Doubt

Perhaps contrary to popular understanding, doubt isn't the primary enemy, or opposite of Christian faith. Doubt is usually healthy. It's an indication that you have a brain that's plugged in and ticking. It's evidence that you care about what you believe and whether it's believable. So particularly if you're a Christian experiencing doubt, doubt is not necessarily a problem. In fact it can be the catalyst for an even more robust, confident faith in the Lord Jesus.

So if doubt's not the opposite of faith, what is? Unbelief. Unbelief occurs when - perhaps after moving through a period of doubt - one comes out the other end choosing to not or no longer believe. Unbelief is definitely a problem - so much so, that the writer to the Hebrews 'harps on' about it in chapters 3-4 (3:7-4:13). He warns the converted Jews against committing the sin of their forefathers - that of having a "sinful, unbelieving heart that turns away from the living God" (3:12). "Don't let sinfulness cause you to disbelieve!" he says. This unbelief is an act of disobedience and it begins when Christians (like the Israelites in the wilderness) start to doubt God's goodness.

I think though there's a different kind (or direction) of doubt that many thinking Christians are susceptible to, and that's doubt about whether it's all real or not. Is Jesus the Christ, the Son of the Living God? Did he live then die for the sin of the world and physically rise again on the third day? Does all of human meaning and purpose rise or fall on these claims?? And I'd heartily say that moving through doubting these things, and finding solid answers to these questions is a helpful, if not vital growth phase for us - especially for those of us raised in Christian families.

It happened for me in my Uni years, when I had non-Christian friends challenge all my long-held grown-up-in-a-Christian-family beliefs and assumptions, and it forced me to do a pile of reading and researching to get satisfactory answers both for them and myself. It worked! What happened was that as I read, I discovered that not only did Jesus' death and resurrection make a good Sunday School story (or 2, or 200), there was more than good extra-biblical evidence to demonstrate beyond reasonable doubt* that it all happened just like the Scriptures themselves say. I became confident that what I had grown up believing as a child, I could continue believing as an adult because now I had seen the evidence for myself - both through what I read and increasingly through what I experienced in relationship with God. Doubts and questions pushed me towards solid answers, and even now I love discovering more and more just how completely the biblical / Christian worldview makes sense of EVERY part of the world (as absolute Truth should, by definition).

Doubt isn't something we Christians feel very comfortable talking about, for fear people will think we're rebels or loonies or both. I hope I can encourage us to have a more healthy, helpful view of doubt - seeing that it can be the catalyst for some very important investigative work which can lead to some very reassuring discoveries. I would suggest we keep our seatbelts on though, as we proceed through the investigation. It's foolish (and probably a bit rude) to recklessly defy what (and Who) we think is true, in the cause of making sure it is. And we need to proceed humbly, because the Bible tells us that it's ultimately God Himself who enables our faith in Him, and you wouldn't want to be rude towards Him and THEN come to realise that all along you actually needed Him.

So my suggestions in short?

• Don't be scared of doubt; go with it but go humbly.
• Read. Read apologetics books (eg Josh McDowell and Lee Strobel; the Aussie version is John Dickson, and the UK version is guys like Nick Pollard - there are several in the SLE Library!) and websites, but by all means keep reading the Scriptures because it's the Scriptures that are able to make us wise for salvation (2 Timothy 3:15).
• Pray. Ask God to help you 'overcome your unbelief' (like the guy in Mark 9:14-27), assuming He is indeed the author of Truth and the Answer to all our questions.
• And maybe ask a Christian friend or your Bible study group leader to keep checking on you from time to time to interact with your thoughts, see how you're going, and pray for your journey.

By grace, I've come to see that John 14:6 - Jesus answered, "I am the way, the truth and the life. No-one comes to the Father except through me." - isn't just an easy way to score stickers in Sunday School! It's Truth to stake your Life and Hope and Everything on. If it's doubt that helps you get there too, that's quite ok. May it lead to life in abundance!


*I read somewhere about the very important distinction between legal proof and scientific proof. We cannot scientifically prove that Jesus died and rose in that - among other things - there is no Roman cross and resurrected body to do DNA cross-matching tests on. But even many of our modern-day court cases are tried not on the basis of scientific proof, but substantial (and sufficient) legal proof. For example, a car-crash and all its damages cannot be scientifically 'proven' in that you cannot make the exact same event happen again in front of everyone's eyes. But you can legally 'prove' that it happened on the basis of things like the testimony of eye-witnesses, photos of the crash site, the presence of crash-residue (broken glass at the intersection), the physical and emotional effect on the crash victims. Similarly, we can't show by re-creation or actual (re)view (seeing again) that Jesus' death and bodily resurrection happened. But on the basis of legal 'proofs' we have evidence beyond reasonable doubt that it did. There was recorded evidence of Jesus' certain death (not just swoon theory), his body was never retrieved (and all his enemies would have been pushing and shoving to ensure this if they could), hundreds of eye-witnesses were able to testify to seeing him post-resurrection, and there was measurable post-resurrection effect on his followers (to say the least!). But go have a read of the books and websites mentioned above; there's plenty more that can be said...!