John 20:19-31 (Year A Second Sunday of Easter and verses 19-23 Year A Pentecost) has the risen Lord coming to a group of disciples, ending with the risen Lord coming to Thomas, a theme consistent with the tradition of the appearances of the risen Lord.
Introduction
The purpose of the segment is to deepen faith in Christ. This segment contains John’s version of Pentecost, his vision of apostolic authority, and Thomas. It expands on the astounding events of Easter Sunday. The risen Lord creates the encounter, the moment, that becomes discloses him to be the Revealer. The Revealer began at the tomb and progressively is the Revealer in the various encounters through which John brings us.
Verse-by-verse study
We begin with the Revealer coming to ten of the disciples (verses 19-23, see Luke 24:36-43), minus Judas and Thomas. The motif of the missionary charge of the risen Lord dominates here.[1] Along with the apostolic commission and the gift of the Spirit is an emphasis upon the administration of church discipline.[2] The risen Lord comes to them on Sunday evening, symbolizing the darkness that had descended upon the minds of the disciples. Their fear of Jewish leaders, who had just conspired to kill Jesus, made them meet behind closed doors. Although they have the witness of Mary Magdalene having seen the risen Lord, they remain hidden and fearful. The risen Lord is a physical presence, for Mary had grabbed him, but the risen Lord is not limited by time and space, so he appears to them and brings a word of peace (shalom), the standard Jewish greeting, fulfilling the promise in 14:27. Focusing upon the physicality of the risen Lord, he shows them his hands and side. Their response involves a movement from fear and dread to joy that they also see the risen Lord, fulfilling the promise of 16:20-22. They interpret the appearance of the risen Lord against the background of the eschatological expectation of a resurrection from the dead. The same will be true in the appearance to Thomas.[3]The risen Lord offers the Jewish greeting of peace. Of theological significance is saying that Christ breathed the Holy Spirit upon them (20:22, fulfilling the promise in 14:26, 15:25-27, 16:7b-11, 12-15), as the Lord breathed into Adam the gift of life (Genesis 2:7) and told them to receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. To accomplish the mission, the Son has given them, they will need energy from beyond their individual capacity. They need the Spirit, the Advocate, for it is the Spirit that gives life, teaches them all things. The Eleven represent all believers. Spirit here is the power of proclamation that leads to the knowledge of Jesus as Life, Light, and Truth, which gives the proclamation its authority.[4] The word of peace opens the portal to a new age of the Spirit, for as the Father sent the Son, so the Son is sending them, recognizing that the relation of the Son with the Father is one he can share with his followers.[5] Here is the common calling of all Christians to continue the mission of Jesus in witness to the lordship of God. This saying is true for all disciples of Jesus.[6] Jesus entrusts the disciples with the same mission the Father had given him. The risen Lord bestows upon the disciples the gift of the Holy Spirit, foreshadowed 19:30 as he handed over his spirit, the glorified and exalted Jesus presented as the one from whom the Spirit will come.[7] The imparting of the Spirit takes place through the risen Lord, justifying our calling the Spirit the Spirit of Christ. Yet this does not alter the fact that the Spirit originates and proceeds from the Father.[8] Based on this passage, the imparting of the Spirit is in connection with an appearance of the risen Lord. This notion of relating the imparting of the Spirit to the Easter appearances seems to have more inner probability than the account of Luke, which separates Easter, ascension, appearances over 40 days, and Pentecost on the 50th day.[9] This verse was important in the Latin theology of the Middle Ages, where it spoke of the procession of both Son and Spirit. In that view, what distinguished these two processions was that the Son was a matter of begetting, and the Spirit was that of breathing. These processions in the eternal divine substance resulted in the persons of the Son and Spirit, who they distinguished by describing relations, the Father actively begetting, the Son passively begotten, and the Spirit passively breathed. Such processions take place from all eternity in the divine essence.[10] The Spirit enables them, in their role of having the authority of messengers to communicate salvation and impose judgment,[11] to discern what sins to forgive or not forgive. As a charge to administer church discipline, it involves the granting or withholding of baptism on acceptance or rejection of the proclamation of the community.[12] The already accomplished forgiveness of sin through the cross becomes a gift the disciples, after receiving the gifts of peace and the Spirit, may offer to others. Sin is a theological category, so forgiveness is the mission of the community to continue the work Jesus began in making the Father known in the world. Jesus defines the primary characteristic of this age to be the giving and receiving of forgiveness. This is a variant of Matthew 16:19, 18:18. One can think of this as the handing over of the power of the keys to the disciples. Yet we cannot speak of the instituting of a penitential rite by Jesus related to the pronouncing of the remission of sins as the sacrament of penance that the church would possess. In early Christianity, the forgiving of sins went with baptism and only later was a special supplementary rite developed for lapsed Christians. Nevertheless, pronouncing the remission of sins originated with Jesus, which we can see in Mark 2:9ff and Luke 7:47. As a result, the risen Lord imparted an authority and indeed an obligation to forgive to all his disciples.[13]
The risen Lord will come to the disciples again, with Thomas present this time (verses 24-29). It marks the beginning of a Thomas legend. Its model is the preceding episode.[14] This scene is of theological significance reflecting the motive of demonstrating the reality of the resurrection body of Christ, the relation of faith and sight, and his confession of faith that Jesus is his Lord and God. The identity of Jesus with the Incarnate Logos is affirmed in this testimony. The uniqueness of the apostolic situation arises, for Thomas, as a disciple, must be sure that he has also seen the risen Lord. He expresses no more doubt than do the other disciples. John only now informs us of the absence of Thomas the Twin in the previous episode. We do not know why he was not present, but when he arrives, the other disciples witness that they have seen the risen Lord. His response is that he wants to see the marks left by the nails in his hands and place his finger there and in his side, and if he does not, he will not believe. He does not trust the witness of his friends. He is an example of the difficulty of these disciples to believe that God had raised Jesus of Nazareth from the dead. He is also an example of the ludicrous demands of those who will not believe until they have evidence. The story is hyperbole and is illustrative of those who allow doubt to the point of wanting to see and touch everything they believe. It highlights the importance of faith without physical evidence. A week later, gathered in the same house, the risen Lord came to them and offered the Jewish greeting of peace. He invites Thomas to put his finger in his hand and in his side, inviting him to set aside his doubt and believe. These first witnesses will have the advantage over future followers of Jesus to testify to an encounter with the risen Lord. Future generations will have to depend upon the faithfulness of their witness. The risen Lord takes the doubt of Thomas seriously. Yet Thomas does not touch the risen Lord but confesses: My Lord and my God (Ὁ κύριός μου καὶ ὁ θεός μου), which could have been lifted out of ritual around devotion to the emperor. The response of Thomas is a powerful affirmation of faith. As John will stress, the presence of the risen Lord for the community today will be through the Paraclete, the Holy Spirit. Thus, the risen Lord is ascending “to my Father and, in a rare instance of this designation of God,[15] your Father, to my God and your God,” suggesting a profound unity between himself and his disciples. The ascending/descending theme here is not linked to the Son of Man language, but the language of pre-existence is a development of the Christian Son of Man tradition.[16] The confession brings the pre-existent, earthly and now resurrected Son into the closest possible relationship with God,[17] for the Word was God (1:1), the accusation he was equal with God (5:18), before Abraham was I am (8:58), I and the Father are one (10:30, 17:11) the accusation that he makes himself God (10:33), that seeing him one sees the one who sent him (12:45, 14:9). The point of such language is that in encountering Jesus one encounters the eschatological presence of God directly at work. The confession integrates the Easter narratives into the theological theme of John. The story reassembles the newly formed people of God, establishing them in the faith of the eschatological presence of God in Jesus. The focus is not the apologetic motive but the confession of faith.[18] This verse is part of the scriptural affirmation of the deity of the Son. The title “Lord” implies the full deity of the Son, and here John sets the title God and Lord beside each other.[19] As an apostle, Thomas must see and believe. All the disciples doubted until they saw. However, the final blessing of the risen Lord is for those who do not see, and yet believe, based upon their trust in the witness of the apostles. The point here is that the resurrected Jesus is the same Jesus who lived with the disciples. Thomas represents pre-Easter disciples. There were hesitation and doubt in the inner circle.
This segment concludes in verses 30-31 with a statement of the purpose for the writing of the Gospel of John. Jesus did many other signs (σημεῖα (properly understood, as Barth[20] stresses) not written in this book. John never refers to either the cross or the resurrection as a sign, for he is acted upon in both cases, in the first by human beings and in the second by his Father. Even the glorification of Jesus that shows itself in the abasement of the cross is a work of his Father. Since a sign in this gospel is something Jesus does to point to his oneness with his Father, resurrection is not a sign in that sense, since the gift of resurrected life is from the Father to the Son. The interest of the gospel shifts to the self-witness of the risen Lord by which he demonstrates his identity with the earthly Jesus. This comment suggests that the essence of the gospel is that it will contain stories of healing, exorcism, and miracle,[21] of which he has selected some to put in his Book of Signs, the signs he share have been written so that the reader will come to faith[22] or to believe , to deepen faith in the exalted titles that Jesus is the promised Jewish Messiah, the Son of God, (Ἰησοῦς ἐστιν ὁ χριστὸς ὁ υἱὸς τοῦ θεοῦ). Such belief will avoid the error both of Thomas and all the disciples. Whose faith depended upon sensory faculties that led to misunderstanding who Jesus truly is. He makes his Christological intent in writing this gospel clear, doing so with a decidedly anti-docetic twist, but also recognizing that affirmation of Jesus as the promised Messiah needs the Hellenistic exposition that he is the Son of God,[23] and that by believing, the reader may have life in the name of Jesus. The imparting of the Spirit is from the risen Lord, and now he makes who the risen Lord is the final chord in his book. The doubts of the hesitant have been played out for everyone to see in the story of Thomas. Now what should be the concluding confession of the newly faithful is spelled out. He calls upon his readers to believe Jesus is the one who reveals who God is. This chapter ends with no hint of further appearance stories, certainly not in Galilee.[24]
Personal application: Doubt
You might remember the story in Matthew 8:23-27, where a storm comes up quickly on the lake while the little boat of the disciples starts flooding. Jesus is sleeping. The disciples are not. They awaken Jesus, and he says, “You of little faith, why are you so afraid?” Notice what Jesus did not say. He did not say, “You of little faith, come back to me sometime when your faith is strong, when you really believe, and then I might try to help you out.” I suppose then, Jesus could have grabbed his pillow and gone back to sleep. He did not say that. Instead, after reminding them that they had room to grow in their faith journey, he immediately came to their rescue. He “rebuked the winds.” Jesus rebukes the winds; we do not. We cannot make having faith an excellent work we do. Thomas does not “achieve” a coming to faith. Faith is something the risen Christ brings to Thomas. Jesus gave Thomas the help he needed even when he was skeptical and full of doubt.
Doubt is often the beginning of exciting learning. The questions we have about the meaning of life, about character, about personality development, about political life, about career, about marriage, are questions that can stimulate us toward greater knowledge, insight, and a better life. We ought not to be afraid of such questions. Our doubts can lead us to deeper faith, stronger faith, and mature faith. The church has too often made doubting people uncomfortable to be in it. Too often, Christians forget the doubts with which they have struggled in their lives. We project to others unrealistic certainty about everything. We forget how weak and feeble our grasp of Christian truth often is. We forget that Christian belief and faith are precisely that – faith. As we encounter those who doubt, we remember that God knows their needs more than we do. God may be testing and strengthening them through their exploration. They may need to lay down their idol god or their ideal god in favor of the Real God. In any case, God knows best what they need, and God is working their doubt, like all things, for their good (Romans 8:28). Therefore, there is no better way to collaborate with people in their doubt than to pray that the kindness of God would address their deepest needs and make known the ways God is shaping them through their questioning.
Many of the great thinkers of the church wrestled with doubts.
Mother Teresa: “Darkness is such that I really do not see — neither with my mind nor with my reason — the place of God in my soul is blank — There is no God in me — when the pain of longing is so great — I just long and long for God … The torture and pain I can’t explain.”
Martin Luther, whose willingness to reexamine what he had believed for most of his life led to the Protestant Reformation, once wrote about a crisis of faith: “For more than a week I was close to the gates of death and hell. I trembled in all my members. Christ was wholly lost. I was shaken by desperation and blasphemy of God.”
Charles Spurgeon, in his sermon “Desire of the Soul in Spiritual Darkness,” bluntly claimed: “I think, when a man says, ‘I never doubt,’ it is quite time for us to doubt him, it is quite time for us to begin to say, ‘Ah, poor soul, I am afraid you are not on the road at all’ ...”
Pope Francis: “If one has the answers to all the questions — that is the proof that God is not with him. It means that he is a false prophet using religion for himself. The great leaders of the people of God, like Moses, have always left room for doubt. You must leave room for the Lord, not for our certainties; we must be humble.”
Of course, as positive an experience as doubt can be, doubt is not a place to live. With humility, we can move forward with the knowledge and experience we have while being open to new learnings life may bring our way.
Christian witness invites persons to live in the truth of God revealed in Jesus. It does so because of the first witnesses to whom Jesus appeared after his crucifixion. Given the painful realities of our world, such a witness is a surprise. We cannot look to analogies in nature or human life to support this belief. It needs to remain a genuine, surprising act of God. We have no right to expect it. The resurrection of Jesus is gift, first to Jesus of Nazareth and through him to us. If we can cross that threshold, and I do not minimize its difficulty, it opens a new world for us. Considering its truth, we can see everything in a unique way. We can look through this event to clarify the ambiguities of our lives and experiences. Through it, we can see human history and even the universe differently. We see much death, evil, greed, and ugliness in the world. In their midst, we can remain people of hope that God has determined our destiny to be life, righteousness, and peace.
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[4] Schweizer, TDNT, VI, 442.
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[20] Church Dogmatics IV.2 [64.3] 238.
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[23] Grundmann, IX, 567.
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