Expressing Doubt Builds Faith

Introduction

Many of us have felt guilty for feeling doubt regarding our faith, whether it be our whole faith or parts of it. I hesitated about using the word doubt in this article because of its potentially negative connotations. However, I choose to use it because it captures the emotion behind what many of us feel when we question or enquire about areas of our faith that we don't understand. Interestingly, Fuller Seminary completed a study on what is most helpful for young people to retain their faith and build maturity, and found that wrestling with doubts was a key. Experiencing doubt can be emotionally draining and a fearful experience, and this needs to be recognised and addressed. When looking at the Bible, it seems to portray God as being merciful (in some cases praising) towards those who express questions or doubts. Faith doesn't seem to be an unquestionable act of trust in God, but more a choice to trust God, whilst acknowledging and wrestling with our doubts.  

 Retrieved from http://www.redletterchristians.org/wp-content/uploads/Faith-in-times-of-uncertainty.jpg

Opening questions to consider:

Is it right or wrong to question our beliefs?

Is it unhelpful or helpful to question our beliefs?

What does God expect us to do?

What does evidence suggest we do?

Two Mindedness is not Necessarily Helpful

I admit that the Bible does emphasise that it is not helpful to be two-minded in our beliefs according to James 1. After looking at many scriptures relating to uncertainty and faith, what James appears to be referring to here is a person who is permanently indecisive and without conviction in life. Most people would say that a person having no conviction about social injustice or various issues would be a person who is unhelpful and impractical to reality. Edmund Burke said "The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing".

Scripture and Doubt

There are many situations in the Bible where people experience a type of doubt and it is not always seen with disdain. What God appears to respect in His Word is the sincere seeking of truth that people partake in. As the Bible says "seek and you will find".  The prophets would repeatedly appeal to what God has done in the past as evidence of God's power and glory, rather than just claiming that God is God. This suggests that God does not expect blind faith, but faith based on evidence. Paul also took time to argue the gospel reasonably and based on evidence. If faith is based on evidence, then it is based on conviction of that evidence and not a fake conviction of nothing. God is more concerned about the sincerity of heart than about shallow publicly espoused allegiance to Him, as Jesus so often accused the Pharisees of doing. 

Mark 9 shares a story where Jesus answered a doubting man's prayer. Jesus said that he needed to believe in order to receive His assistance. The man replied that he believed, but also asked Jesus to help him with his unbelief! What the man requested seems to be an oxymoron, but Jesus had mercy on him and granted his request. It seems that an admission of faith while experiencing doubt can even have prayers answered! God doesn't seem to need our unwavering faith to bring about His purposes. This story suggests that Jesus is more interested in a sincere pursuit of Him, even if that pursuit involves admission of doubt.

Paul says at the end of Roman 14 that we need to be congruent (consistent) or true to ourselves. He says that if we go against our conscience, it is more or less akin to sin. In the context of doubt, this could mean that acknowledging the doubt and wrestling with it, rather than going on pretending it isn't there, is the more helpful way of living.

Matthew states that even Jesus expressed a form of "doubt" when He cried "My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?". I am not saying that Jesus necessarily intellectually doubted His Father's existence, but that He existentially doubted (experiencing emotional or intellectual doubt) God's faithfulness to Him while He was on the cross. We all go through periods in our lives where we experience doubt about God's existence, goodness, or our understanding of "correct" doctrine - whether it be emotional or intellectual. Christ seemed to be free to express his anguish without worrying about the judgement of religious lofty eyes.

Jude 22 also chimes in on how to deal with doubt. He emphasises the mercy that we need to show to those who doubt. Rather than thinking less of those who experience doubt, he appears to imply being slow to judge and quick to hear. 

Expressing Doubt Builds Faith 

I have been reading a book recently by Nancy Pearcy called "Saving Leonardo: A call to resist the secular assault on mind, morals, & meaning".  In it she brings to our attention a fascinating study by Fuller Seminary that investigated High School graduate's tendency to lose their faith after school. In the study they found a key factor that influenced whether youth kept their faith or not. They found that the most effective factor was not prayer or Bible studies, but the safe exploration of questions before leaving home. The college students said that the more they felt they could safely express their doubts meant that they developed higher levels of faith and spiritual maturity. Pearcy believes that the best way for teens to be prepared to give an answer for their faith (1 Peter 3:15) is by personally wrestling with questions. Jesus interestingly said that we are to be child in like some way. Pearcy and Francis Schaeffer said that being childlike is not about believing the first thing we have been told, but about a tendency to ask questions! Pearcy concludes that we need to have the attitude of Paul "Test Everything; Hold fast what is good". 

As counselling theory has well established, safely and honestly exploring our realities (without fear of judgement) helps us to have a greater awareness and understanding which equips us to live more fruitful and sincere lives.   

Doubt and Fear

The alternative extreme to double mindedness is when people engage in a blind following of one belief without questioning it or hearing and entertaining another's viewpoint. I wrote a post recently on the subject of Group Think, its' dangerous tendencies, and how to combat it. I do believe in the usefulness of constructive talk around what we generally see as evidence for the faith (and there is a lot), but if this talk is not balanced it can produce fear amongst people when they doubt something that is taken for granted. Why do we fear? It could be because it has been ingrained into us to believe blindly or else be condemned, instead of engaging honestly with our doubt. I have felt at times that the attitude within church culture can be that to doubt is a sin or a weakness. However, there is a more helpful and God honouring way to view doubt.If I love truth, and God is truth, then I love God. The search for truth comes first, if it doesn't, then we just believe whatever we first come in contact with, or whatever suits our fancy. That would not be honouring God to believe something for the sake of it. On a similar note, if I expect someone else to question their world view in the humble pursuit of truth, then I must also too. God wants us to love Him with our heart, strength and mind. I am not saying that we blow about in the wind 24/7, but how C.S. Lewis put it: "Faith... is the art of holding on to things your reason has once accepted, in spite of your changing moods". People believe things for many reasons, and it would often take a huge amount of evidence before their belief would change anyway. I believe the honest pursuit of truth is the attitude that God would find most helpful to work with, rather than a dogmatic adherence to creeds with the suppression of doubt.    

Conclusion

Scripture suggests that it is not evil to experience doubt, but part of the process of finding out who we are and why we believe what we believe. Instead, we can be true to ourselves. The Fuller Seminary study shows that being real, and safely exploring our doubts leads to a stronger faith. It suggests it is more dangerous to not safely question your faith. However, it is not helpful to always be wavering and double minded, but instead having a humble conviction about what we do have evidence for. Experiencing doubt is not something people can always avoid due to the enquiring minds God has given us, but it can be extremely frightening and painful. One way to help relinquish this fear is by sincerely searching for truth while having an attitude of trust towards God, that if He is truth, He will guide our sincere searching in the most helpful direction. We cannot ever understand everything. Being true to ourselves is the best we can do, and what I believe God wants us to exhibit. I am not suggesting giving up on faith, but suggesting the necessity to express doubt as a part of our faith.

P.S.

Joshua Griffiths is currently doing a series talking about how relationship and the existence of knowledge gaps is essential for a full understanding and experience of faith - Faithfully Valuing the Limits of Scripture (PART 3 - RELATIONSHIPS)

Murder...by pride

Listening to a song by the Christian metal band Stryper inspired this thought. Here are the words to the song first of all:

Saturday night's a lie, I follow every cue
Sunday is sanctified, I smile and take the pew
Monday it's back to school - Am I learning, not at all
Tuesday and Wednesday, Thursday, Friday I just crawl

Seeds that were growing have been dried up by my flesh
I walk the walk and talk the talk but where's the rest
I could have everything even what's behind the stars
But I built my prison without windows, without bars

Gotta fight, gotta stop living a lie
Gotta fall, gotta lay down and die
Gotta stand and run to the other side
Gotta live or it's Murder By Pride



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=puYaPMrcxm8&feature=player_embedded

www.stryper.com

Watching people, including the one in the mirror, and it's easy to see that we live for ourselves too much. It seems like all we care about at times is how we feel or what makes us feel better about our life, our lifestyles, our thoughts, and our actions. As the song says our seeds (our ways of life) have been dried up by the flesh. The flesh causes us to be blind. We start to focus on our own wants and desires of the flesh and this in turn causes us to lose focus on living right. We build our own prisons. We live secret lives. We live lies.

When we live for ourselves we do these things:

• We challenge God's word and authority. This causes us to think less of moral standards or even lose a standard to live by. When standards of God are lost then humanity suffers chaos. A world without Godly standards is called 'hell".
• We exalt ourselves over the wisdom of God. Humanity that can't even control their own finances, marriages, and other issues in life think they can actually get away with making decisions without God or at least the wisdom He has passed on in the Scriptures? What makes us think we are right?
• We feel we are the most important person in existence. People do not listen to wisdom. They feel just because they think it then it must be right. Everyone has a closed mind or turn a blind eye to what they are doing because if they are proven wrong then they have to change.

All of these can be summed up into one word, pride. One being did that a long time ago and a special place has been created for him. Pride came before his fall and pride will come before our fall.

Sometimes we have to put our own desires away. When we live secret lives we not only lie to the world but we lie to ourselves. Yet, we keep going on living that way. We have to stop living a lie. Just because things feel okay to do or we no longer feel bad about some of our actions does not meant that we are living right. We all need certain standards to live by. Just because God's morals are not what we feel are for everybody does not mean His moral standards are wrong. We may think it's okay to release our anxieties with alcohol, but it's not. We may think it's okay to indulge ourselves with "feel good" activities because it has been accepted by the world, but it's not. We may think our wrongful sexual desires are okay to pursue because it makes us feel good and wanted, but it's not. We may think it's okay to get revenge or to react in a vengeful way because we feel people deserve it, but it's not. Just because certain things make us happy and/or we do not understand why God says certain things are wrong does not mean we do not have to abide by His standards. Sometimes we have to lay down our flesh and die to this world. If we keep on living for the flesh then we let our pride murder us.