T is for Thomas (and trauma)

A little extemporaneous preaching at Grace Memorial.

I don’t know if you can preach a complete sermon about Thomas without acknowledging the reality of trauma.

But at the first of Grace’s 2 services this morning, I tried.

What came out was cold and stale and left me feeling a little dead inside.

(Dead inside is not a good news mood, in case you didn’t know.)

I said what I thought was smart, or what made sense. But I didn’t say what was true. I didn’t speak from me heart or my gut. I didn’t connect what I was preaching to my own trauma.

I received a few polite “nice job on your sermon” comments from the 8 o’clockers exiting the sanctuary, but I knew I needed to dig deeper.

So at the 10, I left the manuscript on the stand, stepped away from it, and did my best to speak the truth…

…like Thomas might.

Here’s what came out.

Some questions for you:

How do you connect to Thomas? Do these idea change the way you think of him in any way?

Is he The Doubter for you? Honest Thomas? Or something else?