Jesus last words call us to place our trust in Him for life with God...

This week, we are looking at what happened on the first Easter weekend. Yesterday, we saw Jesus reveal Himself to Mary Magdalene after He was raised from the dead that first Easter Sunday. While there is something different about Jesus in His appearance, that voice; that voice that first called to her when she was lost in a lifestyle of sin; that voice that called to His followers to Him; she could not miss that voice.

And while Mary wanted to cling to Jesus, Jesus would have nothing of the sort. You see Jesus rose from the dead not to go back to the good old days. Jesus rose from the dead to launch something new. So Jesus tells Mary to go and let the others know what she had seen. Which is exactly what Mary does in verse 18:

 Mary Magdalene came, announcing to the disciples, "I have seen the Lord," and that He had said these things to her. 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."

Now the reason Jesus says peace be with you, because the disciples had no peace. I mean imagine being one of the disciples, locked in a room filled with fear of being arrested like Jesus was, when Jesus basically enters the room by walking through the wall, like something out of a scene in the Matrix movies. Wouldn’t you be freaked out?

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."

Jesus appears to the disciples and then gives them a kingdom mission that would forever change their lives. “As the Father has sent Me, I also send you”. Just as Jesus was sent on a mission to be the vehicle that God used to reveal Himself to the world, these followers of Jesus were now given the mission to be the vehicle that He would use to reveal Himself around the world. John then tells us that Jesus breathed on them and said “receive the Holy Spirit”. But what does that mean?

Here we see that just as God the Father breathed the breath of life into Adam, Jesus breathes into His followers the Holy Spirit which gives new life as a new creation in the relationship with God that they were created for. 50 days later, the Holy Spirit would come in a way that would give birth to the church and launch the mission that they were given. However, there is one follower of Jesus who was not present. We meet this follower in verse 24:

 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."

Thomas, who is forever known by the adjective “doubting” next to his name, was adamant that he would only believe if he was shown unmistakable proof. So, eight days later, Jesus appears again in the same manner as before and provides that proof. After providing the proof Jesus then calls Thomas to a point of decision: “do not be unbelieving but believing”.  Now when Jesus uses the word believe here, this word is the same word that is also translated trust in our English Bibles. This word literally means to entrust oneself with complete confidence in someone or something. Jesus is saying “You need to trust Me”. We then see Thomas respond to Jesus proof and Jesus call by making a powerful confession: “My Lord and my God”.

Now notice what Jesus does not say. Jesus does not say “Do not worship Me as God. Do not place Me as large and in charge of your life.” Instead, Jesus says something altogether different: "Because you have seen Me, have you believed? Blessed are they who did not see, and yet believed." In other words, Jesus says to Thomas “You are placing your trust in Me as God in a bod because you have seen Me with your own eyes? Well blessed are those who place their trust in Me as God in a bod who did not see all the evidence that you have seen”.

And it is here that we see Jesus reveal a timeless truth for His followers. And that timeless truth is this: Jesus last words call us to place our trust in Him for life with God.  Just as it was for Thomas; just as it was for the disciples; just as it has been for humanity throughout history; forgiveness and a relationship with God requires placing one’s confident trust in Jesus Christ as the fulfillment of God’s promises. And God, throughout history, has continued to pursue humanity and provide the proof that He is a promise maker and a promise keeper that is worthy of trust. We see John reveal this reality for us in the verses that follow:

Therefore many other signs Jesus also performed in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this book; but 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.

You see, the Bible does have an agenda. And John clearly reveals the agenda that he had in writing this account of Jesus life. While John did not record every detail of Jesus life for us, John did record what was most important for us, so that we would place our confident trust in Jesus as God in a bod and be able to experience forgiveness and the relationship with God that we were created for.

So, have you placed your confident trust in Jesus for life with God?