Faithful Thomas

A Study to 'put the record straight'

The last "Feast of the Passover" that Jesus had with His disciples gives us much to learn on many grounds. The Lord knew that this was the last time He would meet with all of the apostles to teach them before He was to be crucified. He warned them that His earthly ministry was coming to an end and that they had best be prepared for difficult times, most graphically when He told them to get a sword (Luke 22:36). He promised that they would rule with Him over the tribes of Israel. These, and other things, they largely did not understand until later.

For this study we want to concentrate on the reactions before and after the supper of three of the apostles who were present. They are Judas, Peter and especially Thomas. These were the last hours of freedom for the Lord after about three years of teaching these men. This was a dividing point.

Judas and Peter
What can we say about Judas? He came so close to being one of the great people of the ages and failed so miserably in such a shockingly petty way. Luke 22:3 tells us that Satan entered into Judas, but what twisted thoughts were in his mind only God can know. The Lord knew and sent him on his way. Only too late did Judas realise what he had done but he did not repent and ask for forgiveness but went and hanged himself. He is mentioned 25 times in the Bible, often as the betrayer. What an epitaph! By contrast, John is mentioned 133 times and was called the apostle that Jesus loved.

Peter is mentioned 146 times. He was boisterous and certain of himself. He declared his unending faithfulness to the Lord, but he too failed. The Lord knew his nature and had prayed for him (Luke 22:21). Peter truly repented and God made him a strong leader of the faithful.

Thomas
Thomas is an apostle that we can identify with more easily. He was neither a traitor nor a great leader. Most of what we know about him comes from the Gospel of John. He is only mentioned twelve times in the Bible, eight of those times in John. In Matthew, Mark and Luke, his name only appears in lists of the apostles when they were chosen. The Bible never uses the term "Doubting" Thomas, the term so glibly used in Christendom. In my opinion he has been unjustly maligned.

Heroic loyalty
In John the eleventh chapter we are told the story of the death and resurrection of Lazarus. After having been told of Lazarus' illness, the Lord stayed where He was for two more days. In verse 7 we read, "Then after that saith He to His disciples, 'Let us go into Judea again.'" And in verse 8: "His disciples say unto Him, 'Master, the Jews of late sought to stone Thee: and goest Thou thither again?'" Then after the Lord told them that Lazarus was dead, in verse 16 we read, "Then said Thomas, which is called Dydimus, unto his fellow-disciples, 'Let us go, that we may die with Him.'" Thomas, along with the others, recognised the danger but when Jesus spoke, Thomas was prepared to follow. This is true heroic loyalty, not to be unafraid but to act in spite of fear. It is when things go wrong that the true test comes.

In the John 14 account of the 'Last Supper' the Lord spoke to the disciples of going to prepare a place for them. Verses 4 to 6 read:

"And whither I go ye know, and the way ye know." Thomas saith unto Him, "Lord we know not whither thou goest; and how can we know the way?" Jesus saith unto him, "I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father but by Me."

Philip asked that the Lord should show them the Father as a sign. The Jews required a sign. Philip was rebuked for they should have known that Jesus and the Father were one, but Thomas had asked a reasonable question and the Master gave a wonderful, gentle answer.

Now as we have seen, even before the Supper, and the Garden of Gethsemane, Judas had betrayed Christ. Peter, during the supper, had declared his faithfulness, but during the trial he had denied the Lord. Thomas, like all the other disciples, neither betrayed nor denied the Lord. After the arrest of Jesus, and during the ensuing events, both he and the other disciples followed at a distance. It is hard to see what other course was open to them. The Lord had forbidden them to use violence.

After the resurrection
Luke 24:36-44 records an event after the resurrection. Christ appeared "in the midst of them". They thought that they had seen a spirit. He showed them His wounds but they still were not convinced so He ate some food to show them that He was real. Presumably this is the same event recorded in John 20:19-23.

The following six verses (read John 20.24-29) record the event on the basis of which people, I believe incorrectly, have attached the misnomer "Doubting" to Thomas's name. Verse 24 states that Thomas was not present at the earlier appearing of the Lord. Consider the facts:

• The disciples had undergone a tremendous shock when Jesus had been executed at the hands of the authorities. They had "trusted that it had been He Which should have redeemed Israel" (Luke 24.21) . They therefore could not understand why He did not appear to have power over the authorities.
• The other disciples did not believe, even when they saw Him, until He gave them two pieces of evidence.
• When Thomas said that he wanted to see Christ's wounds he was only asking for the proof that the others already had received.
• His mind was on his Lord, not on the other disciples. He was not prepared to simply take their word but wanted to know for himself.
• In all of this he was less of a doubter than the rest. Remember that it is written that "the Jews require a sign" (1 Corinthians 1:22). Everything in the Lord's ministry was affirmed by signs and fulfilled prophecies. The Master had said that the sign to be given was that of the prophet Jonah, resurrection. Thomas wanted to see that sign.

Twice after that Thomas is mentioned. In John 21:2, he and some other disciples went fishing with Peter and caught nothing. The risen Christ appeared and spoke to them and again they did not know Him at first. Again in Acts 1:13 Thomas was with the other disciples, in what may have been the same upper room, when they convened to choose a successor to the traitorous Judas.

The importance of how we see Thomas
What does all this mean to us, and why should we care whether Thomas is slandered or not?

Firstly, if we slander these good people, the disciples, we are slandering our own ancestors in Christ. We owe them better treatment than that.

Secondly, because we receive our knowledge of Christ through them we are throwing doubt on the teaching of the Bible and making ourselves the arbiters of good and evil. What then is the alternative?

Thomas in a different light
The alternative, as I see it, is this. Thomas was a faithful follower of Christ. He refused to be swayed by the opinions of the other disciples, both when they did not want to follow the Lord and go to see Lazarus at Jerusalem, and when they said Christ was risen. As a Jew, he knew the questions to ask and the signs to look for. His source of knowledge was the Lord Jesus Himself. Still, he remained the constant companion of his fellows.

Like him, we can be in constant fellowship with the members of the Body of Christ but only take God's written word as authority since He no longer resides with us physically.

Because Thomas was strong-minded and refused to take secondhand information, he gives us powerful evidence of the reality of the resurrection. Peter could be carried away emotionally but Thomas was different. The risen Christ was not an apparition.

When the Lord said, "....be not faithless but believing" and, "because thou hast seen Me, thou hast believed", those statements applied to the other disciples as much as to Thomas. They had to see Him eat before they were convinced. As soon as Thomas saw the presence of his Lord and heard Him speak, he worshipped. The Master's words, "blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed" speak volumes of comfort to us.

The five words that Thomas spoke to Christ constitute one of the most powerful prayers in the Bible. When he said, "My Lord and my God", he stated the essence of all prayer, and the essence of our position before God. Prayer should first be worship, not a wish list.

Thomas, like the others, was steeped in Jewish teaching and religion which had rejected Jesus as the Messiah. Yet, in the space of three years they received and accepted the material that we have had two thousand years to mull over. If we are to understand the Bible and be faithful stewards, we need to try to put ourselves in their place and use the presumptions that they had to use in their situation. For my part, I am awed at Thomas's faithfulness. I would that I could be as faithful.