St. John 20:19-31
Divine Service
Easter 2

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ:

How many of us remember our high school English class?  Remember the instructions for those 2-page essays; ‘I want a clear thesis statement in the first paragraph.’  And how many of us were marked down because our papers didn’t quite follow that thesis statement.  Then, somewhere along the line, we may have discovered what is called a ‘delayed thesis statement.’  This means that you wait until the last, or next to last, paragraph to present your thesis. 

The trick in using a delayed thesis is to present all of your arguments, all of your material, in such a way as to make the conclusion already obvious to the reader by the time that thesis statement is actually presented.  You need to place your most compelling argument as the last point, so that it is very fresh in the mind of the reader.  A delayed thesis, in this format, is never a surprise; it simply summarizes what you have said to that point.  John, in the last verse of our Gospel lesson, gives us the delayed thesis statement for his entire Gospel: “But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.”

And what has John presented as his most compelling argument, the thing that is freshest in the mind of the reader?  Not the birth of Jesus, a marvelous occurrence.  Not the 3 years of teaching that Jesus did with His disciples.  Not Jesus’ death on the cross.  Not even Jesus’ resurrection, but the doubts of one of the chosen twelve:  Thomas, known as Didymus – the twin.  What makes this story the most compelling story to John?  Why would the Holy Ghost have had John even include this account?  Isn’t belief the opposite of doubt?

Thomas would be considered by most modern scientists to be a very responsible person.  He does not blindly accept the word of others.  He wants concrete proof.  He has been told of the miraculous resurrection.  He has been told of Jesus’ visit to the other disciples.  Still, he has very scientific doubts.  No man has ever before risen from the dead by his own power.  Other people have been resurrected from the dead, but not under their own power! We can assume that he witnessed the resurrection of Lazarus, but Jesus, not Lazarus himself, had accomplished that.  Show me! – Lazarus could have been the poster child for the state of Missouri!

Thomas doubted.  This has been his legacy to the church throughout the ages: doubting Thomas!  He had what modern scientific method would call a very intelligent response.  It had never been done before, so it must not be possible.  Show me proof, and then I will believe that it is so!  Who of us can say that we would have done differently?  That scientific method, the necessity of proof, is part of our education.  We accept very little on faith.  This has been drilled into us throughout our years of education.  We are taught to doubt…to question everything…to believe only ‘scientific’ proofs.

We almost always look at this story with the focus on Thomas.  Thomas was not present on that first night when Jesus came to the disciples.  We often question where he was.  Thomas refused to believe the story of the other disciples.  We look at this as doubting the true witness of the disciples.  But, Thomas could not have known that this was a true witness.  He, probably, should have trusted the report of these men that he knew so well, but can we truly fault him for his doubt?

But let’s look at it in a slightly different manner.  What was Jesus doing when He appeared to the disciples?  What did He give to them on that evening that they were spending in a locked room?  What was Jesus’ gift that he presented to His disciples that night?  He has passed on His Spirit to His disciples. Not the full measure of the Holy Spirit that the Apostles will receive on Pentecost, but His spirit – the charge to forgive and retain sins. He said: ‘receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive anyone his sins, they are forgiven.’  This was Jesus’ action during His ministry.  He forgave sins.

Jesus imparted the power of forgiveness to the Apostles.  He gave them the right to forgive sins through the Spirit that He gave them.  They could forgive sins through His power.  The word ‘forgive’ has lost much of its strength over the years.  We commonly use the word forgiveness to mean ‘ignore’ rather than ‘forget.’  The truer meaning is ‘to cancel or put behind.’  It no longer exists.  It is out of sight, and out of mind.  It was as if those sins had never happened.  This is the power that Jesus gave to the Apostles, and through them to His church – the power to cancel the sins of those who believe.  They will be cancelled – the Father will never see them attached to that person.

And were they to forgive all sins, to make each and every person holy in the sight of God?  No, because Jesus also gave them the power to retain sins.  To retain those sins of which people were not willing to turn away from.  Those sins that people were comfortable with.  These two powers, this authority that Jesus had retained to Himself, and he now passed on to the Apostles.  This forgiveness and retentions of sins are two sides of the same sword.  God forgives those who ask and are truly repentant.  These sins are put behind, cancelled, truly forgotten.  They never happened. Yet, God does not forgive those who are not truly repentant.  Those sins are retained and the penalty for those sins must be paid. 

The penalty that God has commanded for sin is death.  Not just death in this life, for that is our heritage from the first sin.  The promised punishment that mankind has received from Adam and Eve sinning against God in the Garden of Eden.  The full punishment for sin is eternal death.  And we, each and every one of us, have earned that penalty.  We have all sinned.  We have transgressed the ancient covenant carried down off the mountain by Moses.  We look at those 10 simple rules, and we know that we have not kept any of them, let alone every one of them perfectly.  When we look at Martin Luther’s explanation of those, we know even more that we have violated not only the letter of that Law, but we have ignored the very intent of that Law.  The intent that Jesus summed up into two simple rules: ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength’ and  ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’  We constantly ignore those two simple rules. 

Let’s look again at our Gospel lesson.  Jesus returns a week later to the Apostles through those same locked doors.  This time the Apostle Thomas is present along with the rest of the remaining Apostles.  And Jesus doesn’t chastise Thomas.  He doesn’t give Thomas a long tirade about trust and faith.  Jesus doesn’t talk about how Thomas should be living a perfect life.  He doesn’t expect the impossible from any man.  He simply shows Thomas His wounds and tells Him to stop doubting and believe.  And Thomas acknowledges Jesus as both Lord and God.  Not just the man Jesus, who has been his teacher for the last 3 years, but also as God – the true Son of God in the flesh present on Earth.  Jesus ignores, puts behind Him, forgives, the doubts of Thomas. The blessing from God is that He also gives us forgiveness when we are truly repentant, and because of the belief – the faith – that we have been given, He transfers the penalty we owe to the penalty already paid by Jesus Christ.

And Jesus then sums up for us what is important.  Not the keeping of the Law, neither the letter of that Law, nor the intent.  He tells us – those Apostles, the church throughout the ages, you and me – what is important in the life of a follower of Jesus.  He tells of the church to come, and what our situation will be.  What will be important to you, me, to all who have been or will be until our Lord’s return – to all who are baptized into His name: ‘Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.’

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.  Amen

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