Rabbi, uh, hi?  It’s, uh, me, Thomas. 

Wow, that sounds kind of … dumb.  But I really don’t know what to say.  I don’t know what to think.  I hardly even know what to feel — or even what I am feeling right now.  I’m really not sure where you actually are right now, and I have no idea if you’re going to listen to me in any way, but I — well, I have to say what I have to say.

I guess I’ll start with “I’m sorry.”  That’s hardly sufficient, but it’s true.  I came here to Golgotha today, but I should have been here last week.  That’s when you needed me.  But I abandoned you, just as you said I would.  There was some comfort in the numbers — we all hid ourselves away together.  Except for John.  He came here, I know.  He knew where he was supposed to be and didn’t stay away.  There was nothing he could do to stop what was happening to you, but he could be here for you, with you — and for and with the women, even your mother.  But I was thinking only of myself.

I’m sorry.  I was afraid.  There’s no way around that.  I was terrified.  Despite everything you ever told us about trusting you and trusting the Father in heaven, I focused only on everything that was going wrong.  And somehow I was certain that I was in mortal danger and couldn’t be seen anywhere near you.  But that wasn’t true, and it didn’t matter even if it was.  I was a coward.  I was faithless.  I let fear for my own life and safety get in the way of everything you had taught us.  And instead of having  just a few last hours in your presence, and being there for you when you were suffering so horribly, as John did, I gave it all up.  And I feel like I’ve lost everything.  And I feel lost.  And I’m still scared.

Right here is where they crucified you.  How could that have happened?  How could you have allowed it?  How could your Father have permitted it?  I believed you were the Messiah, the Son of God!  And yet you let them take you from us in the garden.  You let them bind you, and try you, and hurt you and mock you and condemn you and turn you over the Romans.  And you let Pilate have you whipped and send you here, to this place of shame and forsakenness and blood and death, to hang on a cross until you … until you … died.

Dead?  How could that be?  How could your Father allow it?  I don’t understand it — all the power that you displayed while we were with you:  healing the sick, raising the dead, multiplying bread and fish to feed the multitudes, walking on water and stilling storms with just a word.  Where was all that power when Judas, that traitor, brought the mob to take you away, or when the soldiers lifted you up on the cross and nailed your hands and feet?  And your authority — the way you made clear to all your enemies that you could not be trapped or intimidated, and always sent them away with their tails between their legs when they challenged you — where was that when they put you on trial and condemned you even though you were the most innocent man that ever lived?

And now that I say all that out loud, I guess that’s why I’ve been so afraid.  Because it seems that everything I thought I knew I could count on seemed to just disappear in an instant.  I remember now that you had said things about having to suffer and to die, but I just never … I guess I just thought you were speaking figuratively or something, or talking about something that could happen but never actually would, because, well, you were you and those things just couldn’t be true.

And the other disciples, and the women, are telling me now that you have risen from the dead.  I want to believe it, of course, but I’m afraid to.  Oh, sure, I told them I won’t believe unless I have physical, visible, tangible proof — that I need to put my fingers in your wounds and my hand into your side — and that all sounded very rational as I was saying it, and I’ve kept on saying it. 

But really it’s not my reason that needs to be convinced.  My heart needs to know that it’s safe to trust this, and I can’t.  Not yet.  I’m afraid.

I’m scared that if I open my heart up again and grab hold of this hope that somehow you are alive again that it will be crushed again — that it won’t be true, or that I’ll just be disappointed another time, and even more.

And frankly, now that I’m talking to you here — even though I really don’t know where you are — I realize that I’m also terrified to face you, even if you have risen from the dead.  Because if you look me in the eye, you’ll see my shame and my guilt — how I abandoned you when you needed us most, how I failed to trust in you and in your Father’s power and plan, how I was such a coward even when I, like all the others, had said I would never leave you.  But I ran away.  I did the opposite of what I should have done.  I don’t have any excuse.  I’m the lowest of the low, and not worthy to see you again.  How can I face you again, here on earth or in heaven?

I suppose coming here, to the place where you were crucified, is a start.  I’m facing the truth about my abandoning you and the fear that caused it.  Or let’s put a finer point on it:  I’m facing my sin.  I did not do what was right.  I chose to do what was wrong.  I failed you, I failed the Father, I failed my brothers and sisters whom I could have encouraged.  And I failed myself.

Is there still room in that generous, expansive heart of yours for forgiveness, after all that was done to you and considering all who turned their backs on you?  John told us that when you spoke, right here, right after they raised you up on your cross, you asked your Father to forgive the ones responsible, because “they don’t know what they’re doing”.   That gives me hope, but I’m not sure if it should — after all, I should have known what I was doing.  And not doing.

I’m so confused, Rabbi!  If you were here, you could set me straight — you always do.  Would you want to?  But … but … I think I know what you would want me to remember.  You would point me to the prostitutes and tax collectors and all the worst kind of sinners and how you didn’t turn your back on them in disgust.  You … you didn’t ignore or dismiss their sin and shame and filth, and you didn’t let them, either, but you told them about God’s grace — that he has grace and mercy for the repentant, that more than matches their sins and wipes away their guilt.  And you forgave them, even though nobody else thought they were worth your time, let alone your pardon.

And there was that parable you told, about the two lost sons, and the one who insulted his father, took his inheritance, and ran away and wasted it.  The father waited, and when his son returned, he welcomed him.  Can that be you, and the son me?  I used to think I was a pretty good and righteous person, but now I think my guilt is more like the prostitute, the tax collector, a thief, a murderer, and that lost son all together, and doubled.  I’m a worse sinner than any of them.  But I don’t want to be.  Not anymore.  Not ever.

I want you back, Jesus!  I want you to stand before me again and tell me everything’s all right.  Dare I ask for you to come back from wherever you are and show yourself to me?  Dare I hope to be forgiven?  I don’t want to doubt anymore.

The others keep telling me to believe.  They’ve tried every way they can think of to assure me that you’re actually alive, and that you really appeared to them last Sunday evening.  I keep putting them off, but I don’t really want to.  I keep asking for proof, but what I really want is you.  

They all are so … happy.  In some ways they seem more confused than I am, but they’re full of joy, and I want that, too.  But I’m still so afraid.  I don’t think my heart can handle having so much hope and having everything go to pieces again.

So I guess all of this is my prayer:  My Lord, my God, let me believe.  Give me back my faith.  Take away my fear.  Put my heart at peace.  Please, please, Jesus, let me see you again.  Show me you’re alive.  I don’t want to doubt anymore.

Amen, Lord.  Amen.