Seeing is Believing?
1 John 1: 1 – 2:2; Psalm 133; John 20: 19 – 31
The pathway to perspicacity.
Thomas, that disciple of Jesus, declared to his fellow disciples, ‘I will not believe Jesus has risen from the dead unless I touch his wounds’. [Jn 20:2] So we call him, ‘Thomas the Doubter’. But is that a fair description? I mean labeling Thomas, ‘the doubter’, is a bit of a put down. Is it not a reasonable thing to require some proof of a significant, if not bizarre, event?
We place a lot of reliance on ‘seeing is believing’. It is a principle of scientific enquiry. Let us be fair: Thomas was not the only one to doubt. He was the only one state clearly his doubt. Did you notice that Mary Magdalene didn’t believe until she heard her name spoken by Jesus? Then she saw who this man was. It was her Lord. Before he spoke to her she thought he was a gardener. The other disciples also believed after Jesus appeared to them. Cleopas and the other disciple on the Emmaus Road only believed when they saw the stranger break bread. I believe when Jesus broke bread in their home they saw his extended hands revealing his wrists through which the nails had been driven. Then they believed and knew that Jesus was with them: risen from the dead. They all needed to see before they believed. I guess we can understand this given the circumstances.
Jesus obliged them with appearances. However Jesus was not uncritical of their need to see. Reflect again on Thomas’ encounter with Jesus, or is it Jesus’ encounter with Thomas. When Thomas sees Jesus he declares his belief. Jesus’ response is very telling. Jesus says to Thomas and to the rest of them; “Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.” [Jn 20:29] This is a gentle critique. It is a critique of Thomas and the others, because they too only believed when they saw Jesus. However future believers will believe without seeing the Resurrected Jesus. They will be blessed. There is an implication that their blessing will be as least as great as first disciples, if not more!
There is a rabbinic story that may help us understand what Jesus might be saying about the blessedness of those who believe without seeing. ‘Rabbi Simeon said: The proselyte (the convert) is dearer to God than all the Israelites who stood by Mount Sinai. For if all the Israelites had not seen the thunder and the flames and the lightning and the quaking mountain and the sound of the trumpet they would not have accepted the law and taken upon themselves the kingdom of God. Yet this person, the proselyte, has seen none of all these things yet comes and gives himself to God and takes on himself the yoke of the Kingdom of God. Is there any who is dearer than this person?’
We may all be acknowledging so far the importance of ‘seeing is believing’. But push the pause button and reflect on what happened when Mary Magdalene had reported that the tomb was empty to Peter and John. They came running. John got there first and waited. Peter arrived and went straight in. We read in John 20:8; Then the other disciple, who reached the tomb first, also went in, and he saw and believed … . The writer, John, gives us the impression that the disciple John understood. John only needed to see the empty tomb to believe that Jesus had risen from the dead. The others saw only the empty tomb. Their seeing led them to conclude that Jesus’ body was gone. John’s sight was informed by his belief in the words of Jesus. Jesus taught that he would rise from the dead. John was putting together the teaching of Jesus and what he saw and concluded that Jesus had risen. In a sense ‘seeing’ and ‘believing’ worked together.
We need to balance the principle of ‘seeing is believing’ with ‘believing is seeing’.
Observation and logic suggests that it is not merely a matter of ‘seeing is believing’. Have you thought about all the things you believe in that you don’t see and may never see? Our sight is important but it is not all-sufficient when it comes to knowing. We can’t see the wind but we know it is there, because of its effect on things. We believe in the existence of atoms and electrons but we can’t see them with the naked eye. Radio waves are another matter that is hardly visible to the naked eye. It is only in last 200 years that radio waves and the electromagnetic spectrum have been serendipitously discovered. We weren’t looking for them! Before that humankind did not believe in them because they were not seen.
The parable of “The Blind Men and the Elephant” reminds us that to rely on our senses may not be enough. You know the parable of a group of blind men who came across an elephant. Each of them grabs a part of the elephant and tells the other what it is. It’s a big spear says the person holding the tusk. It’s a fan says the person feeling its ear. It’s a tree says the persons hugging its leg, and so on.
The Gospel writers are recognising the importance of balancing the ‘seeing is believing’ with ‘believing is seeing’. This is contra to our view that to see is to believe. Certainly that is a truism in many aspects of life. There are instances where seeing is critical to believing. But sometimes we need to hear before we see. That is the case with radio waves. The work of Herschel, Maxwell, Hertz and Marconi convinced us to ‘see’, so to speak, radio waves. It is the word of Jesus the Christ that reveals the truth. The demonstration of the miracle is only there to help us see.
Jesus’ words to Thomas that those who believe without seeing the Resurrected Lord, re-inforce the value of believing the witness of Scripture. To believe the words of Jesus and the witness of Christians is equal to seeing Jesus. Here lies the truth that belief enables us to see God, but the eyes of disbelief are blinded to the reality of God.
It is equally important to believe before we can see. Our appreciation of a stained glass window may help us. The stained glass window can only be appreciated from the inside. We need to enter the sacred space first to appreciate it otherwise we can’t really see it. Belief takes us to the inside and then we see more clearly.
The disciples had to grapple with this new understanding of believing in order to see. They also had to see so they could believe. How does this help us in our times? Our church is small. We tend to be stuck in our ways. We naturally want to bunker down, before we do anything else. We want to hang onto the past because we know it. It helped us then. Unfortunately it may not help us now. We need to step out in faith. I believe we need to step out in faith before we see what God’s will is.
What is holding us back from seeing God’s future? What is holding us back from seeing Jesus?
Is it a fear? Is it the fear that God will ask too much of us? I understand that fear. I battled with that fear in my early stages of walking with Christ Jesus. I wondered how much I would have to give up to follow. It took me a while to learn that I would gain more than I would give up.
Is it a fear that you will lose control of your life or your church? Is it that insecurity that you have that if you let go you will be out of control? The paradox of faith is that submission to Christ Jesus leads to a greater freedom.
Is it the experience of broken trust that inhibits your trusting of others and God? When our trust is broken we do become wary. Yes, it is important to be wary. It is another matter not to trust at all. I recall a school friend who said to me that he didn’t believe in God because he asked God for a bicycle for Christmas and he didn’t get one! A childish response, yes, but a very real truth. Sometimes we are like children with unrealistic expectations of God.
Is it learned cynicism that presides over our thinking that we can’t trust what we hear? Now doubt is a good thing. Doubt should always be in our bag of ‘seeing’. God doesn’t ask us to have blind faith. But doubt void of faith is unbalanced. It is destructive. We need to examine the roots of our doubt, especially if our doubts are mere cynicism.
Search your hearts to see why your believing can’t be extended to receive the wonderful promises of God in Christ Jesus, and through these promises, the power of the Holy Spirit. The Spirit filled life is a life of believing in order to see and understand. The Spirit filled life leads to seeing the wonders of God working in our midst.
*******
Peter C Whitaker, Leighmoor UC: 08/04/2018
/ www.leighmoorunitingchurch.org
