April 12, 2026

John 20:19-31

Alleluia, Christ is Risen! He is Risen Indeed. Alleluia!

Nobody knows what to believe anymore. Cause there so much misinformation, so much disinformation. We’ve got fact checkers and counter fact checkers that check the fact checkers. The truth seems very hard to come by. Scammers use Ai to alter photo and voices. For most people their own truth is their own senses. Truth seems hard to come by and faith seems hard to come by. I mean there are a lot a skeptics out there. But I would claim that even the most skeptical person is a person of faith, whether they know that or not. That is how we are made. We are people of faith, we are wired to be dependent people.

Just walk back the events of so far this morning. That alarm went off this morning, maybe you didn’t like what it said (or you said) but you believed it. You hunted around for it and guess what you trusted in that alarm to get you up and it did. You rolled outta bed and got yourself going. You got that coffee, that breakfast and never doubt once that nutritional information on that yogurt or cereal. You’ve had it before, you knew it was alright to eat. You never met those people who wrote it, who packaged it, who delivered it. I mean we are incredible believers. Time for church, you get in that car and you turned that key. You believed it would start right up. You came into church because somebody told you that there would be a service at that time, you just believed it. Here ya are. You just believed it. Human beings are wired to live by faith.

Now what happens when doubt comes into our lives. I mean when we live by faith that means doubt can creep in. If doubt creeps into our lives it starts to control our lives then we can have some really big problems. Now having said a little bit of doubt can be useful, it can be valuable. I took my car in for a simple oil change.  The guy came back, Hey bro, we took a look around and you need some work. Ah ok. That’ll be $800.00. Ahh, I don’t think so. I don’t doubt that I need those things but I doubt your gonna get $800.00. “No thanks, Just an oil change please.” Doubt can be very useful, very valuable but you can start to become so full of doubt, especially spiritually and you don’t trust God and you don’t begin to understand what it is to live by faith.

That’s what happened to Thomas. Thomas will forever be remembered for doubt. Who knows why Thomas wasn’t there when Jesus appeared in that locked upper room. Maybe he was the one designated to go out and get some supplies or maybe he went out to get some information and maybe they drew lots and his lot came up. Or maybe he wasn’t as afraid as the other ones. Thomas was the one who said to Jesus when He was going up to Jerusalem, “Let us all go so we may die with Him.” But we don’t call Thomas “brave” Thomas, no we know him as “doubting” Thomas. Because when the other disciples told him the news of the risen Jesus, he did not believe them. In fact, for a moment that would last for all of history, he went so far as to say, “unless I see the nail marks in his hand and put my finger where the nails were and put my hand into his side, I will not believe it.” Thomas is absolutely adamant, this is not some half-hearted rejection from Thomas. In the original language Thomas’ words have what’s called a double negative…IOW I am emphatically, under no circumstances will believe. I am adamantly opposed to any concept that Jesus is risen from the dead. Thomas went with his normal experience. His rational, default understanding…this is misinformation and disinformation, this is fake news if I ever heard fake news because dead men don’t rise. Certainly Jesus couldn’t be in the room because His body is locked behind some stone somewhere. Good as dead.

Well ya can’t blame Thomas can ya? He’s so much like any of us. It wasn’t that he didn’t want to believe, I don’t think… I’m sure he did. It wasn’t that he didn’t love his Lord… We know he did. But Thomas was a very, very realistic man, he was skeptical. Because dead people simply don’t come back from the grave. No matter how much they are missed. No matter how much they are loved.

So Thomas doubted. He doubted his friends and their report about Jesus. Till one week later, when Jesus comes once again to that locked upper room and stood among His disciples. He simply appears! He says, “peace be with you.” And then Jesus looks directly at Thomas, looks him right in the eye. Alright Thomas, here’s your chance. Those wounds, here they are. And all Thomas could do was simply fall to his knees and say, “My Lord and My God.” And he’s no longer “doubting” Thomas, he got a different adjective. He’s now “believing” Thomas. He’s “confessing” Thomas. He sees and hears and he believes and he confesses. And Thomas, like all believers, has life.

Thomas is not the only doubter, is he? Before Jesus appeared in that upper room, that upper room was filled with doubters.  None of those disciples were believing, they were all doubters. They were doubting too. And the disciples here in this room, this morning, we also are doubters, aren’t we? And our doubts run the gamut from the resurrection to God’s plan for our lives. We doubt the words and promises of Christ. We doubt those hard words of scripture that just bump up against what our culture says and what our culture tells us to believe. We doubt the clear words of scripture that fly in the fact of what mainstream science proclaims. We doubt the perfect demands of the law. We doubt the soothing forgiveness of the gospel. We wanna believe what we wanna believe not what He calls us to believe. And it’s hard, isn’t it? It’s so hard to say “Lord I trust you with all my heart.” It’s hard not to doubt. When our sinful hearts and our sinful minds and our sinful world are all telling us different things so we end up doubting God and His word.

And yet, still God calls us to believe. He calls us to faith. And still God promises a blessing. Remember what Jesus says, “blessed are those who have not seen and yet believe.” That’s you! That’s me. What a far-reaching blessing. Everybody who believes in Jesus today does so without seeing Him, without touching those wounds. Instead, Jesus comes to us through His word. That word gives us faith and that word has a way of strengthening faith and pushing out doubt. God shows us our Savior in that word. He died on the cross to save us from our sins and He gives us the Spirit to work on our hearts to not doubt but to believe. And then so often Jesus gives to us Himself. He fortifies us through that bread and that wine, His very own body and blood. Not only does He strengthen our faith but forgives us our sins! His blood shed on the cross, His body broken on Calvary given for me. Given for you. Given to forgive. Given to strengthen. Given to dispel the doubts. And those gifts lead us to the blessing of a living trust in our God. Gives us the courage not to doubt and somehow, someway by the power of HS, we believe.

I think it’s a beautiful thing to see how Jesus meets Thomas. I don’t think he tells Thomas to stop doubting and believe in order to scold him… Shame on you Thomas, waging His finger. No, I think He meets Thomas with openness and love. I get this picture in my mind. I can see Jesus smiling to the point of laughter. The look of surprise and joy on Thomas when he finally sees that Jesus is alive. He is risen from the dead. I’m convinced that’s the same way God meets us in our doubts. In openness and love He embraces us, He forgives us, He confronts us with His truth, He gives us the word of truth and He invites us to believe. Lovingly, He calls us not to doubt. We do believe, not because we test it or prove it or measure it or evaluate it, but because Christ has come to us in His word and through His sacraments. He has reassured us with His forgiveness, and He has promised us again and again that with eternal life is ours. And so we fall on our knees and we look to the Savior. And we say with Thomas, “My Lord and My God.” Amen.

Now may the peace of God which surpasses all understanding keep our hearts and our minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.