A week later his disciples were in the house again, and Thomas was with them. Though the doors were locked, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you!” Then he said to Thomas, “Put your finger here; see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it into my side. Stop doubting and believe.” Thomas said to him, “My Lord and my God!” Then Jesus told him, “Because you have seen me, you have believed; blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.” John 20:26-29
In my previous post I sought to better understand doubt based on the story of Thomas. In this post I want to take it another step to show how to break free from the smothering clutches of doubt. While our doubts may not totally go away, they no longer have to cripple and rob us of the joy we have in Christ. So based on Thomas’ experience, here is how to break the bondage of doubt.
Doubt is overcome by small steps of willing trust.
When Jesus first appeared to His disciples, Thomas was absent. A week passed with no further appearances. It would have been easy at this point for Thomas to have washed his hands of the whole thing, packed up and left the group. But he didn’t. For some reason he stayed. It may have been a small step, but that small act of trust opened the door for his doubts to be addressed when the resurrected Jesus came to the disciples again.
I liken it to the process I went through when I learned how to swim as a boy. I don’t remember how old I was when I first began taking swimming lessons, but I do remember being a bit older than the rest of the group. So here I was at least a head taller than all these little shrimps in the pool with me. Talk about embarrassing. It was awful.
But we did all have one thing in common. None of us knew how to swim. Thankfully, our teacher didn’t have the sink or swim approach to teaching swimming. To be perfectly honest, I was doing quite well with the sinking part. Anyhow, the very first lesson he taught us seems rather juvenile now that I think back on it. But at the time it seemed that the teacher had actually lost his mind. We were in the shallow end with feet firmly planted on the bottom and heads clearly out of the water when he told us to let go of the side of the pool.
I was aghast. “Let go. You’ve got to be nuts,” I thought. But that was the assignment. Let go of the side and walk out toward the middle of the shallow end. I was terrified. But thankfully I was a bit braver than the kid next to me. As I recall, I think his mom had to pry his fingers off the side in order to get him to let go.
Nevertheless, bit by bit, the teacher had us take additional steps like put our faces in the water, and go up and down in the shallow end, etc. He was trying to help us overcome our fear. And by the time the two weeks were over, we were all swimming not in the shallow end but where the big boys and girls swam – in the deep end. No sweat.
Do you see the principle here? I learned to swim by taking a small step of faith. That’s how we overcome our doubts. We express whatever amount of faith we can muster at the time. Maybe it will be nothing more than to just keep going to church. Or maybe it will be to choose to read the Bible or to pray. Whatever it is, we do something to help us deal with our doubts.
As we take these small steps of faith, they eventually begin to add up. After awhile, our faith becomes much stronger. So if you’re wanting to overcome your doubts, there’s no need to jump into the deep end of the faith. Just take a step. Do something that will move you in the direction of building your spiritual confidence.
Doubt is overcome by encountering Christ’s truth.
Earlier, Thomas had made a very specific request. If he was really going to believe that Jesus was alive, he wanted to see it for himself. Not only that, he wanted to actually put his finger where the nails were and place his hand in Jesus’ side. In other words, Thomas was wanting truth.
The desire for truth is a key factor in overcoming doubt, because one of the things that fuels our doubts is a lack of truth. When we are uncertain about our faith, we need something to help bolster our confidence. That something is truth. At such times, we are wanting our faith to be something more than just a shot in the dark. We need to know that our faith has some basis of reality behind it.
So where do you find truth? First of all, you find it as you study the scripture. It’s amazing how many of our uncertainties can be answered if we take the time to see what God has to say about them. While not every question will always be clearly answered, you will find that the scriptures can give abundant evidence to a person who is genuinely seeking for the truth. Likewise you can experience truth as you encounter the people of truth. Many a skeptic has been powerfully impacted by the life of a believer who not only claimed the faith but lived it. Allow yourself to come close to people like that. They will lead you to the truth.
Doubt is overcome by a release of worshiping faith.
When Thomas was confronted with the truth about Christ’s resurrection, he had a choice to make. He could have chosen to deny it like many others did. Matthew tells us that Jesus actually presented himself alive to scores of people, and yet some still chose to reject it. Thomas could have done the same thing. But thankfully he made a better choice. The scripture says that having been confronted with the truth, he opened his heart to it and offered these words of praise, “My Lord, and my God.”
In that moment, the pain of Jesus’ death, the disillusionment that came with it, and the uncertainty of the future melted away as he released his faith in worship. That changed his life. According to tradition, Thomas spent the rest of his life until he was martyred proclaiming that Jesus had indeed been raised from the dead.
So when the doubts begin to fly and you are exposed to the truth you need, you have a choice to make. You can either resist it and remain trapped in your doubts, or by faith you can open your heart in worship.
For those who choose the later option, they will find that a wonderful inner transformation has begun in their soul. The doubts start to subside. Faith gets stronger. And confidence rises again as they break free from the bondage which once held them captive.
I hope these postings on doubt have been helpful. If you have questions, let me know. I’ll do my best to respond to you.