Scripture:
John 20:19-31

Theologian Karl Barth, the nemesis of all seminarians with his dense prose and even denser books suitable for door stops, is best remembered for his theological answer to the question: "Would you summarize your theology?" To which he replied: "Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so!" He is also remembered for another pithy statement about why people go to church. He said what brings them to worship is the question, "Is it true?" This is the question not only on our minds, but apparently on the minds of the disciples as they processed the evidence of the empty tomb.

In examining the scriptures and the reactions of the disciples to the news of the empty tomb, there appears to be more disbelief than belief in those eight days from Easter to this Sunday, the day John tells us that Thomas came to believe. In Luke 24:11 it is recorded that the women who had been told by the angels at the tomb that "He is risen" went to tell the other disciples. Luke records: "But these words seemed to them to be an idle tale, and they did not believe them." In the passage immediately preceding the one I just read from John 20:19-31, we are told that Mary Magdalene did not believe, even as she mistook Jesus for a gardener, until she heard his voice calling her. Then she believed and ran to tell the disciples, who it must be inferred did not believe as they were huddled in the Upper Room where Jesus appears to them and shows them his scars. They do not believe until they see.

Then we come to Thomas, one of my favorite disciples, the ever-skeptical Missourian with an attitudee - "Show me!" Notice he does not accept the testimony of his closest companions and friends as he almost defiantly states: "I will not believe, unless I see and touch the wounds." Thomas seems to be asking: "Is it true? I mean really, really true?" Notice Jesus, rather than scold him for his disbelief, takes him where he is and invites Thomas to touch his wounds. Jesus is willing once again to be vulnerable to invite the intimacy of touching his wounds. From the invitation we have Thomas' aha moment when he proclaims: "My Lord and my God."

I especially like Thomas because of his uncompromising honesty. He refuses to say he understands what he doesn't understand, and he refuses to say he believes what he does not believe. This episode gives us permission to doubt along with Thomas. The British poet laureate Alfred Lord Tennyson wrote: "There lives more faith in honest doubt, believe me, than in half the creeds."

Over the past eight days, from Easter to today, the gospels record differing paths to faith and belief. Some do not believe until they hear. Some do not believe until they see. Others, like Thomas, do not believe until they have tangible proof. The gospels seem to be saying we can come to belief through a variety of sensory experiences in addition to the intellectual. Thomas I suspect, does what a lot of us would like to do, namely, have concrete proof, hard evidence. None of this hearsay stuff. Let's be rational. The many quests for the historical Jesus over the past 150 years seem to be focused on finding the evidence, the Jesus Seminar being but the most recent example.

William Willimon, Professor of Theology at Duke Divinity School, quotes a graduate student at a faith and science conference as saying: "As a scientist, I have learned to deal with the world in a purely rational way. Christianity is inherently irrational. There is no way to sidestep the utter irrationality of most of the key events upon which Christianity is based." This student perhaps never realized how right he/she was. You can't sidestep the irrationality of Christianity and the resurrection. That is, in fact, the source of its strength and power. Where would hope be if God wasn't powerful enough to do the irrational, to turn the world upside down, to heal hurts in the midst of pain, to triumph over death, to ensure that the last shall be first, the lowly shall triumph?

The Easter story is irrational. Would you have it any other way? There is no way to prove it by 20th century categories of evidence. Should we disbelieve because it doesn't fit our neat human constructs? Of course not!

Last week, our preacher and resident theologian posed a provocative question in his Easter sermon: "How can I get you to believe it?" He goes on to say: "Which is not easy if your heart/head be not inclined in the direction of belief. God's job, the raising part, is easier than my job, the convincing part. Sometimes I wish God and I could switch jobs. Not because I necessarily want to do the raising, but because there are times when I wish I could get out of the way and let God do the convincing."

He goes on later to proclaim that, from experience, he believes down to the core of his being. His experience with people in times of joy, pain, suffering, even death, are the moments when God is manifest.

From the preacher's plaintive cry of last week to Thomas' skepticism this week, we have been treated in the media to a belief spectacle and orgy of speculation surrounding the truth of the Elián Gonzalez case. This story offers a good opportunity to examine how we come to believe. Do we accept the report of our friends? Do we need proof in the form of photos/videotapes? Are they doctored? Who and what can we believe? Who can we trust? My observation is that whatever we believe about the Elián Gonzalez situation comes out of our predilection towards the outcome more so than all the evidence in the world. In the words of last week's preacher, it is not easy to believe something when your heart and head are not so inclined. How did you come to believe what you believed in this situation?

How do we come to believe what we believe regarding the resurrection of Jesus Christ? The situation of Thomas is instructive in that regard. Let's get down and dirty with Thomas. For a moment, allow me to return to my Good Friday sermon, when I preached on the foot washing passage in John. I commented: "What is this feet business all about?" In Bethany, we are told by John, Mary had anointed Jesus' feet with expensive oil and wiped his feet with her hair, an act of incredible intimacy. Then we had the foot washing when Jesus washes the dirty, smelly, muddy feet of the disciples, even Judas', at the moment he is about to pass over from his earthly existence to his heavenly glory. Both these acts involved incredible intimacy, vulnerability and love connected by the act of touch. The key elements of belief and faith, it seems to me, come out of acts of intimacy, vulnerability and love through the medium of touch. In Matthew 28:9-10, in a post-resurrection appearance to Mary Magdalene and the other Mary, we are told as they were running to tell the disciples of the good news, "suddenly Jesus met them and said `Greetings' and they came to him and took hold of his feet, and worshiped him." What is this foot thing? Nothing more than a touching act of intimacy, vulnerability and love! Thomas, too, wants to touch Jesus. It seems to me that Jesus had faith in Thomas. He was willing to make himself vulnerable by allowing Thomas to touch his wounds.

You classical scholars in the congregation may remember that in Homer's The Odyssey, there is an episode, near the end of the tale, when Odysseus finally returns home after years of wandering. He is disguised as an old man. Nobody recognizes him at home, even his own wife and son. That night, just before bed, the aged nurse of Odysseus, Eurycleia, bathes him. She thinks she is merely bathing an old stranger who visits for the night. But while bathing him, she recognizes a scar on Odysseus' leg, the same scar she remembers from his infancy. She did not recognize him until she saw his scar.

It is significant that the Christ of Easter bears the scars of Good Friday. The disciples only recognize him after they have seen/touched his scars. The stunning triumph of Easter does not erase the scars. To be human is to have scar tissue inside and out. The disciples know Jesus because he didn't hover over the heartache of the world, he embraced pain, touched their cares and sorrows, lived where we live, died as we must die. It is when Thomas confronts the scars-gets down and dirty, if you will-that he believes. Jesus reopens his wounds to Thomas and to us in an act of incredible intimacy, vulnerability and love and invites us to touch in order that we might believe.

The New York Times, in its Thursday, April 27, 2000 edition, reports on John McCain's visit with his son to the Hanoi Hilton, the prison camp where he was a prisoner of war for five-plus years. The article headline proclaimed: "McCain, in Vietnam, Finds the Past is Not Really Past." The article is accompanied by a haunting photo, even more Pulitzer Prize worthy than the other famous photo of Elián Gonzalez. In this photo we see McCain through the bars of the prison, his face contorted by emotional pain. Immediately behind him in the scene is a young man who looks bewildered and frightened. The article states that the visit is "an attempt to balance lingering ill will with hope for reconciliation." As in the Thomas story, Jesus appears to the disciples and states: "If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven." In the pain of revisiting the wounds is the hope of reconciliation.

For McCain, the visit seems to open old wounds, the psychic scars of the experience. He makes himself vulnerable to his captors, the press, his own anger, and his son. The reporter records that for his son, Jack, the visit seemed to confirm the stories his father had told him. It's as though he didn't really believe or understand that it was really, really true until he was invited to touch his father's emotional wounds. It seems Thomas, in that Upper Room, finds that the past is not really past until he touches the scars.

The lesson here is that, in acts of intimacy, vulnerability and love you are practicing the presence of God. The willingness to practice belief while waiting to believe is an expression of faith. You enter into faith through such acts. As we were told by Jesus in John 13:15: "For I have set you an example, that you should also do as I have done to you." In other words, get down and dirty and touch the dirty, smelly, muddy feet of humanity; examine the scars and wounds in Me through those I love, then you will believe and have an aha moment with Thomas.

My wife, Nanci, has given me permission to share her recent experience in caring for her mother who was visiting with us for two weeks before Easter. For Nanci, having to care for her mom in the most intimate, loving and vulnerable touching way was an epiphany for experiencing the presence of God, the unconditional love of God. Her mom is in a wheelchair with crippling arthritis. Her condition required Nanci to hold her mother naked, bathe her, care for her, dress her, and comb her hair. Imagine! Do you want your children to have to care for you in such a manner? After an initial fear, she discovered that these were moments of surpassing intimacy and love. Her mother, making herself so vulnerable to her child, is like Jesus making himself so vulnerable to his children to the point of opening his wounds to us. It was in this experience that Nanci connected with God and learned that it is really, really true ... Jesus' unconditional love for us.

Christianity does not mean knowing about Jesus; it means knowing him, experiencing him through others in acts of intimacy, love and vulnerability. As Marshall McLuhan used to say, "The medium is the message," and the message for faith is seeing and touching Jesus' scars in and through others. It does not mean debating about him, it is about confronting him in the scars. It means practicing the presence of God.

Is it true? I mean really, really true?

Is it true that there is an amazing grace, an unearned friendliness to God's love, which lies at the very heart of all creation?

Is it true that there is a way of surviving and beginning again following the death of a loved one or the loss of a relationship? That I can receive gifts of courage and hope to face an uncertain future?

Is it true that my life and the lives of those whom I love have lasting meaning and value which not even death can destroy?

Is it true that the way I treat people is the way I treat God?

Is it true that Jesus is the clearest clue to the meaning of my life that I have been given?

Is it true that my life will receive its greatest satisfaction by being drawn into a caring relationship with others?

Is it true that, in the acts of greatest intimacy, vulnerability and love, I will be able to touch God?

When we practice the presence of God in acts of intimacy, vulnerability and love, we, like Thomas, will believe. It is true ... really, really true!