Suppose theology started here: “Thomas said to him, ‘My Lord and my God!’” (John 20:28).

A thoroughly Jewish human being–Thomas–is confessing to the resurrected man–Jesus of Nazareth–acclamations of adoration and surrender reserved only for Israel’s YHWH. The context is Thomas’s touching Jesus’ wounds resulting from crucifixion. While the awe of resurrection stuns Thomas, the death marks of the cross are visibly and inescapably evident. Thomas crumbles in worship before the man, Christ Jesus, while blurting out attributes of undeniable (O.T.) deity. Thomas makes it very personal with the double “my” (see Greek text). 

Is Thomas prototypical of the Revelation 7:9-10 scene? Is this Jewish doubter-now-worshiper a present incarnation of future and cosmic redemption? Can we who possess the complete Story fast-forward to the restored End? “After this I looked and there before me was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, tribe, people and language, standing before the throne and in front of the Lamb. They were wearing white robes and were holding palm branches in their hands. And they cried out in a loud voice:
   ”Salvation belongs to our God,
   who sits on the throne,
   and to the Lamb.”

The one man Thomas before the resurrected Jesus of Nazareth offers us a glimpse of the impact of God’s salvation on the nations of the earth. All the nations. The apocalypse of John gives us a peek into the future.

Who exactly is this resurrected man? Why does Thomas revere him as YHWH? These questions turn us back toward the person and ministry of Jesus as the promised “Coming One” and as the suffering Servant of YHWH. How did this most unlikely of messianic claimants (“Can anything good come out of Nazareth?”) make so good on his particular claim when so many others had failed?

Thomas is the pivot of a doubtful humanity before the Christ, the Son of God. We observe a very human response to the sharpest point in salvation history: the death and resurrection of Jesus the Messiah, Savior of the world. As N.T. Wright is fond of asking, “Is God Jesus?” Perhaps theology is not working from deity to humanity, but just the reverse: thinking through real humanity (Jesus of Nazareth) to stunning deity (“my Lord and my God”) within the grand Story of God.

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