Jesus and Doubts

Jesus and Doubts (John 20:24-29)

When Faith Meets Doubt Conference (Grandview Church, Kitchener, Ontario)

April 12, 2024

My father’s first full-time job was as a teller in a bank. One of the first things that tellers were trained in that day to do was to be able to tell if money was counterfeit. Now this was before cryptocurrency or electronic transfers. People carried these things call bills – currency made out of paper, not plastic. It actually crinkled up on your pockets. Some of you remember them. So, instead, of spending a lot of time studying counterfeit money, the bank trained tellers to know what genuine bills felt and looked like. This way when they encountered the counterfeit, it was fairly easy to tell the counterfeit. Our goal tonight is to learn and be reminded of what is genuine. This is will help us fight doubts and deconstructionism in our own lives. And some of you here would not even put yourself in the category of a Christian and are struggling to figure out what is counterfeit and genuine. We welcome you here. This message is aimed at believers in Christ with doubt or with doubters in their lives, but if you are not a believer, hang with me as well. It’s just that judgment always starts in the house of God and so hopefully we will first look in the mirror before looking out the window at the world and those who have left the faith.

The Bible acts like a mirror for us. Sadly, there has been a massive drop off of Bible users (see stats). According to a newly released study by American Bible Study, over the past four years from 50% of adults using the Bible in 2021 to 38% of adults using the Bible in 2024. That is 29 million less Bible users. A Bible users is defined as someone who reads, listens to or prays with the Bible at least 3-4 times a year outside of worship services. These are American stats and I would like Canadians would be less. My friends, Bible reading is critical to fighting doubts. Therefore, if you have your Bibles, please turn to 1 Corinthians 15:1-2 or you can Google 1 Corinthians 15:1-2. You can also read it on the screen. Read 1 Corinthians 15:1-4, 8-9! The Apostle Paul was a doubter at one time. He actually hunted and killed Christians until he had a vision of the resurrected Jesus and became a passionate follower of Him. Listen to what he writes, “Now, brothers and sisters, I want to remind you of the gospel I preached to you, which you received and on which you have taken your stand. 2 By this gospel you are saved, if you hold firmly to the word, I preached to you. Otherwise, you have believed in vain. For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that He was buried, that He was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures … Last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared also to me. For I am the least of the apostles, unworthy to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. ” Paul went from doubter to disciple because he encountered the risen Lord. What Paul thought was counterfeit was actually genuine. Maybe that describes some of us tonight – confusing the counterfeit with the genuine. My task tonight is to preach the gospel that will save you, has saved you and that has been faithfully preached by my friend and your retiring Pastor Bob MacGregor. On behalf of the Waterloo Wellington Association of Fellowship Baptist Churches, I want to thank you Pastor Bob and Grandview Church for your faithfulness to preaching the gospel. I am convinced from my own life and ministry that constant gospel preaching helps us to not believe in vain. My heart though goes out to are some of us here today, myself included, who have loved ones who have walked away from their faith. When you have a child or family member who is doubting, it casts a constant shadow doesn’t it? I have great empathy for you.

It may be helpful to remember that doubts are as old as human existence. Doubts are nothing new! They are as old as time. Doubts were in Eden and doubts in heaven about God’s goodness when Satan doubted and rebelled against God. Recall the seeds of doubt that the serpent planted in Eve’s mind in the Garden of Eden, “Did God really say?” (Genesis 3:1) I want to reassure you that nothing is new under the sun. As I was preparing this message, I had the same thought as one of our speakers tomorrow, Tim Barnett, in his book The Deconstruction of Christianity. This was a confirmation of the Holy Spirit’s message. Tim says, “Deconstruction is nothing new. People have been abandoning the standard of God’s Word and engaging in a process of rethinking – and often abandoning – their faith since the beginning.” And lest you think that this was just an Old Testament problem, Tim goes on to say, “Consider Paul’s first letter to Timothy. In it, he describes those who ‘have wandered away’ (1:6 and 6:10), who ‘made shipwreck of their faith’ (1:19), who ‘will depart from the faith’ (4:1), who ‘denied the faith’ (5:8), who ‘abandoned their former faith’ (5:12), who ‘strayed after Satan’ (5:15), and who ‘swerved from the faith’ (6:21). If you’re keeping track, that’s eight references in one short letter. Since the time of Christ, people have been ‘falling away’ from the faith.” This is despite the fact that Jesus came to fulfill the Law and Prophets, not abolish (or deconstruct) it (Matthew 5:17). It is not comforting to know that doubt has been common from the beginning, but it is comforting that Christ can overcome doubt and renovate our faith.

Let’s pause there and define terms. Terms need to be defined more and more now-a-days because of, ironically, deconstructionism. Words have been co-opted or changed in part due to deconstructionism in society, thanks in part to the French Philosopher Jacques Derrida. I have struggled with defining the term deconstructionism and have had discussions with my friends about deconstructionism. Have you? One exchange I had with a pastor friend, he said, “Personally I am uncomfortable with the term deconstruction. We are implored in the Scriptures to be built up in our faith. We should aim for reform always; but deconstruction? Hmmm, lots of danger here. If what we are talking about is de-CONSTRUCTING our faith, off-loading human constructs attached to our faith that are interfering with faith in Christ alone, that is helpful, but any rethinking or removing of the ‘faith once for all entrusted to the saints’ (Jude 3) then no.” We are to contend for the faith, not deconstruct it. (I agree and hopefully one of the outcomes of this conference is that we see deconstruction is harmful and is really a destruction of our faith.) Or maybe Jon Bloom in his Desiring God article puts it better, “Deconstruction is the process; deconversion is the result.” Doubt makes unstable in all our ways. I can’t recall who summarized James 1:22 that doubts are like being blown around like a beach ball in the wind, but it is a good picture of what happens when we doubt. 

However, deconstruction is more dangerous than doubt, because our beach-ball doubts get batted around like the crowd at a bored Blue Jay game. Deconstruction is not so much a private struggle, but a public sound off. Theologian Kevin Vanhoozer helpfully and prophetically explained 26 years ago, “Deconstruction is not the same thing as destruction. It is not simply a matter of demolishing something through external force, but of dissembling it (which is more pre-meditated than an act of passion or frustration by being disappointed with God). Deconstruction is a painstakingly taking apart, a peeling away of the various layers – historical, rhetorical, ideological – of distinctions, concepts, texts and whole philosophies, whose aim is to expose the arbitrary linguistic nature of their original construction. Deconstruction is thus best understood as a kind of undoing.” This is why this deconstruction is more painful and dangerous than doubt. Every generation has had their backsliders and prodigals who have run away from God, some even were prophets and authors in the Bible like Jonah. In contrast, deconstructionists are running away from God, asking for others to join them and then trying to launch a grenade behind them so there is no bridge back to God.

BUT God! But God! Jesus is the bridge that cannot be destroyed or that needs $1 Billion dollars to repair like the Key Bridge in Baltimore that was recently knocked out by a cargo ship. Lest we think that God steps away and we can destroy our faith by ourselves, may we be reminded that sometimes God hands us over to our sinful flesh for Satan to destroy that flesh (Romans 1:26; Corinthians 5:5). What God has built up; He will not let us ultimately tear down. Cling to this promise written by the one-time doubter, the Apostle Paul in Philippians 1:6, “And I am sure of this, that He who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ.”  We may temporarily damage the house God is building, but God will repair and complete the work in our lives. And those who believed in vain that we read about in 1 Corinthians 15:2, it could be translated “Or unless we never truly believed it in the first place.”

For those who are questioning some of the beliefs and practices that are not aligned with the Scriptures, may I offer up a new term: we are cooperating with God in His renovation of our faith. God is doing a faith renovation project. Renovation almost always requires some demo days in the famous words of Fixer Upper® Chip Gaines. There are some man-made constructs that need to be removed from our life and theology that are renovated with Biblical foundations. I think renovation of our faith aligns with some of the great movements in church history such as the Reformation. Reformation of the church or renovation of our personal faith is a divine-human cooperative. Tim Barnett would like to steer us away from the term renovate our faith like renovating a house because our faith is relational – our faith is in the person of Jesus Christ. However, like my marriage is always being renovated learning where I misunderstood my wife, God is renovating our lives to align with Christ and His Word.

So in our remaining time tonight, let’s preach the gospel to ourselves and see the renovation of the faith of one of Jesus’ followers. His name was Thomas. He has had an adjective unfairly attached to his name. He is known as what? Doubting Thomas! The reality is that the other disciples of Jesus doubted from time to time like we all have. Recall what is recorded in Matthew 28:17 (NLT), “When they saw Him, they worshipped Him – but some of them doubted.” Bible Scholar Scot McKnight explains, “This might be a veiled reference to Thomas, but all eleven might have experienced a mixture of both worship and doubt.” We need to remember though that Thomas had courage at one time. Before Peter ever made his bravado and false declarations that he would lay down his life for Jesus in John 13:37, it was Thomas that led the disciples in making what we would now call a blood pact according to John 11:16, “So Thomas, call the Twin, said to his fellow disciples, ‘Let us also go that we may die with Him.” Thomas also had the courage to ask how to know the way in John 14:5. Maybe this is why musician Steve Bell gives us a different perspective on Thomas, “Yet given his courageous fealty and open honesty on earlier display, should it surprise us that it was only Thomas who was not huddling fearfully behind locked doors when all the others were? Thomas was a realist. What’s done is done. Perhaps he was merely, and bravely, getting on with his life … Thomas doesn’t have doubts as much as conditions for believing.” The reality is that we don’t know why Thomas doubted. The Chosen suggested it was because he lost (spoiler alert) the love of his life. 

Pain can be a pathway to or from God. ER physician Lina AbuJamra in her book Fractured Faith exclaims, “It’s not our longings for more of God that lead us away from God, it’s our longings for more from God that deconstruct our faith.” She goes on to say, “For me, my expectations nearly destroyed my faith.” As a man with high expectations too, I set myself up to be disappointed with God. You see, “God is not always fair and it’s one of the best things to know about the God of the Bible … Christians don’t follow a fair God. He does what we cannot comprehend; He loves the unlovable and He calls us to do the same.” “Justice ensures that fairness is served. Mercy ensures that fairness is not. God is both in the person of Jesus Christ.” But Thomas did not know the justice and mercy of God was found in the resurrected Lord. Turn to John 20:24-31 to find hope in the midst of doubt and deconstruction. Read John 20:24-31!

We do not know why Thomas wasn’t with the rest of the disciples. Maybe Thomas was with his Twin as his nickname alludes to in John 11 and 20? Twins are often very close. I knew two adult male twins who joked they shared a brain. Their wives would disclose it was really hard to be married to a twin because the twin often came first. When one of the twins woke up, the first thing he would do would be to call his twin brother. They were what psychologists would call “overly connected.” Maybe Thomas was running to his twin for comfort in the midst of all the trauma he experienced with Jesus’ arrest, trial and crucifixion? We do know that Thomas’ twin was not one of the Twelve, which shows that sometimes kids can grow up with the same experience and one of them believe and the other not believe. We do not know why Thomas was not with the other disciples when Jesus first appeared to them. It does serve as a reminder to stick close to other believers in uncertain times.

Thomas seemed to be a FACTS to FAITH person. I have been taught that there are two types of people in the world: FACTS TO FAITH people or FAITH TO FACTS people. The FACTS TO FAITH people are the ones who research all the evidence, even trying to refute all the arguments for Christianity. Finally, after they have made a thorough quest for the truth, they believe the gospel to be true. Often these engineer types are unshakable in their faith. Then there are FAITH TO FACTS people who have an experience with Christ. It could be a vision, a dream, a conversation, a conviction and then they turn to faith in Christ. After turning to faith in Christ, their faith is confirmed by studying the Bible and other evidence for Christ. Paul seemed to be a FAITH TO FACTS person. Thomas was a FACTS TO FAITH person. Which are you? A FACTS TO FAITH follower or FAITH TO FACTS follower of Christ? Maybe you are still seeking facts or an experience? Have you confirmed your faith by the facts of the resurrection?

If Thomas deconstructed his faith, an encounter with the resurrected Christ made Him a believer and worshipper of Jesus. Thomas had lost sight of Jesus and the promised resurrection. What are you going to do about the resurrection? It is either a historical fact or not; genuine not counterfeit. Thomas knew this. As did the Apostle Paul who admits in 1 Corinthians 15:14, “And if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain and your faith is in vain.” Nobody has loved me more than those in the church and nobody has hurt me more than those in the church, but I need to keep my eyes on Jesus. Seeing Jesus changed everything for Thomas. He declares of Jesus, “My Lord and my God” (John 20:28). One NLT scholar concludes, “Thomas’s response represents one of the strongest statements of Jesus’ deity in the New Testament, and the culmination of the Gospel of John’s portrayal. Later tradition speaks of Thomas working as a missionary in the East: in Parthia (according to Eusebius), Persia (according to Jerome) and India (according to the Acts of Thomas). The Mar Thomas Church with its million followers on the west coast of India traces its roots back to the early missionary work of Thomas.” This gives us great hope that anybody’s doubts can be turned into devotion to Christ. God can renovate our deconstruction into a million strong Temple of the Holy Spirit. What we need to do is to go back to Jesus and His resurrection! His resurrection is genuine, not counterfeit. He is our hope when we don’t have answers.

One of my crises of belief was when there was a couple at my previous church that had struggled with fertility. They so desperately wanted a baby. They went the In Vitro fertilization route and were blessed to be pregnant with twins. The pregnancy was high risk. One day I got a call that the young wife was going into pre-term labour at 20 weeks. The babies came and lived only a few minutes. They asked me to conduct the funeral. What would you have said to the couple? I came to the conclusion that the only hope I could give them was Jesus and His resurrection. All the other supposed comforts would be cruel. And this leads us to two ACTION POINTS:

1. BE MERCIFUL TO THOSE DOUBTING AND DECONSTRUCTING – Jesus was merciful to Thomas who doubted and so should we. Jude 22 commands, “Have mercy on those who doubt.” Christ offered peace for Thomas’ troubled mind and doubts. Jesus even knew Thomas questions being in his presence. Jesus knows our questions and doubts. Jesus still shows mercy for those who doubt. Canadian Bible Scholar D.A. Carson encourages us when he states, “By taking up Thomas’ challenge in this way, Jesus simultaneously proves that He hears His disciples even when he is not physically present and removes all possible grounds for unbelief, even the most unreasonable.” Being merciful means not quarrelling with doubters and deconstructionists. Instead, we are to be kind and gently instruct those opposed to the truth. Remember, “Jesus did not rebuke Thomas for his doubts, but for his unbelief.” On the screen is a picture of two men – my grandfather and my father. Both were pastors (pictures of my father and grandfather). My grandfather help to start a Pentecostal denomination here in Canada and then went to serve as the global denomination’s missionary director for many years. My father had many doubts about the church he grew up in as he saw a lot of hypocrisy, legalism and phoniness. Most of his siblings deconstructed in part because their father was somewhere around the world caring for somebody else’s kid at the neglect of his own children. My father went through a greater inner turmoil deciding to finally leave his parents’ denomination. However, despite the heartache of leaving his church and tribe, my father and grandfather remained close. I think that was because they tried to show mercy to each other. It is doubtful I would be a pastor today without that mercy. 
2. PREACH THE GOSPEL TO YOURSELF TO FIGHT DOUBT AND DECONSTRUCTION – In Tim Barnett’s research, he found a common theme in deconstructionists. He says, “Focusing on this world is a common sentiment in deconstruction stories.” Having a Best life Now theology causes disillusionment. Lina AbuJamra found, “The biggest mistake we make in Christianity is to make ourselves the center of our story.” We must remember that we follow the Saviour Jesus who was born to suffer, die and rise again. Taking up our cross daily and following Christ helps stave off doubt and deconstruction. Notice it is the word of God written down that helps us to continue to believe as John declares in John 20:30-31, “Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this book; but these are 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.”  Do you have life in Jesus’ name? May you today! If one can deconstruct, God can reconstruct! Let’s pray!

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