HEY! I WANT TO BELIEVE!

John 20: 19-31

Tom Faggart

The family was gathered in a country graveyard. Grandmother was being buried. Said, Normal Vincent Peale, it was a lovely day, slight breeze, bright sun, and birds chirping away nearby.

All was quietly still ... as an old country preacher's voice began to say these words:

..."JESUS SAID, I AM THE RESURRECTION AND THE LIFE, HE THAT BELIEVES IN ME THOUGH HE DIE, YET; SHALL HE LIVE. HE WHO BELIEVES IN ME SHALL NEVER DIE."

Dr. Vincent Peale said those words seemed true to him. He believed them. Even as a 10-year-old boy he sensed their power and their value.

He had undergone a very serious operation. Several weeks had passed. Strength had returned. Even though I know I had an operation, he said; its almost like it didn't happen. Sometimes I don't believe it occurred.

The apostle Thomas found himself caught in a wedge somewhere between these two experiences after the death of Jesus Christ. In the morning's lesson we find him dealing with the results.

Frankly, he did not believe! He did not believe Jesus was alive!

And the only way he would believe was to have concrete proof.

THOMAS WANTED VERY MUCH TO BELIEVE.

There are some people who are quick to tell you that they pride themselves on identifying with Thomas. "I'm a skeptic," they say proudly. "I'm from Missouri, you'll have to show me!"

Actually, there are three approaches to doubt.

It is the skeptic who says he or she is a doubter and proud of it. That is a very convenient approach to life. In the name of skepticism, one can avoid making any kind of a commitment.

The second approach is that of a person afraid to doubt at all. A voice inside your head suggests you will fry in hell if you entertain even the slightest doubt that everything you have been taught is not true. This voice usually sounds very much like some parent's or some preacher's.

The group is made up of people like Thomas--and I suspect like you and me. This is the group of people who say with the man who encountered Jesus, "I believe. Help my unbelief." (Mark 9:24)

Thomas was no agnostic. He knew that his Lord had been crucified. He knew that he had been pronounced dead and laid in a borrowed tomb. It was too much to ask him to believe that this same Lord was now alive and appearing to his disciples and friends. It would take more than their wishful assurances to heal Thomas' broken heart. "Unless I see for myself the mark in his hand and place my fingers in his side, I will not believe."

Who among us would condemn him?

HOW MUCH LIKE THOMAS ARE WE!

We, too, would like some physical evidence that God is.

Evidence that is concrete and indisputable.

Woody Allen once asked, "If God does exist, why doesn't He give me some sign--like depositing a million dollars in my name in a Swiss bank?"

Dr. H. H. Farmer once wrote, "If only God would, so to say, sign some of His gifts. If only, like the artist, He would put His signature at the foot of some masterpiece of coloring in the sky."

Many of us have probably had the same wish. Why doesn't God reveal Himself to us in such a way that never again would we have to live in doubt and despair? Perhaps He hides Himself on purpose. Perhaps in order to bring us to spiritual maturity, it is necessary for Him to make faith a challenge.

IF WE SEEK HIM, WE WILL FIND HIM.

That is the promise of the Scripture. He will not forever hide Himself from us. "If with all your heart you truly seek Me, you shall surely find Me." (Jeremiah 29:13)

Thus says our God.

Thomas did. Eight days later he was in a room with the other disciples. The doors were shut and yet Christ appeared to them. "Peace be with you," he said. Then he turned to Thomas and said, "Put your fingers here and see my hands; and put out your hand

and place it in my side. Do not be faithless, but believing."

Thomas answered him, "My Lord and my God."

The late Corrie ten Boom told the story of how as a child she went to her father and said: "Papa, I don't think I have the faith to handle real trouble. I don't know what I'd do if you should die. I don't think I have the faith that some people have to face trouble."

Corrie's father looked at her tenderly and said, "Corrie, dear, when your father says he will send you to the store tomorrow, does he give the money to you today? No, he gives it to you when you are ready to go to the store. And if you are going on a train trip and need money for a ticket, does your father give you the money when we decide you may take the trip?"

No. He gives it to you when you are at the depot, all ready to buy your ticket. Corrie, God treats us the same way. He doesn't give you the faith until you need it. When you do need it. He will certainly give it to you."

Corrie never forgot her father's words, and later her life became a testimony to their truth.

(2) HAVE YOU EVER WONDERED WHAT WOULD HAVE HAPPENED HAD THOMAS BEEN THERE AT THE FIRST APPEARING?

Do you think being surrounded by the disciples and exposed to their faith he would have had the same reaction?

There is something about Group support that is powerful.

Group support is what the church is all about. One of the greatest of New Testament scholars, Dr. C.H. Dodd, said that as the years came and went he found a much greater need in the church to be comforted in the midst of life's sorrows and its sobs.

D. T. Niles told of a member of his congregation whom he met on the street one day. She had been active once but in recent months drifted away. She told Niles that after suffering numerous personal and family problems God had become distant to her. She felt she had lost contact with him.

This was how Niles answered her: "Not only now but even in the future, there will always be times when God seems distant; when it looks as if God has forgotten and does not care; when prayers go unanswered and life is difficult. And at such times you must learn to hold on to your fellow Christians. Your difficulty is that you tried to hold on to God alone, and man was never intended to hold on to God alone."

I cannot tell you how faith will come to you. I can only tell you that once it comes:

YOU WILL GIVE AN OFFERING INSTEAD OF PAYING DUES TO CHURCH.

YOU WILL HAVE A HUNGER TO STUDY, AND KNOW THE BIBLE.

YOU WILL HAVE A SENSITIVITY TO THOSE AROUND YOU.

THE CHURCH WILL BECOME VERY IMPORTANT IN YOUR LIFE FAITH WILL LEAD YOU TO NEW SENSITIVITIES OF YOUR OWN SINS AND SHORTCOMINGS, AND DRIVE YOU TO CONFESSION.

Thirty years later the Peale family was back at the same graveyard. Another country preacher ... this time it was his own mother whom was laid to rest. Generally the same setting. He wondered if the memory of this trip would equal the last.

Then the words began to flow

JESUS SAID, I AM THE RESURRECTION AND THE LIFE; HE THAT BELIEVES IN ME , THOUGH HE DIE ,YET; SHALL HE LIVE. AND HE THAT BELIEVES IN ME SHALL NEVER DIE!

DO YOU BELIEVE THIS?

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1. David McKechnie, EXPERIENCING GOD'S PLEASURE, (Nashville:

Oliver Nelson Publishers, 1989).

2. Robert A. Schuller, POWER TO GROW BEYOND YOURSELF,

(New York: Jove Books, 1987).