Fear does
not equal Failure and Doubt does not equal Disqualification
The angel said to the women, “Do not be afraid, for I know that you
are looking for Jesus, who was crucified. 6 He is not here;
he has risen, just as he said. Come and see the place where he lay. 7 Then
go quickly and tell his disciples: ‘He has risen from the dead and is going
ahead of you into Galilee. There you will see him.’ Now I have told you.”8 So
the women hurried away from the tomb, afraid
yet filled with joy, and ran to tell his disciples. 9 Suddenly
Jesus met them. “Greetings,” he said. They came to him, clasped his feet and
worshiped him. 10 Then Jesus said to them, “Do not be afraid. Go and tell my brothers
to go to Galilee; there they will see me.”
***
16 Then the eleven disciples went to
Galilee, to the mountain where Jesus had told them to go. 17 When
they saw him, they worshiped him; but
some doubted. 18 Then Jesus came
to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.19 Therefore go and
make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of
the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 and teaching them to
obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the
very end of the age.” Matthew
28:5-10, 16-20 (emphasis
added)
Woven into the great good news of the
resurrection is the subtheme that Jesus uses us in spite of our fears and
doubts. We see that in Matthew’s account
of Jesus’ response to the women who first discovered His resurrection and some
of His disciples’ doubts.
To fully appreciate what’s going on there we
must consider what preceded it. The
women and the disciples had been with Jesus for three years, immersed in His
powerful teaching and witnessing His great miracles, including several
instances where raised
the dead. Indeed, they had participated in and were direct
beneficiaries
of
some of His miracles. Further, and of
particular importance here, Jesus had repeatedly
told
told them that He would be murdered and resurrected. They therefore should have
known that His death would not be the end of things.
Yet, being human, they were overwhelmed by the
traumatic circumstances of Jesus' death and the apparent failure of all they had
lived for. They lost sight of Jesus’ plan and experienced fear and doubt, even in
the face of powerful evidence that what Jesus said was going to happen was
actually happening. In short, they didn’t
“get it,” their perception was clouded.
But rather than giving up on or condemning
them, Jesus understood their frailty and continued to use them. He gave them immediate
missions (to tell the others about the resurrection, to meet Jesus at a
particular place), and that lead to their being restored to very fruitful
service.
So what does that meant to us, 21 centuries
later? At least two things.
First, it shows us that God uses us in spite
of fears and doubts, that our human failings do not disqualify us from
effective service. Jesus’ patience with
the women’s fear and the disciple’s doubts are part of a broader pattern of God
getting us past our initial fears/doubts and using us in spite of them. Abraham,
Moses,
Gideon,
Isaiah,
Jeremiah,
Mary,
Peter,
and Ananias
each had initial doubts about what God called them to do, and God used them in
spite of those, and even later, doubts.
Second, it shows us how we should respond to
those fears and doubts: by taking the immediate next step God asks of us. The women did that by relaying the message Jesus
gave them, in spite of their own fear. The doubting disciples showed up where
Jesus told them to meet Him. Neither were huge tasks, but both got those folks
past their fears/doubts and back into the pattern of productive service.
