Jesus is risen!
.. You can’t prove it, can you?
Christ Born & Witnessed, Crucified, Risen, Ascended..
It’s really easy to hear someone’s story of a baby born in a manger during the census of Augustus Caesar.
The Babe in a manger (and His mother) have become our iconic emojis of virtue.
Roger Harned – talkofJesus.com – on Christmas traditions replacing the significance of Christ’s Resurrection
The Witness of Thomas
Imagine what Thomas must have pondered before he saw Jesus once more..
His miracles were authentic. He was a man like us, yet so unlike us.
We discovered many times that the Lord Jesus was more than any man we had ever met, even John the Baptist..
Like when He calmed the raging Sea of Tiberius, fed thousands and especially when Jesus healed the sick and even raising some like Lazarus just recently from the grave.
But we witnessed also the defeat of Israel’s Messiah, our only hope — His rejection by our own Jewish leaders and Rome’s cruel sentence of His death on a cross, mocking our Rabbi as “Jesus, the King of the Jews.”
I wasn’t close for His execution, for I was afraid like all the others; but Jesus is certainly dead as any other nailed to a Roman Cross.
John 20 (continued)
John continues his witness of Jesus’ resurrection appearances which first were to a group of women, Witnesses to Jesus Risen! – Mary Magdalene then to ten of the Eleven Witnesses to Jesus Risen! – the Eleven remaining behind locked doors.
This is the witness of Jews who had hoped that Jesus would restore the Kingdom of Israel. (Translations incl. Complete Jewish Bible) All of the Twelve were born as Jews, as was the Lord Jesus (Yeshua).
24 Now T’oma [Didymus in common Greek] (the name means “twin”), one of the Twelve, was not with them when Yeshua came.
When the other talmidim [disciples] told him,
“We have seen the Lord,”
he replied, “Unless I see the nail marks in his hands, put my finger into the place where the nails were and put my hand into his side,
I refuse to believe it.”
Believe it .. or not
Well there it is: Like what happens so frequently, someone else tells us about the biggest event ever in their lives.. AND we missed it. Just like Thomas, we weren’t there.
I either don’t believe them, pause with the uncertainty of doubt .. OR maybe I find it beyond belief that the Lord did not also choose ME to be part of such a life-changing moment.
Perhaps you and I are not so unlike ‘doubting Thomas’ as we would like to believe.
A timely note about time: Even though we've slowed the actual timeline of events between Jesus raising Lazarus and His own Resurrection, I will not delay John's Gospel an additional week to reflect real time. RH
26 Eight days later His disciples were again inside, and Thomas was with them. Jesus came, the doors having been shut, and stood in their midst..
Although the doors were locked, Yeshua came, stood among them and said, “Shalom aleikhem!”
27 Then he said to T’oma, “Put your finger here, look at my hands, take your hand and put it into my side. Don’t be lacking in trust, but have trust!”
Witnessed Crucified; Witnessed Risen
Thomas finally experiences the risen Christ Jesus the slain Messiah of Israel the same as the other Apostles and the women who saw Him first.
Then He said to Thomas, “Reach your finger here, and look at My hands; and reach your hand here, and put it into My side. Do not be unbelieving, but believing.”
John 20:27 NKJV
28 Thomas answered and said to Him, “My Lord and my God!”
Depicting Christ Crucified and Jesus Risen to Life!
The scene of Thomas witnessing the wounds of the Risen Messiah, Jesus, their friend and their Teacher is beyond illustration.
John must have recalled Jesus’ similar approach to Martha just before the Lord raised her brother Lazarus to life.
“I am the resurrection and the life,” Jesus had asked the bereaved sister of Lazarus. “Do you believe this?”
John 11:25-26 excerpt with context
Martha and Mary had mourned the death of their brother.
Mary the mother of Jesus also mourned helplessly. She could not save Him from suffering as she sorrowfully watched His death on a Cross nearby.
Faithful painters of the Renaissance could neither paint nor sculpt the horror of the Lord Jesus’s wounds.
Our focus draws to the hearts of the living rather than to the Redeemer of our lives.
Believe by faith
29 Jesus said [to Thomas, with all the Disciples present], “Because you have seen me, you have believed.
Blessed are those who have not seen and yet believe.”
By their witness and that of many others who had seen the risen Christ Jesus, many came to believe by the time John writes his Gospel, even many who would take up their cross to follow Him. These too the Apostle John would witness.
30 So then, many other signs Jesus also performed in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this book; but these have been written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that by believing you may have life in His name.
To be continued...
Next: We will return briefly to further witness of the Eleven near the conclusion of John's Gospel.
