Do You Struggle With Doubt & Unbelief?(Part 3)

I started this topic of our common struggle as Christians with doubt and unbelief by saying that many times our assumptions about what the Christian life should look like gets us into real trouble.  We might assume that once we are Christians doubt just disappears because we are disciples of Jesus now. This connection to Jesus doesn’t guarantee less struggle with doubt but actually can intensify it. As unbelievers we walked in deception and now as believers we are trying to walk in truth and reality.  That is difficult! Remember the movie the Matrix?  There is the choice of taking the blue pill, which represents deception and going back to sleep, or choosing the red pill, which exposes us to what is really going on. If you haven’t read the first two articles please do so before reading this one. It will make more sense.

In the first article we looked at an encounter with a father wanting to get relief for his son who was demon possessed in Matthew 9:21-24. The man confessed he had “Believed” Jesus could cure his son and that he struggled with Unbelief. What I would like to do is clarify what doubt and unbelief are because many think they are the same.

First, doubt is a struggle with what is and is not true. We all experience doubt to one degree or another, but it is those that learn how to manage their doubt that move forward in faith and gain ground in their faith. Doubt is questioning what you believe. Unbelief, on the other hand, is the refusal to believe. Unbelief involves spiritual blindness and is determined resistance to trust God. A case in point is when Jesus rose from the dead and an angel reveals he is alive to Mary Magdalene. She was told to go tell the disciples that he was alive. The disciples, Peter included, didn’t believe the women’s report.

Mark 16:10-11                                                                                                                                                                      

She (Mary) went and reported to those who had been with Him, while they were mourning and weeping. When they heard that He was alive and had been seen by her, they refused to believe it.

Another time is when Jesus first appeared to his closest disciples after the resurrection. One disciple was not there and he refused to believe. Many times God gives us some of the facts but not all the facts in order to test whether we will trust ourselves more than God and his word.

John 20:24-25                                                                                                                                                                       

But Thomas, sometimes called the Twin, one of the Twelve, was not with them when Jesus came. The other disciples told him, “We saw the Master.” But he said, “Unless I see the nail holes in his hands, put my finger in the nail holes, and stick my hand in his side, I won’t believe it.”

Many times we shift from doubt because of questions and move into the realm of unbelief.  Living in a world where we only believe in the natural can enslave us to unbelief. The spiritual world is denied because we have refused to embrace what is outside of our understanding.

When I first came to Christ I was in an American Baptist church. For the most part, they refused to believe in the supernatural even when it’s clearly in the scriptures. They had learned to explain the supernatural away and thus, when the supernatural was happening in a youth group of 150 kids, they chalked it up to “Emotionalism”. They demanded that we give up such notions as speaking in tongues and casting out demons if we were going to remain in the church. Their unbelief blinded them to the fact that Jesus still does miracles today. Regrettably, we left that church and started a new ministry with mostly young people and God honored our faith with more miracles.

So how do we deal with our doubts and unbelief? First, we need to realize there are many things we can’t understand about faith and walking with Jesus but we can focus on what is reliable and true. The scriptures are the bridge between the natural and the supernatural. The Scriptures educate us in how God thinks and how we should think. Psalms 119 and others relate the power of God’s word to lead us out of darkness into the light.

Psalms 119:105                                                                                                                                                                   

Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.

God gives us revelation from scripture so that if we are willing we can leave the realm of unbelief to the realm of faith. Remember, God is not against us having doubts about our faith walk but he is against unbelief. Consider how Jesus approached his faith walk before he was anointed to do miracles. For thirty years he lived by faith in the word of God. When battling Satan in the wilderness he leaned on what the word said and not his ability to debate Satan.

Matthew 4:1-4                                                                                                                                                                     

Then Jesus was led out into the wilderness by the Holy Spirit to be tempted there by the Devil. For forty days and forty nights he ate nothing and became very hungry. Then the Devil came and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, change these stones into loaves of bread.”But Jesus told him, “No! The Scriptures say, ‘People need more than bread for their life; they must feed on every word of God.’ ”

The apostle Paul said in the book of Romans that real faith comes not by figuring everything out but rather by hearing and reading what the word of God says.

Romans 10:17                                                                                                                                                                           

So faith comes from hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ.

Let me close this out by saying there are two realms, the natural and the supernatural, which is all around us. We were meant to live with both in harmony, but we have lost the ability to live constantly in and trust the supernatural more than the natural. Everything around us tells us to trust only the natural but when we open our hearts to the Holy Spirit he helps us trust the Father’s plans….. even when we don’t fully understand them.  Always remember the passage of scripture in Proverbs that tells us how to live the life of faith.

Proverbs 3:5-7                                                                                                                                                                     

Trust in the LORD with all your heart; do not depend on your own understanding. Seek his will in all you do, and he will direct your paths. Don’t be impressed with your own wisdom. Instead, fear the LORD and turn your back on evil. 

Questions:

1) Do you struggle most with doubts or unbelief? Your answer tells you what you need to work on.

2) Are you reading the Word of God daily? If not, you are starving your soul.

May the Holy Spirit give us insight to walk in faith daily and glorify our Heavenly Father.

Pastor Dale