Austen M. - Hold the Door
Ryah H. - Y'all Means All
Grace W. - Peace be with You
My grandmother has some pretty interesting stories. She once told the story of when her mom was dying in the hospital in the year 1957, from colon cancer. It was about 1:00 am and she had the sudden urge to go and get some coffee. As she left she could see her family asleep in the waiting room. When she came back to her mother’s room she noticed that the chair was pushed closer to the bed and her mom was wide awake. Her mother tells her that her father, my grandmother's grandfather, was there. There is one problem with this. He was dead. Like any normal person my grandmother was skeptical about this so she asked the nurse if anyone had come into her mom’s room and the nurse said no and no one was even in the elevator. Apparently he told her that heaven was not like it was in the bible and he would be there to greet her on the other side. According to my grandmother, her mom would never say that heaven is not like it was depicted in the bible or refer to heaven as the other side. Obviously my Grandmother was very skeptical of this and still does not know if her mom was hallucinating or if she really saw her deceased father.
I can imagine this is how Thomas felt when the other disciples told him that Jesus had returned from the dead. So Thomas being a skeptic like most people would be said “ Unless I see the mark of nails in his hands, and put my finger in the mark of the nails and my hand in his side, I will not believe.” Thomas had to see for himself that Jesus was alive. I think we can all relate to Thomas in this way. Thomas did not believe that Jesus had returned without proof. We may sometimes be in this place of doubting Thomas, we may sometimes be in this place where we want more reassurance or more evidence or more certainty. Or we may be in another place where we accept or need miracles.
When I hear my grandmother tell this story I can imagine how in that difficult moment I would want nothing more than to know that God and family are with me and everything will be ok. This tied in to how afraid the disciples were when Jesus was crucified, Jesus first came back.
Daniel R. - Ending with Appreciation