Good morning. Now we come to “doubting Thomas“. He was not
with them when Jesus came. 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. It is easy to put him down for saying this – and we
do - but in truth would we do any better? In the world, seeing is believing;
but in Christianity believing is seeing. 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. This is the same thing that
Jesus said the first time He came into the room. He said to Thomas, reach here
with your finger, and see My hands; and reach here your hand and put it into My
side; do not be unbelieving, but believing. Thomas answered and said to Him, my
Lord and my God! Because you have seen Me, have you believed? Blessed are they
who did not see, and yet believed. That of course applies to all of us
believers today. The world wants to “see“ before they will believe; however,
you must believe before you can “see“. Therefore many other signs Jesus also
performed in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this
book; these have been written so that
you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing
you may have life in His name. If you did not believe after the signs John did
write about, it would not have made any difference had he written about dozens
more. Father thank You that we have believed without seeing. Help us to share
that belief with others.
Therefore I exhort you, be imitators of me
Good morning. Paul then gives a list of a lot of things that he has gone through as an apostle. I do not write these things to shame you, but to admonish you as my beloved children. For if you were to have countless tutors in Christ, yet you would not have many fathers, for in Christ Jesus I became your father through the gospel. There could be many people that you listen to either in church or through the Internet or other means; but there was only one person (as a general rule it was a person) that lead you to Christ. Therefore I exhort you, be imitators of me. He was saying that just like a child imitates his or her father, they were to imitate him. He says that again seven chapters later. Since it is easy to forget some things about people we have not seen in a while, Paul says that he sent Timothy to them to remind them of his ways which are in Christ, just as he taught everywhere in every church. Some have become arrogant, as though I were not coming to you. I shall find ou...
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