The Wounded God: John 20:19-31 - Second Sunday of Easter

¹⁹When it was evening on that day, the first day of the week, and the doors of the house where the disciples had met were locked for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you.” ²⁰After he said this, he showed them his hands and his side. Then the disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord. ²¹Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.” ²²When he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit. ²³If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.”  ²⁴But Thomas (who was called the Twin), one of the twelve, was not with them when Jesus came. ²⁵So the other disciples told him, “We have seen the Lord.” But he said to them, “Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands, and put my finger in the mark of the nails and my hand in his side, I will not believe.”
  ²⁶A week later his disciples were again in the house, and Thomas was with them. Although the doors were shut, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you.” ²⁷Then he said to Thomas, “Put your finger here and see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it in my side. Do not doubt but believe.” ²⁸Thomas answered him, “My Lord and my God!” ²⁹Jesus said to him, “Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.”
 ³⁰Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book. ³¹But these are written so that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name. (NRSV)

City Methodist Church - Gary, IN by Mike Boening Photography on flickr.  CC BY-NC-ND 2.0.

Today’s Gospel always brings to mind a song I sang in Sunday school:

"Why worry when you can pray
Trust Jesus he'll be your stay
Don't be a doubting Thomas
Rest fully on his promise
Why worry worry worry worry
When you can pray"

I learned that song well—because I worried a lot about earning good grades and making my parents and teachers proud.  This song wasn’t a comfort.  It was a stern lecture; a disapproving finger pointed at me.

It also made me despise Thomas, the doubting disciple.   In my mind, he’s almost as bad as Judas Iscariot, the betrayer.  He refuses to believe that Jesus has been raised from the dead unless he can see it for himself.  So Jesus appears, gives Thomas what he wants, and lectures him that it’s better to believe without seeing.  So all you doubters, be warned!

But let’s call our dogs off Thomas for a moment…  Can you honestly say that you’ve never had doubts about Jesus, and everything you’ve come to believe as a Christian?

Thomas saw Jesus arrested, beaten, and then crucified.  This was a soul-crushing trauma that brought his whole world crashing down.  And because of his associations with Jesus, he was in danger of ending up crucified just like Jesus. 

When he hears the news that his fellow disciples have seen the Lord, he’s not ready to believe just on their testimony alone.  He says, “Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands; and put my finger in the mark of the nails and my hand in his side, I will not believe.”

So instead of calling him “Doubting Thomas,” you could call him “Conditional Thomas.”  And let’s be clear: faith isn’t genuine if you are setting the terms of your trust in God.

But here’s what strikes me about Thomas: he needs to see and touch the wounds of Jesus.  You’d think that a resurrected Jesus wouldn’t still bear the wounds of crucifixion.  He should literally be a new man. 

Yet, when Jesus appears to Thomas, his wounds are still there.  Thomas is still bearing his wounds, as well.  So are the other ten disciples, who are still too scared to leave the house even though they’d seen Jesus alive.

The wounded Jesus meets the wounded Thomas, and Thomas becomes the first person in John’s Gospel to confess Jesus as “my Lord and my God.”

Make no mistake about it: the Jesus you worship, the Jesus you pray to, and the Jesus you serve, remains wounded while at the same time being raised from the dead.  The body is still broken, and the blood is still shed, for you.  You eat and drink it at the Lord’s table.

What’s more is that the resurrection of Jesus doesn’t eliminate your wounds or reverse the traumas you’ve suffered.  It doesn’t undo or fix the past.  I doesn’t erase the sins you’ve committed against others, or that others have committed against you.  You remain a sinner, and Jesus loves you anyway.  By his wounds, you are healed.  Relationships and communities are healed.

Because Jesus shares your woundedness, your wounds become birthplaces of resurrection—that comes in the form of forgiveness, reconciliation, restored relationships; healing and wholeness; justice and peace.

The wounded Jesus gives you permission to be honest and upfront about your woundedness.  You don’t have to hide it away in shame anymore.  If you have doubts, own them.  If you’re too scared to face tomorrow, you own it.  If you’ve wounded someone, or someone’s wounded you—own that, too.  We need to own that our congregation is wounded and broken.  The same goes for our homes, our families; our neighborhoods, schools, workplaces, government, and culture.  It’s nothing to be ashamed of.  It’s fact.

I love ministries like GriefShare and AA/NA, because people speak honestly and openly about their brokenness and they don’t judge each other.  The Church must learn to create more safe places for people to enter into the brokenness of Jesus without feeling the need to hide or conceal their own.  It’s not a sin to doubt.  It isn’t a sin to question God or the core beliefs of the Christian faith.  You only sin when you deny your brokenness—and deny others the freedom to be broken without your judgment. 

In your bulletin, you will find a doubter’s prayer.  I invite you to write on the back of it your questions, your doubts, about anything: about God, about the faith, about yourself, about this Church.  Then pass them in with the offering.  We’re going to stay seated for the hymn of the day so that you can do this more comfortably.  You need not sing if you’re still thinking or still writing.  Then, we’re going to put these up on the back window of the church—because the wounded Jesus promises to meet you in your places of brokenness and doubt.  The Holy Spirit gives the gift of faith to see beyond the brokenness and doubt to a future resurrection.  Our wounded healer makes us all wounded healers, as well—living into a new creation made possible by the death and resurrection of Jesus.

Why Worry When You Can Pray by Alfred B. Smith, John W. Peterson.  (c) 1949 New Spring   (Admin. by Brentwood-Benson Music Publishing, Inc.) 

CCLI 77771 under license #11228777.