If You're Real Show Me | God, If You're Real | Menlo Church Live Stream

When we have doubts, when we start asking hard questions, when we hear something that that challenges our our belief system, do we just believe our doubts and assume that they they must be true? Or do we bury our doubts and try to pretend that they don't exist because either option gives our doubts a power over us that they were not intended to have? Or is there something else God is inviting us to do with our doubts and questions? What if Jesus longs for you not to believe your doubts or to bury them, but to bring your doubts to him, honestly? [00:25:46] (46 seconds)  #BringYourDoubts

As Thomas sat in his doubt and questions and pain, peace be with you because Jesus is big enough, he's strong enough, he can handle our fear and our wounds and our doubts. One of my my favorite prayers in the bible is the man who prayed, Lord, I believe, Help my unbelief. Lord, I believe. Help my unbelief. Because doubt can be a doorway to deeper trust when we place it in Jesus' hands. It makes us curious. It makes us settle not for a superficial faith or an overly simplistic faith. [00:38:50] (40 seconds)  #HelpMyUnbelief

It makes us a little uncomfortable, which forces us to wrestle more, to dig more deeply. It paradoxically can make our faith stronger as we get closer to the truth and to Jesus who is the way and the truth and the life if we trust him with our doubt, if we're honest about it. Because Jesus won't reject you when you have honest doubts. Even Thomas' infamous doubt, it didn't keep Jesus away. Jesus showed up specifically for Thomas because of his doubt. He singled Thomas out to transform it and lead him to a deeper faith. [00:39:48] (43 seconds)  #DoubtBuildsFaith

And much later, a man named Saul, who was a ruthless enemy of the Christian church and the Christian movement would be transformed into Paul, perhaps the greatest proponent of the Christian faith of all time. Every single time, the witnesses who recorded this tell us that the one experience they had in common was that they encountered the risen Christ. Jesus risen from the dead standing among them. And our doubt might say that is impossible. But as the great missionary Hudson Taylor once said, there are commonly three stages in work for God. There's impossible, there's difficult, and there's done. [00:45:45] (45 seconds)  #ResurrectionChangesEverything

Now coming back to Thomas in this story, again, we don't know exactly what he did. We do know how he ultimately responded and what was changed. Thomas, the doubter looked back at Jesus, and he declared my Lord and my God. He moved from doubt to determination. He makes this confession that is it's the pinnacle of him realizing who Jesus really was. He still didn't know everything about what Jesus came and all of the theological depth that came much later, but he knew enough. [00:43:56] (35 seconds)  #FromDoubtToDeclaration

This is an amazing turning point not just for Thomas, but for everything because this this is what the resurrection does. This is what happens when the resurrected Jesus shows up because something happened that Thomas went into that room troubled by doubt, but he came out strengthened in faith. Just as Mary Magdalene went to the tomb early that Easter morning with tears of anguish, and she returned with tears of joy. Something happened that the other disciples went into that upper room in fear, but they came out with boldness. Something happened that they went into that room with a sorrow beyond words, but they came out with a peace that passes all understanding. Something made that kind of change, that kind of transformational, hope giving, life giving change possible for the disciples and for those around them. [00:44:45] (59 seconds)  #ResurrectionTransformsLives

He saw Jesus die on the cross. He was there when they laid him in the tomb. Thomas wasn't just a skeptic. He was grieving. He had skin in the game. His world, his whole world had been shaken. He picked up everything. He risked everything. He left everything to follow this Jesus. So for Thomas Dow, it it wasn't just a a choice. It was a defensive mechanism against getting hurt, against getting burned again. And I think we've all been there in some way where it's like, I I don't wanna trust again. [00:34:10] (43 seconds)  #WoundedDoubter

But I can look back and I can see that God has been faithful time and time and time again. He's been patient with my doubts. He's gracious in my shortcomings. He's forgiving with my failures. He's been present in my trials. He remains steadfast even in my skepticism. That doesn't mean I get all the answers, not this side of eternity, but I know that God is good. I know that he's faithful. And I've slowly, slowly, slowly come to admit that maybe his understanding is greater than mine, and I can actually trust him. [00:50:32] (45 seconds)  #TrustInGodsFaithfulness

And sometimes you're the one waiting. You're waiting for a test result or a a response from a job application. Your mind goes through all the what if scenarios and you question and you start to doubt. And in those moments, we really don't need answers so much. We just need presence. We just want someone to come and be with us in those times. And the risen Jesus wants to come into that room with you, with your doubt, with your questions, with your pain. He comes to meet us there, to be with us there, but he doesn't want to leave us there. [00:37:03] (38 seconds)  #PresenceOverAnswers

And sometimes we're just afraid to acknowledge, so we just build a little room from which we hope our doubts can't escape. But doubt is not the enemy of faith. Doubt isn't the enemy of faith. It can be a doorway to greater faith. It's the waiting room of faith. It's sometimes where we have to wait for answers that we have not received yet. And some of you, like, you're in a lit you've been in a literal waiting room. You're sitting in a room waiting for the the outcome of of a procedure or a surgery or something about a loved one, and you don't have all the answers. [00:36:27] (36 seconds)  #DoubtIsDoorway

I mean, you could go to an escape room by yourself, but it wouldn't be much fun because a lot of fun is you're with other people and you get to lean on their wisdom and their insight along the way and also is a lot better when you're not in it alone because you're never really alone in your doubt. I guarantee any question or doubt that you have, there are people who have wrestled with the same thing over the centuries and in this room, and they may not be able to give you the exact answer that satisfies every single lingering question you have, but they can help you to ask better questions, to dig deeper, to seek the honest answers that will satisfy you and lead you to the next room and the next step. And most importantly, together, they can help you experience God's presence even in the questions. [00:54:38] (48 seconds)  #WrestleTogether

So when you feel stuck and your doubt, don't do it alone. Invite Jesus into the room, ask questions together, talk with other believers, talk to one of our church staff. We may not have all the answers either, but, again, we can help point you in the right direction. And we have a six week group coming up later this month. It's gonna be meeting at the Devil's Canyon Brewery in San Carlos. It's called Alpha, and it's all about asking honest questions about faith, where all those questions are okay to bring to the table. So when you're wrestling with doubt, don't do it alone. Don't let your doubts define you or dominate you. Don't bury them either. Give them to Jesus. Let him into that room with you. Trust that even your doubts could be a doorway to a deeper faith than you ever thought possible. [00:55:26] (53 seconds)  #AskHonestQuestions

And a good AI engine will lead you to define your questions more clearly, and our doubts prompt us to ask better questions. For example, our doubts could prompt us to ask how this ragtag band of disheartened, disillusioned, fearful, doubting disciples crouching behind locked doors became the great apostles who preached and witnessed and suffered and died for their faith. Or our doubts could drive us to ask how this community of believers that's described in acts came to be where where new Christians from every social class, every ethnicity, every walk of life, every nationality came together and shared everything in common. And outcasts were welcomed, and people that used to hate each other instead would celebrate together. That seems like an impossibility in today's world. But it happened because resurrection happened. [00:48:23] (58 seconds)  #DoubtSparksCommunity

What if your doubts can be a doorway to a greater faith? In fact, your doubts might be exactly what God is using right now to pull you to himself to draw you closer to who he really is. Maybe not your preconception of what he is, but who he really, really, really is. So as we go ahead, with our our message today, that's the question we're gonna wrestle with and we're gonna meet one of the most famous doubters of all time. [00:26:32] (35 seconds)  #DoubtsDrawYouCloser

Now you might think, Mark, you know, you're a pastor. You've studied all these things for many years and these theological issues and have lots of books. You remember books and this paper things. You don't have any doubts. But here's a secret. Don't tell anybody, especially if we're online and YouTube and everything. This is really secret. I'm a natural skeptic. My brain will find a counterpoint to any point, and sometimes my mouth will blurt it out. I will find ways to question just about anything. It's a blessing and it's a curse. You can ask my family that. [00:49:55] (37 seconds)  #EvenPastorsDoubt

We're panicking. We're talking over each other. We're like scrambling for ideas, like looking at different objects and poking things and pressing the wall and looking for secret panels, anything at all, and then something doesn't work. And we're like, no. And finally, after ten or fifteen minutes of of kinda chaos, we figure out how to get the door open. We're thinking we've crushed it. It's only fifteen minutes in. We got the door open, and we walked through, and we're in a locked corridor with three more locked doors. It just led to more locked rooms, and we had to start all over again because in an escape room, you think that solving one puzzle gets you out. [00:29:16] (40 seconds)  #FaithIsAnEscapeRoom

But usually, it just leads to a new room with new questions, new puzzles to solve, more locks, and faith in our faith journey can sometimes feel like that. You solve one doubt. You wrestle with one set of questions and you think, I've got it. And then you find yourself suddenly you're in a different room and different life circumstances. A different crisis comes up, and you're standing with a different set of questions and doubts that you're having to wrestle with and saying, how do I get out of this room? [00:29:56] (31 seconds)  #OneDoorOpensAnother

Could God really forgive me knowing everything about me and everything I've thought and done? Could there be more to life than just what I'm seeing around me or what I'm reading in the news? Is there a greater purpose? Is there a bigger hope for the world? God, if you are real, show me. But sometimes we're afraid to face those doubts. Even if we've been in church a long time, we're just taught like, oh, we just have to check our doubts at the door. But guess what? Those questions still will come up. [00:35:53] (34 seconds)  #HardQuestionsMatter

Now everybody swears when they go into an escape room, we will not press the help button. We're not gonna do it. You do a blood oath with each other. You're like, no matter what happens, how desperate we are, that's we're not gonna hit that clue button. Okay? We can figure it out. And guess what? Maybe ten minutes, maybe fifteen minutes, maybe it's forty five minutes and you're really panicking. Somebody's like, we gotta hit the clue button. And there's a little screen up at the top of of each room near the ceiling, and it'll give you a hint. It doesn't give you the whole answer. It doesn't say here's the easy steps to unlock all the doors. It just gives you a hint. It just points you in the next direction because you're not really alone in that escape room. There's somebody there. You can say, I need a little bit of help. [00:53:48] (46 seconds)  #HitTheClueButton

Now we're talking about an event that's so incredible that the gospel writers themselves, the people that were there struggled to put it into words to describe how this risen Christ could eat and breathe and speak. It also show up out of nowhere and walk through closed doors and do things that we cannot. They struggled to explain it all. And in the end, they all agreed that the only way to explain it is that this Jesus is who he said he was. Because Easter happened. Resurrection happened. Now today, we don't have the benefit of the risen Jesus suddenly walking through this wall and saying, touch my hands, feel my side, don't doubt. I mean, we wish we wish we wish we could do that. But honestly, even if it happened, we would probably still find a reason to be skeptical and to doubt it somehow. [00:46:38] (61 seconds)  #MysteryOfResurrection