A village was suffering from severe shortage of water. It had not rained for months and drought was threatening the harvest. The pastor in the village decided to call for a prayer meeting. Church members came together to pray for rain. After much prayer and singing the pastor looked up and asked the congregation, 'where is your faith? How come you did not bring umbrellas?'

One of Jesus' disciples forever associated with doubt is 'Doubting Thomas.' He got this unfortunate title because he told other disciples that he would not believe in the resurrection of Jesus until he himself saw and touched the wounds of Jesus. Thomas was not there when the risen Lord appeared to his beloved disciples and announced peace and the Holy Spirit to them.

Is it okay to doubt like Thomas did? In my pastoral ministry I had a number of people come to me and shared their honest doubts about faith. I remember one fellow. He was very bright and had already established himself as a professional in his late twenties. He told me that he no longer believed he was a Christian. He had done some personal readings on 'the history of God' and concluded that his idea of God was really his own invention. All I could pray was that the Lord would reveal himself to this young man some day as he had done to Thomas.

Jesus appeared to Thomas
A week after his resurrection, Jesus appeared again to his disciples. This was now his second appearance to the disciples. His resurrected body was special, for it was capable of walking through the locked door! He offered peace to his disciples and told Thomas to touch his wounds, "Put your finger here. See my hands. Reach out your hand and put it into my side. Stop doubting and believe." (vs. 27)

The last sentence is literally 'stop being an unbeliever and be a believer.' Jesus called for faith from Thomas.

Doubt is okay
From the way Jesus was relating to Thomas, we might say that doubting is okay, as long as it brings clarification. But doubt for the sake of doubt gets us nowhere. Doubting can be an endless thing. No matter how much evidence there is, if a man has set his heart to doubt and continue to doubt, then no amount of evidence can persuade him to the path of faith and trust. Abraham Lincoln once said, "there is enough evidence for those who want to believe and there is not enough evidence for those who do not want to believe."

Sometimes we cannot help but doubt because we want to get our facts straight on what we wish to believe. Some people in the history of church justified their 'doubts' by saying, 'I understand in order to believe.' They were saying in essence, 'I need reason to enrich my faith.' Jesus would say, 'No problem! Do what you need to do.'

Faith is better
But there are times when we just know that reason alone will not get us anywhere. We need to take a step of faith. 'We believe in order to understand.' Faith is a necessary step for reason to work itself out. So some people might say, 'I believe in order to understand.' Doubt is okay but faith is better.

Jesus says, "Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed." In other words, Jesus says blessed are those who accept the resurrection of Jesus by faith. Doubt is okay if it brings clarity. Faith is even better because it brings trust. After all, our relationship with Jesus is, ultimately, one of trust.

The resurrection of Jesus Christ is the most important miracle of all. How we respond to this miracle also determines our eternal destiny.

The apostle Paul said, "if Jesus had not been raised from the dead, we would still be in sin and that we would be men to be pitied the most." Why did he say that? It is because our Christian faith is completely based upon the claim that Jesus died and rose for us. Do you believe in the resurrection of Jesus Christ? Do you really believe that Jesus defied death and rose from it? Do you believe that this Jesus now stands next to you and is offering eternal life, that 'whosoever believes in him will not perish but have everlasting life'?

I pray you do.