Then the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain where Jesus had told them to go. When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted. (Matthew 28:16-17 NIV)
The Lord is risen!
He is risen indeed!
Amazing, wonderful, incredible … almost unbelievable!
Can the dead be resurrected from the grave?
Is this incredible promise of Easter too good to be true?
Even the eleven disciples of Christ found this hard to believe. They had their doubts. Who wouldn’t?! After all, they had witnessed the bloody crucifixion of Jesus just a few days earlier. Jesus was placed in a tomb, the equivalent of our modern cremation ceremony. So even though, with their own eyes, they now saw Jesus standing there before them on a mountain in Galilee, they couldn’t fully believe what they were seeing.
The NIV translation quoted above implies that some of the Eleven disciples worshiped while others doubted. That may be correct. But I wouldn’t judge the ones who doubted too harshly. They were not gullible, naïve, unthinking simpletons (as some rather unthinking simpletons today sometimes assume about 1st century disciples). No, those early disciples knew as well as we do that dead men usually stay dead.
But the NIV translators may have missed Matthew’s point in verse 17. It is possible to translate the Greek verse as follows: When they saw him, they worshiped him, but they had doubts. And if this is correct, then it illustrates what may well be true of some (many?) of us today. Yes, we worship God faithfully Sunday after Sunday. We are disciples of Christ who serve alongside fellow disciples. But we still have doubts. Some things still seem too wonderful, too incredible to believe.
Conviction with crystal clarity is rare, and not required for worship. We see only partially, we know only partially (1 Corinthians 13:9), so we should not be surprised if we believe only partially. Let’s not be too quick to condemn those who doubt. Instead, as the Bible in Jude 22 says (in the NIV again, which here I think is correctly translated): Be merciful to those who doubt.
Disciples have doubts, but that need not stop disciples from worshiping Jesus the risen Christ.
On TRAC Together for God’s Word, Worship, Welcome, Witness and Wonder
Rev Dr Gordon Wong
TRAC President
This article has been edited from the original which first appeared in Methodist Message April 2018. Used with permission.