Revelations from the Word

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My Lord and my God

by Jean-Louis Coraboeuf

"And after eight days His disciples were again inside, and Thomas with them. Jesus came, the doors being shut, and stood in the midst, and said, Peace to you! Then He said to Thomas, Reach your finger here, and look at My hands; and reach your hand here, and put it into My side. Do not be unbelieving, but believing. And Thomas answered and said to Him, My Lord and my God! Jesus said to him, Thomas, because you have seen Me, you have believed. Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed" (John 20:26-29).

Thomas was one of the twelve disciples of Jesus, which is why He knew Him well as the Son of Man. He was also not as unbelieving as one might want to say he was for he had been taught by Jesus for three years. However, he had difficulty in realising the spiritual import of Jesus' words as his reflections bear witness: "Let us also go (to Jerusalem), in order to die with Him (Jesus)" (John 11:16) and "Lord, we do not know where you are going; how can we know the way?" (John 14:5). When Jesus appeared for the first time in the midst of His disciples, Thomas was not there, that is why he would have had difficulty in believing the other disciples who were party to the Lord's visit (John 20:24-25). Like them, he had still not understood that, according to the Scriptures, Jesus was to be raised from the dead (John 20:9).

Thomas knew the prophet Jesus who had done miracles, he believed in what He had said and he believed that the Holy Spirit was going to come, but he did not know the power of the resurrection. This passage makes clear the need for every man born again to have a revelation of the risen Christ. That is why the apostle Paul announced the Good News of Jesus and of His resurrection (Acts 17:18), he who had given up everything to know the power of this resurrection (Philippians 3:8-11). God the Father considered it good to all the fullness dwell in Him (Colossians 1:12-20):

• the Son is the image of the invisible God,

• He is the heir (first born) of all Creation,

• all things have been created by Him and for Him, and have their being through Him,

• He is the first born from the dead, the only Resurrected One,

• He has been raised for our justification (Romans 4:25),

• He is at the right hand of God, and He intercedes for us (Romans 8:34),

• and death no longer has any power over Him (Romans 6:9).

Thomas then understood that, because He had been raised, Jesus was really God in all His fullness, Emmanuel, God with us, who had been announced by the prophet Isaiah (Isaiah 7:14). Jesus was Thomas' Lord; He became also "his God". Because we have this testimony, it is easier for us to believe without seeing, "If we confess with our mouth the Lord Jesus, and if we believe in our heart that God raised Him from the dead, we are saved" (Romans 10:9).