Learning to believe by giving your heart away

Did you know that the original meaning for the word “believe” meant to give your heart and not what we have stored in our heads?  Belief is about what we have given our hearts to not what we have managed to store up in terms of knowledge, facts and proofs. This is the moment when we are called to reach out not with what we know but with hope for the things we do not know and the things we cannot prove and yet still know that they are still true.  Or if you want to think of it differently, is believing without doubt really faith?

Let me draw you a picture of what those first days after the resurrection might have been like: there was no pipe organ, no piano, no priest lead and preach. It was the Christian community at its lowest and worst. They were in behind locked doors and shuttered windows for fear of what the world was going to do to them next. It was Church at its nastiest:  group who were frightened, disheartened and defensive. Into this perfectly gloomy conglomeration of people, through locked doors comes the risen Jesus who bids them a good evening and God’s very own peace. The first time he had to say it not just once but twice. The first bidding to was to announce his presence among the disciples and bring their disbelief to an end. Then he greeted them a second time so that they knew that they knew that it was him. Only then they could properly greet each other, Teacher and disciples. But there was one missing who needed to be there but he wasn’t.

And here is the thing about the absent Thomas. The Ranger had Yogi Bear. Snow White and the Dwarfs had Grumpy. Sesame Street had Oscar the Grouch. Charlie Brown had Lucy. And Jesus had Thomas. Thomas was not about to accept anything but the real thing. He wanted an experience all his own; to know that it really was him for his own self after what he had seen on that hill that day not so long ago. Many will pour scorn on Thomas because he did not just accept what he was told. Wasn’t it Thomas who was the one, who in John’s Gospel, encouraged and called his fellow apostles to go with Jesus that they would meet their death together with Jesus? Thomas believed with all his heart that Jesus was the Messiah, the Chosen One and had given it freely only to have it crushed on that hilltop just outside the city. Thomas didn’t need to have a change of heart, just a change of mind.

That’s why Jesus confronted him and challenged Thomas to open up his broken heart to continue to believe in him. And did you notice that Thomas did not need to do what said when confronted? He did need to touch and to see – he knew that he knew he was in the presence of the Master, which is why he boldly confessed for everyone to hear, “My Lord and my God”.

Having faith does not mean that you suddenly have all your questions answered. Having faith means that you will trust what you know because God has shown things to you and that you have hope for what you have not seen because you know God and put your trust in him. e need to learn to walk with our questions knowing that it may take time for us to know and to understand because, as St. Paul might remind us, we see in a glass darkly. We know only in part and only see in part. So I can trust and believe in what I know and leave room for hope because of what I do not know. Thanks be to God for that! Jesus is risen, alleluia!