Doubt?
One of the things that you experience when you read the New Testament, are the numerous occasions when Jesus’ disciples show their doubt about His mission, teaching and actions. It isn’t just Thomas (John 20:24-29) who is sceptical and needed physical proof to believe, even though they saw Jesus’ amazing powers to heal and other great works, they fairly regularly doubted that he was indeed the Son of God.
In fact, how people reacted to Jesus’ mission tend to fall into three broad categories. There were those who accepted him wholeheartedly- people for example like the demon possessed man who was healed and the Centurion whose faith was such that just the word of Jesus was sufficient to bring back to health his sick servant. Then there were those who opposed him – some Pharisees, King Herod, the Romans and other teachers/experts of the Law because of the threat Jesus posed to them, and of course ultimately it led to them conspiring to kill him. The third group of people are those who neither accepted Jesus wholeheartedly or rejected him but who were unsure or doubted him and who he was- in essence they had a rather agnostic viewpoint.
There are numerous examples of where the disciples fell short in their faith- think of how they responded to Jesus’ teaching of the parable of the Sower, the feeding of the five thousand, Jesus’ repeated statements where he predicted his death, or where Jesus calmed the storm or walked on water. At these times, the disciples’ response, rather than seeing these events as signs and evidence to confirm who He was, was to ask “Who is this?” (Mark 4:41).
They were not alone in their doubts- even John the Baptist was unsure as in Matthew 11:3 he asked of Jesus: “Are you the one who was to come, or should we expect someone else?” Now this is John who personally baptised Jesus and witnessed the descent of the Holy Spirit upon him and declared him the Lamb of God-tey even he doubted!
So how do we deal with doubt? For wisdom I look to the late and great Selwyn Hughes who amongst other achievements set up the Crusade for World Revival (CWR). He once said “Many Christians are afflicted with doubt. Doubt is not the problem; it is how we respond to it that determines whether it will be an obstacle or an opportunity. Don’t repress your doubts but acknowledge them and bring them to Jesus. Face them in the confidence that they can be used as stepping stones to a deeper awareness of God”.
That has to be right – we should not feel guilty if we have doubts, in many senses they are natural, but as Selwyn said, it is more about how we deal with that doubt, that we should shine a light on them and take them to God in prayer.