to the truth of the Gospel because it is the power of God for the good of mankind. I cannot but tell because what I have seen is not simply Good News to make individuals happy…it is Good News that can and must change the world. 

Scripture has been subjected to more rigorous examination than any other historical document and yet it has never been discounted. In fact, archaeological findings repeatedly vindicate what has been recorded in Scripture. It is not that we are lacking evidence, is it? We have access to more “proof” than any other generation before us…what more do we need?

 In this light, perhaps the words of Jesus to Thomas echo in our own ears: Have you believed because you have seen me? Because you have irrefutable proof? Because you have evidence that will satisfy those who challenge your faith? Blessed are those who believe me because they love me and choose to obey me.

Let us pray.

© Johannes W H van der Bijl 2022