Easter2B, April 8, 2018
Acts 4: 32-35, Psalm 133
1 John 1: 1-2:2
John 20: 19-31
St. Thomas the Apostle
The Rev’d Leo Loyola
I proposed to Melody on a December afternoon in a San Francisco courtyard.
We had just met online six months earlier. But, we never actually met in person until a couple of days earlier. We were literally on our first date as I slipped an engagement ring on Melody’s finger.
And, how long did it take for me to decide that she was the one? Would you believe less than a few seconds of first sight?
Now I know what you are thinking…the romantics in the room are probably thinking, “How sweet. That Father Leo is such a romantic.” And, then there are the realists who are thinking, “Are you nuts?” For this second group, I hear you.
If we met in through a more conventional way, we probably would’ve done that, But, I was living in Hawaii and Melody was living and working more than 7,000 miles away in Russia. So meeting after work for drinks was out of the question.
And yet, even without actual physical contact, we gave getting to know each other a shot.
We wrote each other every day. We spent hours talking on the phone long-distance, We learned about each other’s quirks and personalities, our strengths and flaws, or likes and dislikes. Pretty much what people do on actual dates.
And, after six months, we felt ready to finally meet.
I nervously waited for my future wife to arrive at the San Francisco terminal. She smiled at me as she descended down the escalator. Five seconds and I knew I would propose.
Many say that “seeing is believing”. But the reverse is not always true. Believing is not always the result of seeing. As my and Melody’s story can attest, belief can happen even without it.
This brings us to the heart of our Gospel this morning.
For the past couple of days the disciples had locked themselves in a house, fearful of their fate. Perhaps they started to regret their decision to follow Jesus. Who can say? But, when Jesus suddenly appeared before them, showing them his hands and side, the disciples rejoiced. Everyone except for Thomas who hadn’t been at the house at the time.
The disciples were ecstatic: Thomas! Thomas! Thomas! We have great news! We have seen the Lord, and he is alive!
But when Thomas hears this, it’s easy to imagine him staring back at his friends incredulously rolling back his eyes and muttering, “Yeah, right!”
He says this not because he doesn’t want to believe that Jesus is alive again. Of course he wants that. But just because you want something badly enough to be true doesn’t make it so.
He is a realist.
If we were in Thomas’s place. We too would say, “Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hand and put my finger in the mark of the nails and my hand in his side, I will not believe.”
After all, seeing is believing. We don’t live in a fantasy world of magic.
And yet hear Jesus’s words to Thomas: “Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.”
Like Thomas, we go through life wanting to believe. But we never had the benefit of standing before the risen Christ himself, examining the wounds where the nails pierced through.
We need something firm to plant out feet upon. We need something before we are willing to risk or change our ways. Much less give a strong maybe to Christ.
How then can we even conceive of Christ when our lives seem to be shaped more by science and politics than religion? When our lives in the present day witness great evils winning out over the good at time.
If it’s difficult for us, consider the difficulty for those who have never yet heard of Jesus.
As unsatisfying as it might seem, faith is simply a choice we make. We choose to see what we cannot see. We choose to live in a way that might seem foolhardy or meaningless to some. We cling to a hope that doesn’t seem apparent at times.
We refuse to allow ourselves to grow disillusioned or discourages by what we can see in this world today … and because of this, we are blessed.
I find this passage from Hebrews particularly timely:
Faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see. This is what the ancients were commended for…All these people were still living by faith when they died. They did not receive the things promised; they only saw them and welcomed them from a distance, admitting that they were foreigners and strangers on earth. People who say such things show that they are looking for a country of their own. If they had been thinking of the country they had left, they would have had opportunity to return. Instead, they were longing for a better country – a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared a city for the.
May we share in the confidence of the ancients. May we choose to believe even what we cannot yet see.
