To doubt, or not .. . are we fooling ourselves?

[This blog post has been under construction for some weeks. I was uncomfortable with it because I felt I wasn’t communicating my thinking adequately. Then I read an interview with Greg Boyd about his upcoming book, which, coincidentally (?) is on the same topic. I decided to finish this now, and pray you get the point.
Since then I have run into the issue repeatedly.

The blog i read is  http://daviddflowers.com/2012/11/10/qa-with-pastor-greg-boyd-part-i/ ]

What do we do with our doubts? Or don't you have any? I daresay that a person of faith, living in this world of massive wrong, deception, anger and hatred, greed and abuse, injustice and downright unfairness, lies and more lies, is bound to have doubts about their faith, about what this life is all about after all. Any sensitive, sensible, honest one does. How then does that correlate to our faith?

The desire for security is one of our core motivations. It is the stuff of life. We look for it everywhere - work/career; family; social groups; political affiliation; government; church/religion - anywhere we can be confirmed in who we are and what we're doing here on planet Earth in 2012. We identify so we can belong so we can feel a-part-of so we can feel as if we're ok, we're cool, we got it made and are headed in the right direction, just like everyone else of consequence. We are sure of it …

But what of that? Some time ago a man dared to challenge the status quo, the ‘ we-are-sure-of-its ‘, on several fronts. In fact, he was such a threat to the security of one or the other group that they killed him. His legacy lies in the concept of an alternate sense of belonging, a different reality that challenges the reality we live and die for - an inside-out, upside-down reality. And he changed the world as we know it, and does so to this day. His was a most insecure circumstance.

I speak to things spiritual, and so I'm going there direct. We often see our 'church' and our religion as the place where we feel safe, where we get our convictions, our indisputable truths, our sureties on which we hang our god. We even create creeds, doctrines, dogmas and dogmatic theologies, memorialized in our hymnody, to enshrine these sureties. They serve to make us feel comfortable in our belief system, make us sure. They solidify who we are.

It’s true that we find, and should find, a sense of security in our church, a sense of belonging, of sharing, of family. We need that, for we live in a world, in a system, that runs contrary to the kingdom agenda of Jesus. As we live out life in the world as contradictions, we gather stress, and it is imperative for us to find encouragement and release among friends and family. But when we allow the church/religion to be the system by which we inculcate our sureties, our absolutes, without resolving those 'absolutely-sure' things in our own hearts and minds individually, making them our very own, we run the risk of failing to grow ourselves, losing sight of our faith, undervaluing the struggle that is so much the lifeblood of that faith. 

For faith springs out of un-surety. It is the phoenix that brings life in this confusing and dying world, in which we pose, as if we're secure, safe ... sure.

Don't swallow it simply because the preacher said so. Chase it with a heart full of desire to know for yourself. And never give up on it.

The church does not supplant or satisfy the need for doubt. As a disciple you should never feel that the questions you have, the niggling doubts you feel inside, the nagging question marks in the margins of your Bible are somehow weaknesses or disabilities, faithless, or even heretical. Do not for a moment allow yourself to be cowarded, to be made to feel as if you’re not ‘in’ because you have doubts. To question, to wrestle, to argue, to doubt… these are normal things for us as redeemed humans living in occupied territory, and we need to pursue them, to struggle with them, for in so doing we grow, we strengthen and mature. 

We are not perfect. We have doubts.

It is this struggle, this grasping for truth, this exertion of our spirit to understand, to grow, to be transformed into the likeness of the Son, that the Father wants. He wants my commitment, in the midst of doubt. This desire to walk on, regardless of the doubt, is what makes for a disciple. I trust God while in the doubt-mire. Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not rely on your own understanding; think about Him in all your ways, and He will guide you on the right paths. (Prov 3.5,6 HCSB). What need for trusting God if we are sure of everything?      What need indeed?

When we rely on a sense of security, so we can feel secure, so we can live and move and breathe with confidence, so we can divert our minds from threat, danger and possibly death, then we have created a god in whom we trust. We trust in our sureties.

See, Jesus said something strange that cuts to the quick, one of those upside-down things. He said that a person, to save their life, must lose it. We tend to interpret that to mean: a willingness to die for our beliefs; a dedication of our lives to the Christian way of life; a ministry focus/full-time work in the church. But maybe Jesus was also pointing to something more fundamental: a willingness to forego our sureties and simply trust in God. Release your refuges and allow God to take over. In this way we relinquish all of our Earth-holds - things like career and house and wealth - and we become pilgrims, journeying to a better kingdom, following the lead of our Forerunner to a fulfilling life where God is all in all.

My take on Hebrews 11.1 is that faith gives substance to hope, and provides evidence for what we, by virtue of our finity, cannot see. ( Now faith is the reality of what is hoped for, the proof of what is not seen. (HCSB {compare NKJV} ). 

Without faith there is no true absolute. 

Faith then is active and necessary. We need our faith to fill in the gaps of what we are unsure of, and to provide hope for our future Kingdom.

So don’t stop doubting; act on it. Don’t stop putting those marks in your Bible; put them there, determined to seek to resolve them with the Spirit's guidance. Don’t stop questioning and pleading with God for the injustices that are there, staring you in the face; ask him why, and wait for the answer. If it is not forthcoming, ask again, and again.

God is not intimidated by you or by me. His love is big enough to handle our childishness.

" God is in control! " .. .  ... . sure doesn't seem that way sometimes, ya?

Now … trust, and doubt. Doubt from within the context of trust. 

Increase your faith, while asking God to increase your faith. 

Stretch yourself, for God, for your Body, for your family, friends, for your neighbor.

Doubt me? Try it. Faith it.

Shalom.