Date: May 2, 2010
Author: The Rev. Vicki Cok
Reading: John 20: 19-31
Recording: mp3 or
wma (Windows Media Player)
For Discussion
What evidence of divine activity has Jesus left behind? Where/when/how do you see Jesus?
Thomas responds with conditions for believing. What’s the difference between doubt and conditions?
Should faith be based on some objective criteria? If so, where do we go for it? Or is faith an inner experience of hope and resolve unrelated to objective realities? Is faith entirely experiential and affective, an inner-emotional or psychological decision shaping how we live and think, but not anchored to specific events in history (such as the tomb)?
If one of Christianity’s chief claims—the resurrection of Jesus—proves to be unhistorical, what happens to our faith?
Comment on the following statement by William Barley: There is more ultimate faith in the man who insists on being sure than the man who glibly repeats things which he has never thought out, and which he does not really believe. It is doubt like that which in the end arrives at certainty.... Thomas doubted in order to become sure; and when he did become sure, his surrender to certainty was complete. If a man fights his way through his doubts to the conviction that Jesus Christ is Lord, he has attained to a certainty that the man who unthinkingly accepts can never reach.
Review the 4 stages of faith (below) and consider in which stage you find yourself. If you have not yet owned your faith, what could help move you from searching faith to owned faith?
- EXPERIENCED FAITH (preschool & early childhood) -- imitating actions, e.g., a child praying the Lord's Prayer without understanding the meaning of all the words -- "This is what we do. This is how we act."
- AFFILIATIVE FAITH (childhood & early adolescent years) -- belonging to a group, which still centers on imitating what the group does -- "This is what we believe and do. This is our group/church."
- SEARCHING FAITH (late adolescence) -- asking questions, "Is this what I believe?" Thomas is our example of this. He will not blindly accept what others have said, but needs to find certainty for himself. This stage of faith is adding the "head" to the "heart" of the earlier stages. Westerhoff comments:
- OWNED FAITH (early adulthood) -- this stage comes only through the searching stage. After exploring the question, "Is this what I believe?" one, hopefully, discovers a Christian answer that declares: "This is what I believe." The Thomas scene ends with such a personal confession: "My Lord and my God" -- a confession we don't hear from any of the other disciples who did not go through the same questioning as Thomas. However, this is the strong, personal faith that one witnesses to and one is willing to die for -- the other disciples certainly ended up in this stage.
What is this "peace" that Jesus brings? Is it a type of relationship between people or a sense of personal inner tranquility.
