John 20:29

Jesus said to him, “Have you believed because you have seen me?  Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.”  

It’s a common thing to hear from a Christian that it would have been so nice to be there at the time Christ walked the earth.  Such a sentiment confuses the issue, though.  In this life now, we have the Word of God, which is the greatest treasure of life.

Jesus responds to Thomas’ worship of Him with this line and we’re wise to contemplate it.  What does He mean when He says that one is blessed if they believe even though they haven’t, with their own eyes, believed on Him?  Is He talking about some special spiritual account one receives?  Is this some weird form of prosperity gospel?  Is there an account of blessings stored up and you and I have a larger account than Thomas and the disciples?  

The way to understand Scripture is to always let it interpret itself.  The hard rule is: never interpret a passage by itself but always in light of the rest of Scripture.  This is what we will do here.  

You see, the ones – you and me, for instance – that will believe without having seen Christ, will do so on the foundation of gospel preaching done by these very disciples, Thomas included.  Romans 10 tells us, “and how are they to believe in Him of whom they have never heard?  And how are they to hear without someone preaching?”  It then says, “It is written, ‘How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news!”  Do we see the wondrous continuity of Scripture?  We should.  And we should marvel at it and give praise to God that He would see fit for Isaiah to write (how beautiful are the feet…) and Paul to quote it about Christians fulfilling the Great Commission, which will bring the Word to the ears of those who will believe without ever having seen the Lord Jesus with their own eyes.  

This, dear friend, is what it is to be blessed – it’s to believe the Word of God!  

Psalm 1 tells us that “Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked…” which is to say that he, the believer, is greatly fortunate, immensely prosperous beyond imagination due to the spiritual richness of salvation since he/she is now favored by God.  The blessed man or woman will not face judgment due to faith in Christ, which came from believing the gospel.  To be blessed is to know that God’s wrath on unbelief is yet to come at the end of the age but the believer has had the wrath he/she deserved poured out on Christ already at the cross.  This is the impact of what Christ says to Thomas as He stands there in His resurrected body.  Who better to talk of this blessing but the risen Savior?  

The way to a blessed life, therefore, is to delight in the law/word of the Lord (Psalm 1:2).  We often “delight” in too many earthly things and they preoccupy our minds, causing us so much stress, unsettling us.  But to love His Word is to treasure the precepts and principles of Scripture so greatly as to see them rightly as the greatest thing about life.  Nothing else can compare to knowing the Lord and worshipping Him in spirit and truth.  To love Him is to know Him through His Word since He’s indivisible.  If your life has lost its vigor, if your soul lags and your spiritual energy has sagged, if life has you along the ropes, then know it’s because the source of the good life is love of God’s Word and we must return there if we’re to be renewed.  To be blessed by God in Christ is to believe in Him who said, “Sanctify them in the truth.  Your Word is truth”  (John 17:17).  

To be blessed is to be “like a tree firmly planted and fed by streams of water, which yields its fruit in its season” and you will grow to maturity this way.  That living water is Jesus Christ, feeding you through the Spirit who illuminates the Word all to the glory of the Father.  A Christian life without the Word is a barren one, a long, arduous crawl through some desert, a constant weariness.  That’s not what God has in mind for His beloved children and for you.  Blessedness is what He wants to give.  He wants to lift you up, not cast you down and He wants you to know Him through His Word, which is His precious letter to you.  

Many years ago when I was a child, my older brother, who was my hero, left for the Marine Corps.  I was only 10 and l remember that day as unequivocally the worst of my life up to that point.  I watched him at the door as he left, his bag with him and cried as I saw him disappear around the corner.  I ran to my room, which now felt so abysmally empty and all of life had slowed down.  The hole in my heart seemed to encompass all.  Then I noticed on my bed a sports book of his that he had cherished.  It was on my pillow.  I stared at it and wondered why it was there.  Perhaps he’d forgotten it.  No…he wouldn’t have taken that with him anyway.  So, why was it there?  Was this a gift he intended for me to find?  Hesitantly, I reached for it and took it in my little hands with great care for it was his book that he loved.  I opened it and there was a note in it.  To me!  It told me that the book was mine and not to worry, that he’d see me again soon and that he loved me.  

Well, Christian, the Bible is for you.  God has made sure that you have His Word and that you aren’t alone.  Oh, how blessed is the man or woman who clutches God’s holy Word to their chest and loves it – and desires, more than anything else in all the world, to live out its precepts.  This, be sure, is the path of blessedness.