Faith Is Recognizing the Greater Truth!
FAITH IS RECOGNIZING THE GREATER TRUTH, NOT RELYING UPON THE LESSER EXPERIENCE OF SEEING!
"Have you come to believe because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and have believed."
It does not seem fair that the Lord should reprimand Thomas when Thomas actually professed, "My Lord and my God!" After all, Jesus did appear prior to this occasion to Thomas’ fellow disciples, who indeed told him Jesus came back to life. And so when Thomas said, "Unless I put my finger in his nailed hand, and my hand in his pierced side, I will not believe.", what he honestly was saying was ultimately this: "Hey, I missed that one; and I also want to be able to see our Master!"
And so exactly what was the point of our Lord with his statement to Thomas? The Lord was telling Thomas, like he always would say in the past with his equivalent style of talking to stress it to his disciple Thomas to be sure he really believed. And what does real belief mean? It means believing in the greater truth, and in not being content with the lesser experience. Thus, what was important was that Thomas remembered Jesus was the same Master he had known, namely the God who became man, and who therefore, even when he was put to death shall come back to life like he has said. And his word was true, like he as Lord – the Son of God was and will always be true to himself and to his words. Thomas was supposed to believe as to know deep within himself like, "Okay, I missed the Lord’s showing himself to me; but that’s alright, I am pretty sure sometime down the road I shall be with him again, one way or another – whether this be in the End-Time or at that second time the Lord showed himself to his disciples, along with Thomas.
To repeat, the greater truth here is Thomas understanding, aided by grace, that by Jesus’ truthfulness to his words, and by his being the Son of God as he has taught Thomas and the rest of the disciples, Thomas should believe his Master will be true to his word, and as already told him by his fellow disciples, has got to be indeed alive again.