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As I continue on in my walk with God and journey of faith through this life, I find that I often have questions. I don't mean questions about the basic tenets and principles of the faith, although I do have those kinds of questions from time to time, usually in a curious way. I am relentlessly curious, so I will investigate nearly anything from different perspectives to see what it looks like.
But with regard to those more basic questions, over and over again I've tested the core tenets of Christianity, based on my ongoing experiences and taking into account criticisms both new and old that I've encountered, and found that they hold together without budging. Given the existence of a Creator God, the faith set forth in Scripture follows, and no other religion or holy writings could stand up to the rigorous assaults withstood by the Church for centuries now.
As Christians we can be reluctant to talk about doubt, since to acknowledge that sometimes we consider the truth of what we believe as something that could potentially be untrue sounds like we're denying our faith.
But doubt is not the same as denial, doubt is a testing of our faith, and such tests are necessary to strengthen it. The question is whether we will pass the test with stronger faith, or become doubters, our faith weak, remaining mired in uncertainty. James had strong words for people who chose the second option...
The questioning and uncertain thought or feeling that pops into your mind is not yet sin; what you do with it might be sin, or might instead be a glorious victory. If we need more faith, God is willing to provide it, but the biblical conception of faith is an active reaching out to God, not a passive hunger strike. Sometimes we must find ourselves crying out to God along with the man in Mark 9: "Lord I believe, help my unbelief!"
The Irrationality of Doubt
When I do get those doubting sorts of moments, lately they are of that vaguely anxious "but what if 'all this' isn't true?" variety. Interestingly, that sort of doubt is the least able to stand up to logical inquiry. Nonbelievers (in the world of Western thought) would have you believe that Christianity is not rational or logical, and, recently and irrelevantly, that is has been made unnecessary by "Science," as if the laws of physics would be a challenge to or replacement for the One who set them up and provided the energy to have any matter to begin with. ("Bless me, what do they teach them at these schools...")
It's the opposite, actually: given the presuppositions from which Christianity begins, everything proceeds in quite a logical and orderly fashion. So for these vaguely anxious sorts of doubts, simply asking "Can you be more specific? Which part isn't true exactly? What alternative truth claim is being suggested here?" often dispels it outright without it even bothering to explain itself. Very, very few doubts stand up to any vigourous inquiries about a) content, and b) motive.
So for me at this point, I can say that doubt is inherently irrational. I know the depth and truth of scripture more than I did earlier in my life, and have a more clear understanding of how Christianity all holds together, and perceive that the reality of the world as understood through Scripture is indeed the inevitable conclusion to which an honest and informed look at reality would drive one (what Paul is talking about in Romans 1). Yes, the more I've learned about Scripture and the history of doctrine and our faith the more questions I have had, but my curiosity has been joyously satisfied by the truth of God's word and the miracle of His church and His presence.
Also, my faith has been extended over any question marks that remain for me (and there always are, for now we see in a mirror dimly), not primarily due to answered questions, but because I have experienced over and over again God's gracious intervention in my life. Lack of total knowledge about the story can't make me doubt the author when I've met Him, and He is not passive. I have some pretty cool stories... crazy things have happened exactly when they need to happen.
And that is where a believer and a non-believer go in totally opposite directions: when some crazy, unlikely thing that seems like supernatural intervention occurs, the believer states that given God, the simplest explanation is that He did this, since this sort of thing doesn't happen by accident. The non-believer states that given no God, the only possible explanation is that sometimes crazy coincidences happen by accident, or maybe that there's no such thing as 'accident' or 'miracle,' everything just happens, and it's your own confirmation bias making you think it's for your own benefit or some other purpose.
But they're the ones that are trapped. While we can look a crazy, wonderful miracle in the face and say "This cannot happen naturally, God did this," they must always either deny that it occurred, concoct an explanation so unlikely that the only excuse for it is "well it happened, and there's no God, so this must be how it happened," or pull out the tiresome confirmation bias hammer, for which to those who wield it everything seems to look like a nail.
And often they misunderstand us. When met with something they do not understand, people may simply say "God did it." Then along come scientists and say "Ah, not so: this is caused by energy transferred in X way by Y methods. See, your so-called god is vanishing one explanation at a time." (Then we ask them where energy came from originally, and they vow to have the answer to that too, someday. There are theories. Just have faith.) This is the 'god of the gaps' idea, that "God" is merely the answer to things for which science has not yet provided a purely natural explanation. Some Christians do use this argument, and I think they should stop. We don't believe God hides in the inexplicable; we believe He created the explicable. As Paul reminds us, God's invisible attributes can be observed clearly from the things that are made. His existence need not be only inferred from the things that are mysterious. That would be weak faith indeed.
In the end, however, it's not even a necessary conflict. One can say that lightning is a transfer of energy and one can say that lightning shows the power of God, and those two statements are in no way contradictory. If God created this universe, then "God did it," applies to everything that follows, it doesn't matter by what means He was pleased to arrange things to occur. "Friction kept your tires on the road" is not a rebuttal to the claim that you drove to work this morning, it's one piece of evidence that your claim is a rational one.
The Experience of Doubt
I certainly do experience feelings of doubt from time to time. It's a strong temptation on the missions field in general, and for me in this place specifically where people hear of Jesus and say neither "Lord" nor "silly myth" but "Wonderful, you've got your god, we've got ours.. lots of them actually."
But I had strong feelings of pain when I stubbed my toe the other day too, and I did not throw out my preexisting conception of the universe based on those feelings. ("I've been wrong all this time.. all is pain! There is nothing in life but all-consuming pain and that blasted metaphorical chair leg, whatever it represents!") The example is obviously absurd, but in more serious situations that's more or less what occurs. Some pain does not pass so quickly, and its intensity can weaken our convictions and make us question our assumptions, even when it shouldn't.
I often have the weird situation here on the mission field where I get 'attacks' of very strong feelings to doubt, as I mentioned earlier, without even much content to speak of, only force. It's much like someone sitting beside you screaming at you "doubt! doubt! doubt!" without ever saying what it is you should doubt.
Now here's the fun part: The fact that you already know what it is you're 'supposed' to be doubting, and the force with which this demand to doubt comes into your mind, all plays into exactly how the Bible describes the world. I'm being tempted to doubt by whom? The existence of a tempter is a pretty good confirmation of scripture, no? And you want me to doubt who? Precisely the God of Scripture, as it turns out? So it turns out that by turning the tables on a doubt, and making it answer the questions, typically you destroy it. (Caution: Don't be prideful about that, that's just trading one sin for an equally dangerous one. Doubts often fade away after a little while, pride typically does not.)
After that realization, doubt began to no longer feel like potential ulcer wanting to crop up inside me, but more like a wind trying to buffet me from the outside. Sometimes buttoning up my jacket is sufficient; sometimes I call to the One who calmed the winds with a word.
In both cases, I am able to bring to mind numerous moments in my life where I intentionally set up a remembrance stone in my memory, to say "here is where God did something amazing." I've experienced so many of those moments; of students coming to Christ and my seeing the immediate, inexplicable change in them, of situations that seemed impossible right up until we prayed, of the joy and peace and love I feel in His very real presence. The evidence of God, once seen in faith, is unending and wonderful.
But one doesn't get to see it much inside one's comfort zone, I should add.
Conclusion
Doubts may attack sometimes, but my faith is never in doubt. Even when assailed by a gale of doubt and feeling neither faithful nor logical, I have my remembrance stones, and the wind can't push those around. And it obeys the voice of the One who died for me, who offered Thomas the proof he asked for, yet blessed us who believe without yet having seen it. But we will see it. Let us continue in faith.
God cannot be 'proved' in the way people demand proof, but by faith He can certainly be experienced, proof enough to the we who experience Him, and faith in His existence and presence explains everything else in a perfectly sensible way. As C.S.Lewis famously said, "I believe in Christianity as I believe that the sun has risen: not only because I see it, but because by it I see everything else."
In the end, so many times it turns out like this:
Scripture says there is an invisible ladder in this spot, so in faith I begin to climb here, and after considerable effort I find that miraculously I am fifty feet up in the air, just as Scripture said. The scoffer's mocking reaction that I am merely imagining myself to be fifty feet off the ground would carry more weight if he wasn't shouting into the sky to let me hear him.
I hope reading this strengthens your faith as well.
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