Resurrection 2: Thomas Sunday: Believing in the Grace of Resurrection (Western & Eastern 2025)

Reading Time: 18 minutes The Spiritual Mysteries of the Divine Calendar: April 27 – May 3, 2025

Before we uncover what the theme of this Sunday, often called Thomas Sunday, means for our lives, let us first look at how the grace of resurrection works within and around us from two angles.

The Grace of Resurrection: Two Angles

As with the Incarnation, the Resurrection of Jesus Christ is the most glorious and impactful event God has performed for mankind. In the Resurrection of Jesus, we find an unending fountain of renewed strength and grace. The grace of resurrection enables us to become more like Jesus and follow Him, no matter how hopeless we feel. Even if parts of our lives seemed to have died, Jesus can revive us.

“I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in Me, though he may die, he shall live. And whoever lives and believes in Me shall never die. Do you believe this?” (John 11:25–26) Jesus said this before His own resurrection and before He raised Lazarus from the dead.

During His days in the flesh, Jesus completed the acts of salvation for our sake. His divinity clearly shines through His acts as a human being in the Incarnation, Transfiguration, Crucifixion, Resurrection, Ascension, and all the miracles He performed.

Jesus died as a human on the cross with His divinity united to His human spirit. The human spirit of Jesus descended into Hades and preached to those who had been dead since the time of Abel (Gen. 4:8–10). “For to this end Christ died and rose and lived again, that He might be Lord of both the dead and the living” (Rom. 14:9).

When Jesus rose from the dead, He raised mankind with Himself. One of the oldest and most important icons in church history is the Icon of the Resurrection of the Lord. It depicts Jesus being risen from the dead while holding Adam with His right hand and Eve with His left. The raising of Adam and Eve implies that what happened to them also happened to you and me. We were dead, but God raised us from the dead by the grace of Resurrection.

The first perspective on the grace of resurrection we see in Ephesians 1:15–20 and the second in Psalm 107:14–16. In these two passages, we see different aspects of the resurrection of Christ. Paul speaks about the action and effect of the resurrection happening within us—and he can’t express himself forcefully enough. The second passage from Psalms talks about an outward and manifested action when Jesus broke the chains of death and brought us out of the darkness of Hades.

 

Ephesians 1:15–20: First Angle on the Grace of Resurrection.

Let us look at the first angle from Ephesians 1:15–20. The Apostle Paul prays for the Christians in Ephesus to know Jesus Christ with a specific type of spirit: the spirit of wisdom and revelation. Then Paul writes about the resurrection of Christ. The great Apostle, with a tongue of gold, is in wonder and can’t express what he tries to communicate about the grace of resurrection.

“Therefore I also, after I heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all the saints, do not cease to give thanks for you, making mention of you in my prayers: that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give to you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him, the eyes of your understanding being enlightened; that you may know what is the hope of His calling, what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints, and what is the exceeding greatness of His power toward us who believe, according to the working of His mighty power which He worked in Christ when He raised Him from the dead and seated Him at His right hand in the heavenly places.”

Paul wrestles to find words to describe the mighty effect that the resurrection of Jesus has on us: “…what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints, and what is the exceeding greatness of His power toward us who believe, according to the working of His mighty power which He worked in Christ when He raised Him from the dead…”

(If you’re interested, here are some additional comments on verse 19.)

 

Psalm 107:14–16: Second Angle on the Grace of Resurrection

The second angle on the grace of resurrection we find in Psalm 107:14-16: “He brought them out of darkness and the shadow of death, and broke their chains in pieces. Oh, that men would give thanks to the Lord for His goodness, and for His wonderful works to the children of men! For He has broken the gates of bronze, and cut the bars of iron in two.”

This passage describes how Jesus broke the prison of Hades and the domain of death, and how He released those who had been waiting for the coming Messiah since the time of Abel.

 

What Do These Two Angles Mean?

These two passages speak about two parts of our lives the resurrection of Jesus Christ impacts. The grace of resurrection influences our inner man, something hidden and unseen, and the other effect is something that becomes manifest, clearly seen.

We have two types of inner lives: one that we are aware of, clearly observable through our behavior, mindset, and motives, and another that hides from our awareness. This second (hidden) type of inner life was the main arena of the battle during Lent.

This second type of inner life intermingles with the deep roots of our old man, the fallen human nature, and most of us are unaware of what happens in these yet-to-be sanctified parts of our souls. But the glorious good news is that, right now, the grace of resurrection works in this fallen, hidden inner life of the old man.

It is important to know that our old man died with Christ on the cross and is defeated. However, the Holy Spirit wants to release that victory into the hidden areas of our souls, and that is the primary activity of the grace of resurrection.

“For if we have been united together in the likeness of His death, certainly we also shall be in the likeness of His resurrection, knowing this, that our old man was crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves of sin” (Rom. 6:5–6). “For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh) nothing good dwells; for to will is present with me, but how to perform what is good I do not find. For the good that I will to do, I do not do; but the evil I will not to do, that I practice. Now if I do what I will not to do, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me. […] O wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? I thank God—through Jesus Christ our Lord!” (Rom. 7:18–20, 24–25a)

Photo by Mohamed Nohassi on Unsplash

The Hidden Inner Work of the Grace of Resurrection

What is the source of this resurrection that takes place in the hidden death of the soul? It is Jesus’ own secret resurrection from the dead—no one knew the exact moment of His resurrection. But after He arose there was an earthquake, and the angels rolled away the stone from the tomb and told the good news to the myrrh-bearing women.

When the first witnesses of the Resurrection arrived, Jesus had already risen in secret. Then Jesus rebuked His disciples when they didn’t believe the testimonies of Mary Magdalene and Peter. Jesus only appeared to select people because He wanted us to believe in His resurrection not only as an external event, but an event within us, hidden from our eyes.

Besides giving evidence that He indeed was risen, Jesus only appeared to those who had special needs. Most people, like the beloved disciple John’s first encounter with the Resurrection, only “saw and believed.” “Then the other disciple [John], who came to the tomb first, went in also; and he saw and believed” (John 20:8).

“Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed” (John 20:29).

Jesus wants to assure us that the grace of resurrection works inside us. Yes, the day will come, at “the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed. For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality” (1 Cor. 15:52–53). The day will come when we will physically rise from the earth with new glorified bodies, like Jesus’ body, but until then, Jesus wants to assure us that the grace of resurrection is far from dormant. We simply need to believe it.

As we already discussed, we have two types of inner lives. One is obvious, displayed through our personality and easy to know. But the other inner life hides and is the major source of our agony and sorrow. We rarely understand what happens in this part of us—where do these bad thoughts and behaviors come from? This was the battlefield of Great Lent, as the Holy Spirit helped us discover the deep things we didn’t know about ourselves, but now we see the grace of resurrection enter to do its miracles.

Jesus gently reveals these hidden areas during Lent, and maybe we recently discovered what we needed to repent of, but then, all of a sudden, Great Lent ended. Then Jesus gave us the grace to follow Him, close to His heart, during His journey in Jerusalem towards the cross in Holy Week. Last week, He gave us the grace of His glorious resurrection—but we still can’t forget this thing we realized we must turn from.

This struggle described above expresses genuine repentance that rises from deep within. It proves that the grace of resurrection is already working in our hidden inner life.

Jesus, through the grace of resurrection, takes hold of us to lift this part of our inner lives from our inner grave to the heavenly places (the key to the Season of Resurrection) that we talked about last time. The replacement is happening. Jesus grabbed our hidden source of misery deep within and resurrected it into the heavens where He installs the new man in its place.

“But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), and raised us up together, and made us sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus” (Eph. 2:4–6).

This is how Jesus meets us in this Season of Salvation: Jesus takes hold of us with His incredible power—as Paul wrote, with “the exceeding greatness of His power toward us who believe, according to the working of His mighty power which He worked in Christ when He raised Him from the dead” (Eph. 1:19-20).

Each year, this spiritual work of the grace of resurrection goes deeper and deeper as we pass through the Seasons of Salvation, consciously aware and praying into these mysterious acts of the Holy Spirit, doing our best to cooperate with Him. During our first year through the Divine Calendar, we might not see big change right away, but after some months we will notice something feels different.

Next year, the work of the grace of resurrection will be even greater until it completely restores this specific part of our inner lives to the image of Christ. As the years go by and we journey through the Divine Calendar instituted by the spiritual fathers of the church through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, we become different. We become more Christlike. “My little children, for whom I labor in birth again until Christ is formed in you” (Gal. 4:19).

 

The Visible Work of the Grace of Resurrection

Jesus will not only give us a hidden resurrection. We will discover another manifested resurrection in this specific area of our lives. Our thoughts and behavior suddenly change because we understand their origin.

We received revelation during Lent and Holy Week, and then the grace of resurrection provides even more understanding and a hidden transformative power. This hidden power manifest “and broke [our] chains in pieces” and “the gates of bronze, and cut the bars of iron in two” (Ps. 107:14,16). Within us, many links of a heavy chain broke, and we can see that, after a while, the chain will snap. The result is true transformation that does not fade away. Usually, this happens at a high frequency at the start of the Christian walk, then the process seems to slow down, but only because it works deeper—and sometimes we are to blame for the slowing down as well…

This is what it means to “work out your own salvation with fear and trembling; for it is God who works in you both to will and to do for His good pleasure” (Phil. 2:12c–13). And we can rejoice because God “is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us” (Eph. 3:20).

 

Overview of the Season of Resurrection

Our goal with the Sunday Gospels and these talks is to inspire synergism between us and the Holy Spirit to build up our inner man (the new man) piece-by-piece. The cross of Christ put to death the old man and we are in great need of healing. Through the grace of resurrection, heavenly parts must replace the earthly, fallen parts of our inner man to construct the new man. “And that you put on the new man which was created according to God, in true righteousness and holiness” (Eph. 4:24).

Each Sunday of the Season of Resurrection contains a theme related to the resurrection of Jesus. These themes unfold this building process of our new man in the heavenly places.

Building Our New Man: Unfolding the Mysteries of the Grace of Resurrection:

First Sunday: The Feast of Resurrection (Holy Pascha): Resurrection and Life (John 1:1–17)

Second Sunday (today): Thomas Sunday / Antipascha: The Living Faith (John 20:19–31)

During the coming weeks, we will cover:

The Living Bread (John 6:35–45)The Living Water (John 4:1–42)The Living Light, The Living Word (John 12:35–50)The Living Way (John 14:1–11)

On May 29 is the Feast of Ascension, and the Season of Ascension lasts ten days until the Season of Pentecost.

Journeying through these weeks causes our inner man to grow, and the Holy Spirit fills this newly expanded space on the Feast of Pentecost, the fiftieth day after the Feast of the Resurrection.

Let us now turn to the Sunday Gospel of Thomas Sunday, the second Sunday of the Resurrection Season.

 

Sunday Gospel: John 20:19–31 (NKJV)

Then, the same day at evening, being the first day of the week, when the doors were shut where the disciples were assembled, for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood in the midst, and said to them, “Peace be with you.” 20 When He had said this, He showed them His hands and His side. Then the disciples were glad when they saw the Lord.

21 So Jesus said to them again, “Peace to you! As the Father has sent Me, I also send you.” 22 And when He had said this, He breathed on them, and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit. 23 If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.”

24 Now Thomas, called the Twin, one of the twelve, was not with them when Jesus came. 25 The other disciples therefore said to him, “We have seen the Lord.” So he said to them, “Unless I see in His hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the print of the nails, and put my hand into His side, I will not believe.”

26 And after eight days His disciples were again inside, and Thomas with them. Jesus came, the doors being shut, and stood in the midst, and said, “Peace to you!” 27 Then He said to Thomas, “Reach your finger here, and look at My hands; and reach your hand here, and put it into My side. Do not be unbelieving, but believing.”

28 And Thomas answered and said to Him, “My Lord and my God!” 29 Jesus said to him, “Thomas, because you have seen Me, you have believed. Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.”

30 And truly Jesus did many other signs in the presence of His disciples, which are not written in this book; 31 but these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you may have life in His name.

 

Thomas Sunday: Feeling Left Behind

For forty days, Jesus appeared to His disciples. “The former account I made, O Theophilus, of all that Jesus began both to do and teach, until the day in which He was taken up, after He through the Holy Spirit had given commandments to the apostles whom He had chosen, to whom He also presented Himself alive after His suffering by many infallible proofs, being seen by them during forty days and speaking of the things pertaining to the kingdom of God” (Acts 1:1–3).

And so we embark on our forty-day expedition through the Season of Resurrection in the heavenly places—even though it sounds lofty.

The Divine Calendar wants us to know two things: 1. Christ is risen. 2. He is not here. “He is not here; for He is risen, as He said. Come, see the place where the Lord lay” (Matt. 28:6). If we want to receive more of the grace of resurrection, we must remind ourself of the heavenly realm.

Jesus did not appear to the Apostle Thomas right away—even though, knowing Thomas, Jesus knew the Apostle needed to see Him like the others did. Jesus appeared when all the disciples were together, except for Thomas.

In verse 24, we read: “Now Thomas, called the Twin, one of the twelve, was not with them when Jesus came.” This troubled Thomas terribly, because he loved Jesus so much. Thomas wanted to be close to Him. When Jesus wanted to raise Lazarus from the dead, the disciples objected because the Jews wanted to stone Him—except for Thomas: “The disciples said to Him, ‘Rabbi, lately the Jews sought to stone You, and are You going there again? […] Then Thomas, who is called the Twin, said to his fellow disciples, ‘Let us also go, that we may die with Him’” (John 11:8,16).

When the disciples told Thomas they had seen Jesus, they shocked him. He wanted to see his risen Lord with his own eyes. Verse 25 reads: “The other disciples therefore said to him, ‘We have seen the Lord.’ So he said to them, ‘Unless I see in His hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the print of the nails, and put my hand into His side, I will not believe.’”

Thomas wanted Jesus to appear to him as well. He remained in this troubled state of mind until the Sunday after the Resurrection, which is today.

In verses 26–28, we read: “And after eight days His disciples were again inside, and Thomas with them. Jesus came, the doors being shut, and stood in the midst, and said, ‘Peace to you!’ Then He said to Thomas, ‘Reach your finger here, and look at My hands; and reach your hand here, and put it into My side. Do not be unbelieving, but believing.’ And Thomas answered and said to Him, ‘My Lord and my God!’”

During the Feast of the Resurrection, something important happened to us. We received an incomprehensible amount of grace. “And of His fullness we have all received, and grace for grace” (John 1:16). During the upcoming weeks, the Sunday Gospels of the Divine Calendar help us understand the grace of resurrection and what actually happened on the Feast of Feasts.

The message to us on this second Sunday is: Jesus has risen for you—and for you in particular. He resurrected not only for the believers in every nation. He rose uniquely for you.

If we try to remember what happened to us in the previous Seasons of Salvation—it is easy for the intensity of Lent and Holy Week to blur what God did in the Season of the Kingdom of God and the Season of Incarnation—we know God sees a much bigger picture when He looks at our lives.

Jesus tells us this Sunday that we need Him specifically and individually. We can place ourselves in the shoes of Thomas. There is a personal resurrection for us as well. On this Thomas Sunday, we must believe that the grace of resurrection works within us as well.

After such events like Holy Week and the Resurrection, we usually try to analyze and figure out what happened. But when Thomas Sunday comes, we sense something has happened, but we need Jesus to remind us and make it plain.

 

Building Our New Man: Unfolding the Mysteries of the Grace of ResurrectionThe Living Faith

Jesus encountered Apostle Thomas—and the rest of us—on this Sunday to give us this specific gift: a renewed type of faith. A living faith. “And whoever lives and believes in Me shall never die. Do you believe this?” (John 11:26)

This is a pulsating faith that renews day after day, drawing energy from the resurrection of Jesus, our new well of salvation. It is a divine charge embedded in our faith-muscle that seems to pump new life into our faith. We can see past previously immovable obstacles and find the strength to “walk by faith, not by sight” (2 Cor. 5:7).

But the devil will not leave us alone just because we have finished Lent and Holy Week. It is said that only humans waste time. The devil and his demons waste no time. “Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil walks about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. Resist him, steadfast in the faith…” (1 Pet. 5:8–9a)

The Season of Resurrection contains spiritual battles as well, because our spirits are in the heavens during these forty days of the Resurrection—and the spiritual warfare can be severe. “For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places” (Eph. 6:12).

The Season of Resurrection is not equal to resting—even though it is a season of feasting—because the Resurrection is equal to the heavens. The devil wants to take us down from the heavenly places and tie us to the earth. So let us continue, be strong and resolute in Christ, drawing from the grace of resurrection.

The grace from this new living faith enables us to continue through the Season of Resurrection and face whatever the enemy puts in our way. The enemy wants to plant his deception in our minds that there is no resurrection happening inside of us.

But with grace from Thomas Sunday of the living faith, we agree with the Holy Spirit and know that something has happened inside, even though we don’t understand the details yet. The fountain of the grace of resurrection renews this type of living faith every day, and we are going to need it.

Jesus delayed His appearance to Thomas for one week after His resurrection. The Lord knew that many people—not only Thomas—would need the grace of the living faith of the Resurrection. Therefore, the risen Christ wants to appear before every one of us in a unique way—mostly unseen, but just as real.

Christ is Risen!

Indeed He is Risen!

Thank you again for taking the time to read and journey with me through the Season of Resurrection. Let us pray for the grace of the living faith to keep us advancing unhindered these weeks. As always, it is a privilege to be on this mystical expedition with you.

Since the Season of Resurrection is not a season of fasting but of feasting, it might be helpful to review what we previously discussed regarding How Do I Feast?

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The post Resurrection 2: Thomas Sunday: Believing in the Grace of Resurrection (Western & Eastern 2025) first appeared on Father Elisha: Let me take you on an intriguing journey..