April 6: “Blessed Are They Who Did Not See, and Yet Believed!”
♫ Music:
Day 49 - Tuesday, April 6
Title: “BLESSED ARE THEY WHO DID NOT SEE, AND YET BELIEVED!”
Scripture: John 20: 19-29
So when it was evening on that day, the first day of the week, and when the doors were shut where the disciples were, for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood in their midst and said to them, “Peace be with you.” And when He had said this, He showed them both His hands and His side. The disciples then rejoiced when they saw the Lord. So Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you; as the Father has sent Me, I also send you.” And when He had said this, He breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, their sins have been forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they have been retained.” But Thomas, one of the twelve, called Didymus, was not with them when Jesus came. So the other disciples were saying to him, “We have seen the Lord!” But he said to them, “Unless I see in His hands the imprint of the nails, and put my finger into the place of the nails, and put my hand into His side, I will not believe.”
After eight days His disciples were again inside, and Thomas with them. Jesus came, the doors having been shut, and stood in their midst and said, “Peace be with you.” Then He said to Thomas, “Reach here with your finger, and see My hands; and reach here your hand and put it into My side; and do not be unbelieving, but believing.” Thomas answered and said to Him, “My Lord and my God!” Jesus said to him, “Because you have seen Me, have you believed? Blessed are they who did not see, and yet believed.”
Poetry:
[The Choice]
by Nate Klug
To stand for once
outside my faith
to steady it
caught and squirming on a stick
up to mind’s
inviting light
and name it!
for all its faults and facets
or keep waiting
to be claimed in it
FAITH AND DOUBT
Certain experts who study personalities have determined that Thomas was a rationalist who found it difficult to trust others. His intellectual curiosity, deep passion for knowledge, and desire to fully understand something before he embraced it has forever made him ‘Doubting Thomas.’ When Christ appeared to Mary Magdalene at the Garden Tomb after his resurrection he told her, “Don’t cling to me.” Yet when Christ and Thomas were finally in the same room together, he demanded that Thomas touch his hands and side. Our Lord knew that Thomas, whose tendency was to withdraw and isolate himself, needed at least for a moment, to be the center of attention as Christ empowered him to move from all the thoughts swirling around in his head to the highly visceral experience of seeing and feeling still-fresh wounds. This transformative encounter from mind to heart, ended with a believing Thomas crying out, “My Lord and my God.” Michael Landry, the artist who conceptualized the Doubting Thomas sculpture before us, echoes the physicality of Christ’s challenge to Thomas by creating a kinetic work activated when viewers step on a pedal thereby sending a resin hand crashing into a wounded torso. Talk about an unforgettable visual experience!
These days there seems to be a continual stream of stories on the internet regarding Christian leaders caught in scandals, or those who have compromised their faith in some way, or who have abandoned the faith altogether. When a dear friend of mine who was a missionary and then a minister of music for many years called with the news that he had become an atheist I was floored. He cited the reason many give who’ve jumped ship—that those around him who claimed to be followers of Jesus led toxic, inauthentic lives. One ex-Christian pastor recently stated, “I came to the point where I realized I was holding other people to a biblical standard that I was not able to keep myself.” Hypocrisy runs rampant both inside and outside the church, but somehow fallout from believers who claim to follow Jesus often results in more serious consequences because a holy trust has been broken. It’s not hard to be inconsistent. Truth of the matter is, the more we justify the sin in our lives, the easier it is to doubt and eventually stop believing altogether. Author Paul Chamberlain writes, “Usually there is a complex combination of factors that in the end moves people away from the faith they once believed and promoted. When these skeptics leave the fold, they often become some of Christianity’s most adamant and well-informed critics.”
I’d like to think that true Christianity encourages critical thinking and the freedom to honestly examine any sort of difficult question. To me, contending for the faith means grappling with the most challenging objections and moving beyond predictable answers. There have been times in my Christian journey when nothing made sense and in my discouragement all I could muster were the desperate words of the demon possessed boy’s father in Mark 9, “Lord I believe, help my unbelief.” Doubt cannot always be viewed as the enemy of faith, but a force that should actually strengthen our beliefs. Klung’s poetic words, “To stand for once outside my faith to steady it” describes this process well.
Jesus’ concluding words in today’s passage, “Blessed are they who do not see, and yet believe” are both challenging and comforting. They are challenging because all too often our behavior is much like Thomas’. It’s natural for humans to demand evidence, to seek signs and miracles as concrete proof that the things of God are real. It is however those more mature believers who consistently trust and love even when experiencing the ‘dark night of the soul’ that find comfort in Christ’s blessing. Pastor Josiah Trenham offers these much-needed words of encouragement:
“It is not as though you can only be called a believer if you have absolutely perfect, non-faltering faith at all times. If that were the case, no one would ever be called a believer except Jesus Christ himself, whose faith has justified us. In fact the quest is to believe a little bit more every day, to repent a little bit more. We seek a stronger belief day by day. The assumption from the Christian heart is that every day is an opportunity to believe more than the day before. What would happen if you fully believed? You would become a saint. That is what a saint is—someone who has struggled to fully believe, little by little. This is God’s will for every person.”
Prayer
An Affirmation of Faith
My hope is built on nothing less
Than Jesus' blood and righteousness.
No merit of my own I claim,
but wholly lean on Jesus' name.
On Christ the solid Rock I stand,
all other ground is sinking sand.
Amen.
Barry Krammes
Professor Emeritus, Art Department
Biola University
For more information about the artwork, music, and poetry selected for this day, we have provided resources under the “About” tab located next to the “Devotional” tab.
About the Artwork:
Doubting Thomas
Michael Landry
2013
Mixed media
205 x 186 x 80 cm
Image courtesy of the artist, Thomas Dane Gallery, and the National Gallery
During a residency at the National Gallery in London, artist Michael Landy was invited to create contemporary works in response to the gallery’s collection of Old Master paintings. The resulting pieces were featured in the exhibition entitled Saints Alive. Doubting Thomas alludes to Thomas, who was troubled by doubts on Christ's resurrection - until Jesus invited him to touch his wounds. The sculpture was created with found objects and scrap materials with tri-dimensional renderings of Christ’s torso and Thomas’s hand is represented by Giovanni Batista Cima’s painting entitled The Incredulity of Saint Thomas. All of Landy's kinetic sculptures require that the viewer set them in motion. Visitors are invited to press a foot pedal, which activates a mechanism causing the index finger to poke the wound in Christ’s side. Eventually a large hole is bored into the torso, which needed to be replaced several times throughout the exhibition. Besides encouraging visitors to adopt Thomas’s perspective through their actions, Landy raises questions as to the implications of Thomas’s doubt.
Adapted from a commentary by Pablo Perez d'Ors
https://thevcs.org/doubting-thomas/thrust-it-my-side
https://www.dw.com/en/michael-landy-s-kinetic-art-on-show-in-basel/a-19314309
About the Artist:
Michael Landy (b. 1963) is a British artist. A member of the Young British Artists (YBAs), conceptual artist Landy produces installations that comment on consumerism. For his best-known work Break Down (2001), Landy gathered all of his worldly belongings, including clothes, postage stamps, a car, and works of art by himself and other artists such as Damien Hirst and Tracey Emin, and installed them in a former shop space in central London. After cataloguing all 7,227 items, Landy destroyed them on an assembly line with the help of ten workers. None of the remaining rubbish was sold, and Landy made no money from the project. “I’m always trying to get rid of myself,” Landy said of the piece. “That’s the closest I’ve ever got.” In Art Bin (2010), Landy invited members of the public, collectors, and artists to dispose of artworks in a giant transparent container installed in a London gallery. In recent years, Landy has also produced etchings of weeds in the traditional style of botanical studies.
https://www.artsy.net/artist/michael-landy
https://www.dw.com/en/michael-landy-s-kinetic-art-on-show-in-basel/a-19314309
About the Music:
“My Hope is Built” from the album O God, Our Help in Ages Past
Lyrics:
My hope is built on nothing less
Than Jesus' blood and righteousness
No merit of my own I claim
But wholly lean on Jesus' name
When darkness hides His lovely face
I rest on His unchanging grace
In every high and stormy gale
My anchor holds within the veil
His oath, His covenant, His blood
Support me in the raging flood
When all around my soul gives way
He then is all my hope and stay
When He shall come with trumpet sound
Oh may I then in Him be found
Clothed in His righteousness alone
Redeemed to stand before the throne
Chorus
On Christ the solid Rock I stand
All other ground is sinking sand
About the Composer
Edward Mote (1797-1874) grew up in a non-Christian home. His parents were atheistic tavern owners opposed to anything religious. Oddly enough, they apprenticed him to a godly cabinetmaker whose life greatly influenced the young Edward. At the age of 15 he heard the preaching of John Hyatt at the Tottenham Court Road Chapel and made a decision to follow Christ. As an adult he became a master cabinetmaker as well a prolific hymn writer. At the age of 55 he changed careers becoming a Baptist pastor, a role he assumed at Strict Baptist Church in Horsham, Sussex, for over 20 years. Mote composed more than 100 hymns. He published his hymns in 1836 in Hymns of Praise, A New Selection of Gospel Hymns. One day on his way to his shop he got the idea for “The Solid Rock” as it is sometimes referred to today. Mote wrote: One morning it came into my mind as I went to labor, to write a hymn on the ‘Gracious Experience of a Christian.’ As I went up to Holborn I had the chorus, On Christ the solid Rock I stand, all other ground is sinking sand. In the day I had four verses complete, and wrote them off.... On the Sabbath following... by the fireside [I] composed the last two verses... Brother Rees of Crown Street, Soho, brought out an edition of hymns (1836) and this hymn was in it.
About the Performers:
Martin Luther College Choir
Martin Luther College is part of the Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod (WELS). Formed from an amalgamation of Dr. Martin Luther College (founded in 1884) and Northwestern College (founded in 1865), Martin Luther College opened its doors to the next generation of church workers in 1995. The college campus is located on a beautiful wooded hill overlooking the city of New Ulm, Minnesota. The College Choir is an auditioned group of 60 singers, open to all Martin Luther College students. Members of the choir participate in on campus concerts with other ensembles and prepare several additional sacred concerts during the year. The choir tours various areas of the synod each spring. The mission of the choir is to proclaim the Gospel in song.
About the Poet:
Nate Klug is a poet, translator, and essayist. He is the author of the poetry collections Anyone, Hosts and Guests, and Rude Woods, a modern translation of Virgil’s Eclogues. His poetry has appeared in the Nation, the New York Review of Books, and The Best American Poetry. A Congregational minister, he lives in Albany, California. His writing has been supported by fellowships from the James Merrill House, the MacDowell Colony, and the Poetry Foundation. He lives and works in the Bay Area of California.
http://www.nateklug.com/
About the Devotion Author:
Barry Krammes
Professor Emeritus, Art Department
Biola University
Artist and educator Barry Krammes (b. 1951) received his B.F.A. in printmaking and drawing from the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire and his M.F.A. in two-dimensional studies from University of Wisconsin, Madison. For thirty-five years, he was employed at Biola University in La Mirada, California, where he was the Art Chair for fifteen years. Krammes is an assemblage artist whose work has been featured in both solo and group exhibitions, regionally and nationally. His work can be found in various private collections throughout the United States and Canada. He has taught assemblage seminars at Image Journal’s annual Glen Summer Workshop in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Krammes has served as the Visual Arts Coordinator for the C.S. Lewis Summer Institute in Cambridge, England, and has been the Program Coordinator for both Biola University’s annual arts symposium and the Center for Christianity, Culture, and the Arts for several years. He has also been the editor of CIVA: Seen Journal for Christians in the Visual Arts (CIVA), a national arts organization. For the last five years of his time at Biola, he was the planning coordinator for the CCCA. Krammes was the originator of the Advent and Lent Projects.