Saint Thomas
Habakkuk 2.1-4; Ephesians 2.19-22; John 20.24-29
John 24.29. Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.
I believe in the talking cure. Listening and speaking can cure people. And sometimes they are the only things that will cure people. Like any healing process, for all sorts of reasons, it sometimes doesn’t work. But when it does! Well praise God, its remarkable what listening and speaking can do.
The talking cure isn’t the sole preserve of qualified counsellors. It happens in all sorts of circumstances. I think of Denise – not her real name I must add, and also I can’t tell you the whole story about her – what I can tell you however is that she was as nervous as a kitten, absolutely lacking in self-confidence, frequently greeted with hostility and occasionally verbal abuse, even in the church I’m ashamed to say, betrayed at home, and thoroughly miserable. She joined a small group for Bible study. A few months in, the group was looking at the story in Mark of the woman with the haemorrhage and the healing of Jairus’ daughter. You know the story where Jesus is called to this local leaders’ home because his daughter is dying, but despite the urgency he stops on the way to engage in conversation with an outcast woman suffering bleeding who has broken all the taboos by touching him. This ostracised and scared woman finds healing with Jesus while the important man has to wait. In a moment of revelation Denise saw herself as that woman, the outcast Jesus loved. Denise is now an ordained priest in this church of ours. Who would have imagined those years ago that such a change could happen for her? It was all words – a talking cure.
It wasn’t a talking cure for Thomas. He demanded rock solid evidence, and that’s what he got. Once he had seen the evidence, from the mouth of the sceptic comes the last of the great declarations of Jesus’ real nature in John’s Gospel – “My Lord and my God.” When Thomas finally sees the vision of Jesus the others had seen his unbelief is instantly converted into adoring faith. The other disciples had repeatedly told him what they had seen but Thomas stubbornly insists on physical proof. His insistence is met with seeing, but don’t envy him.
Yes, Thomas becomes an eyewitness; no talking cure, this is hard reality. He’s any eyewitness, but he is the last eyewitness. The Gospeller John is clear about this, and clear too that in the generations since this happened many other people have come to believe in Jesus who haven’t had Thomas’ privilege. The faith of these more recent believers is every bit as good as that of Thomas. These are the ones who have come to believe not on the basis of physical evidence, but on the basis of words. Sure the words may have been reinforced by all sorts of wonderful things – the love given by parents, the loyalty of friends, the belonging offered by a church, the compassionate care of someone who bothered, the soul-friending of a good listener – but at heart it nevertheless comes down in the end to words. A talking cure.
Talking does not have about it a fixed form – it is varied, and moving, and dialogical. It happens between people. It is subjective and engaging, always incomplete yet tantalisingly fulfilling. It can never be absolutely rigid and formulaic. Of talking there is no end. And the gospel is always a talking thing, a way of naming this world as God’s reality. Such naming cures us, gives us the language of healthy living, alerts us to the transforming power of God’s love.
This is the way of faith for every person since those eyewitnesses like Thomas. We should rejoice in a God who made us language animals – that’s our glory, that’s out blessing. Jesus said, ‘Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.’
I believe in the talking cure. Listening and speaking can cure people. And sometimes they are the only things that will cure people. Like any healing process, for all sorts of reasons, it sometimes doesn’t work. But when it does! Well praise God, its remarkable what listening and speaking can do.
The talking cure isn’t the sole preserve of qualified counsellors. It happens in all sorts of circumstances. I think of Denise – not her real name I must add, and also I can’t tell you the whole story about her – what I can tell you however is that she was as nervous as a kitten, absolutely lacking in self-confidence, frequently greeted with hostility and occasionally verbal abuse, even in the church I’m ashamed to say, betrayed at home, and thoroughly miserable. She joined a small group for Bible study. A few months in, the group was looking at the story in Mark of the woman with the haemorrhage and the healing of Jairus’ daughter. You know the story where Jesus is called to this local leaders’ home because his daughter is dying, but despite the urgency he stops on the way to engage in conversation with an outcast woman suffering bleeding who has broken all the taboos by touching him. This ostracised and scared woman finds healing with Jesus while the important man has to wait. In a moment of revelation Denise saw herself as that woman, the outcast Jesus loved. Denise is now an ordained priest in this church of ours. Who would have imagined those years ago that such a change could happen for her? It was all words – a talking cure.
It wasn’t a talking cure for Thomas. He demanded rock solid evidence, and that’s what he got. Once he had seen the evidence, from the mouth of the sceptic comes the last of the great declarations of Jesus’ real nature in John’s Gospel – “My Lord and my God.” When Thomas finally sees the vision of Jesus the others had seen his unbelief is instantly converted into adoring faith. The other disciples had repeatedly told him what they had seen but Thomas stubbornly insists on physical proof. His insistence is met with seeing, but don’t envy him.
Yes, Thomas becomes an eyewitness; no talking cure, this is hard reality. He’s any eyewitness, but he is the last eyewitness. The Gospeller John is clear about this, and clear too that in the generations since this happened many other people have come to believe in Jesus who haven’t had Thomas’ privilege. The faith of these more recent believers is every bit as good as that of Thomas. These are the ones who have come to believe not on the basis of physical evidence, but on the basis of words. Sure the words may have been reinforced by all sorts of wonderful things – the love given by parents, the loyalty of friends, the belonging offered by a church, the compassionate care of someone who bothered, the soul-friending of a good listener – but at heart it nevertheless comes down in the end to words. A talking cure.
Talking does not have about it a fixed form – it is varied, and moving, and dialogical. It happens between people. It is subjective and engaging, always incomplete yet tantalisingly fulfilling. It can never be absolutely rigid and formulaic. Of talking there is no end. And the gospel is always a talking thing, a way of naming this world as God’s reality. Such naming cures us, gives us the language of healthy living, alerts us to the transforming power of God’s love.
This is the way of faith for every person since those eyewitnesses like Thomas. We should rejoice in a God who made us language animals – that’s our glory, that’s out blessing. Jesus said, ‘Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.’