DOUBT

John 20:19-31
Faith United
April 19, 2009


Have you ever been overwhelmed?
Isn’t that an awful feeling?
I think a lot of people are overwhelmed right now
by the economy, losing jobs, and the chaos
When I’m overwhelmed, I just want to go to bed
and pull the covers over my head
take a nap
Naps are good

Sometimes you just have to sit down on the floor
Maybe scoot up against the wall and just sit for a minute
catch your breath
When a lot of bad things happen at once
or everyone’s coming at you with something
with bad news or complaints or anger
or your boss is driving you crazy or work
you feel underappreciated or even used
It gets overwhelming

When people you love die, it’s overwhelming
Simple everyday tasks suddenly seem really difficult
we can get paralyzed
When we’re overwhelmed, we feel small, weak
and out of control
Which is the reason I’m especially nervous
these days with the rise of gun sales
I’m not feeling really safe
knowing that a lot of overwhelmed people,
a lot of angry people who feel like they have no control
are now armed
Call me crazy
There are some days I wouldn’t trust myself with a gun
much less someone who’s lost their job
where they’ve worked for 35 years
and is dismissed as if he is nothing

These days it is really easy to feel like things are out of control
When really, they are always out of control
at least, OUR control
but we don’t really realize that until
things are particularly bad

I think Jesus’ disciples were overwhelmed
that’s the only explanation I have for them sitting in their room
twiddling their thumbs,
hugging their teddy bears behind closed doors
They’d already heard from Mary
who told them that she’d seen Jesus… alive
but they didn’t believe her,
because women are so emotional
they don’t think rationally like men –
you know, like men who are huddled in the dark
with the doors locked afraid to even go to the bathroom…

They’d heard that Jesus had been spotted,
out there, walking around
and here they are locked away
All I can say is that they had to be overwhelmed
Death is overwhelming
it’s very powerful, it’s beyond our control
it’s cruel sometimes
and Jesus’ death was particularly cruel

I suspect it wasn’t just grief they were feeling
I bet they were feeling a lot of regret
Guilt
They weren’t there
They panicked
when things got heated, they ran
some of them denied every knowing him
only John had the guts to be there for the execution
along with the women disciples
We don’t know where the men disciples were hanging out that night
maybe this same room
they couldn’t be there with him
they ran
they lied about him
maybe they were scared that if it was true
that if Jesus was really out there,
he’d be pretty ticked off with them
alive or not, they’re not ready to face him, perhaps!
I can’t say I blame them
And c’mon, he’s alive? Yeah right
That in itself would be overwhelming
Death is death, death is final,
and from all the things they heard, Jesus was dead
Gone
taking all their hopes and dreams for the future with him
They have no idea what to do next
They’re sitting on the floor, in the corners
some with their heads down
completely exhausted by reality
overwhelmed by reality

And then… woops, there he is
Talk about overwhelming!
There he was
the door was still locked, they were still on the floor
and yet Jesus was standing there grinning at them
“Hey, how’s it going?” he might have said

Then he must have realized they were about to wet themselves
and he had compassion on them
“Peace be with you,” he said, still smiling
He showed them his wounds
to prove it was him
and they said, “wow.”

“Peace be with you,” Jesus said,
and then he …. well, he breathed on them
but when he did, it was like they were knocked over
pinned against the wall
and they felt a strange new assurance, confidence

Reality hadn’t changed
the world was still as it was,
except now Jesus was here, alive…
and he gave them the Spirit to rely on,
to fuel up, you might say
And then he said an impossible thing…

“Forgive…” he said
Forgive who? It doesn’t say –
but they all certainly had something to forgive
what’s more, is that they all knew without a doubt
that they had plenty to be forgiven for
How could they NOT forgive anyone else
if they expected Jesus to forgive them
for screwing up, running away, betraying him?
and Jesus left them, disappeared again
leaving them bewildered, still overwhelmed, but in a different way

The funny thing is, a week later,
after all this, they were still locked in the house
that I don’t get, but who am I to judge?
Thomas hadn’t been there that day
he was the brave one, I think
he wasn’t huddled in the dark with his buddies
he was outside walking around, maybe running errands
out in the open, where he could get hurt
but at least he was out there
getting on with life
he wasn’t paralyzed
he was out moving around

When he came back,
the disciples told them they’d seen Jesus
“yeah, right…” he said
“I’ve gotta see that for myself!” he said
and can you blame him?

These guys hadn’t bathed in weeks – they hadn’t left the room!--
all huddled up in this room,
in the dark, doors locked
doing nothing, really
and he’s going to believe them that Jesus is alive?
I don’t think so

Doubt is not something people value
if we were raised in the church
we were probably taught that doubt is not good
you should never doubt
just believe

I just saw the movie, “Doubt,”
and I won’t tell you too much about it
because I think you should see it
and I don’t want to ruin it
but essentially Meryl Streep plays a really nasty, uptight
emotionally constipated nun in the 60s
all the kids in the Catholic school
and all the other nuns for that matter
are terrified of her
with good reason
She’s just not a happy camper
but she is a woman of certainty
she sees it as her mission to save the school
from modernity
and progress
to keep it pure, free of corruption
free from any secular influences
she is a woman of profound certainties
but what the movie ends up showing
is how damaging such certainty can be
She will not relent in things that she believes to be true
Like a small-town rumor
or small-town gossip that gets out of hand
and people believe it just because they heard it
She will not be convinced of any other truth
than what she herself believes,
no matter how flimsy her evidence
and her certainty proves to be horribly damaging
to the people around her and to the school itself

The mind is a powerful thing
it can convince us of things that may not be true
I think it was very dangerous for the disciples
to be locked away, isolated from the rest of the world
Sometimes when we are overwhelmed,
we isolate
and that’s bad
I don’t know if you can relate
but I think that when we isolate ourselves from others
we can spin all kinds of nonsense in our heads
we can obsess about it, work on it relentlessly
and then believe it to be absolute truth
Or when we’re overwhelmed by reality
we can sit and listen to the media’s spin on things for hours at a time
The media banks on keeping us stirred up, ticked off
they fuel nasty fires in people
they lead us to believe things that aren’t true
because we are vulnerable when we’re overwhelmed

William Sloane Coffin writes,
“As I see it, the primary religious task these days
is to try to think straight….
You can’t think straight with a heart full of fear,
for fear seeks safety, not truth.
If your heart’s a stone, you can’t have decent thoughts
either about personal relations or about international ones
A heart full of love, on the other hand,
has a limbering effect on the mind…”

People are shooting each other
writing and saying nasty things against each other
placing blame, stirring up hatred and absurdities
because we’re afraid
The world is a mess, and of course we’re afraid
and when we’re afraid, we lash out
some people shoot other people
some people get on TV and air their rage
for all of us to listen to
but it is never good to act out of fear….

And yet Jesus comes back again and again
and finds us in our fears, doubts, and guilt,
like he did the disciples
and he says, “BREATHE.”

Breathe in my spirit
don’t breathe in all the nastiness and chaos around you
breathe the breath of God
I like Thomas
he was honest
He didn’t pretend to believe something that he didn’t
just to be accepted and liked
he was honest, “I don’t believe it.”
But at least he was willing to be convinced
Show me, he said, and maybe I’ll believe
He needed some more evidence
He wasn’t just going to believe something on the basis
of someone else
especially someone who’s been locked away alone
for weeks, isolated from the rest of the world

And Jesus comes again
“Hey, Thomas…”
And Thomas just about fell over backwards
“Touch me, Thomas, if you don’t believe it’s me, go ahead…”
Thomas was convinced
“My Lord and my God!”

“Have you believed because you have seen?” Jesus asks,
already knowing the question
“blessed are those who have not seen
and yet have come to believe…”
and that would be us…
we haven’t seen Jesus
at least the flesh and blood Jesus

Frederick Buechner talks about the value of believing
more than what our eyes can take in
He writes,
“Our eyes tell us that the small country church down the road
needs a new coat of pain
and that the stout lady who plays the organ looks
a little like W.C. Fields
and that the pews are rarely more than a quarter filled
on any given Sunday…. “
Our eyes see facts, but our hearts see the truth
For example, he says,
“the truth about the shabby little church
is that for reasons known only to God
it is full of holiness.”
I think doubt is a good thing, a healthy thing
Jesus doesn’t mind it
He’s not threatened by our doubts
he more than anybody can see
all the reasons we would have for doubting
and he doesn’t want us to be
first –grade Christians
he wants us to think, to discuss
to be open to what God might be doing in the world
to get past our ideas that God might be ready to destroy this world
and consider for a moment
that God is always doing a new thing
even in the midst of chaos
the world, we’re told, was created out of chaos
this time that we’re in
is not more chaotic than any other time in history
we’re not so special here in the 21st century
God’s been there, done that, seen it all
God’s not shocked by anything
But God keeps breathing because God is not dead
God keeps breathing new life into us, into our world
and says, GO! Get up off your butt!
Stop feeling sorry for yourself and unlock that door…
get outside, breathe some fresh air
open your minds and your hearts
and don’t think that because things are bad
I’m going to make it easy on you
and just destroy the world
it’s not that easy

God wants us to get out there and breathe grace
the grace we’ve already received
BREATHE
In and out
Receive and give
Believe in what you cannot see
believe despite what the media is shouting about --
doubt what THEY say !--
and consider what GOD is saying

It’s ok, sometimes to have to see for ourselves
I remember when my friend Ed was having heart surgery
it was pretty bad
he had a faulty heart valve
that needing replacing and it didn’t go smoothly
I was living in NE Pennsylvania at the time
and he was having surgery in Philadelphia
which was three hours away
and it’s awfully easy to get lost in Philly
Larry and I went to Philly, there and back in one day
to see Ed on the day of his surgery
I knew he wouldn’t be awake --
but waiting for a phone call to tell me he was ok
was simply not enough
I had to see for myself

He was hooked up to a ventilator
he was still unconscious when I saw him
but he was alive
he was breathing, even if he had help
It was worth the trip for me just to be able to see for myself

Sometimes the demand to see is not necessarily doubt
sometimes
it’s love.