It was 1971. I was a newly minted Christian, and eager to share the good news of what I had found. I had gone to what the Methodist Church called a Lay Witness Mission, sort of a revival, and given my life over to God. It was phrased as “give as much of yourself as you can, to as much of God as you can understand.” It wasn’t much in either case – I didn’t understand much, and I couldn’t give much, but I did what I could. One of the things they had emphasized was the need to share the message of the faith you had found. They didn’t say much about how to do that, but just had a few lectures on the basics of Christianity.
So there I was one night, sitting in a dorm room at Texas Tech University in Lubbock, trying to share my faith with a friend of mine. I had gone to high school with Jerry, and we’d spent a lot of time water skiing and hanging out at the lake. He was at Tech to get a biology degree, and wanted to eventually get a PhD in some specialized type of biology that I didn’t understand. I had barely gotten through the dissecting the frog course, so I had no idea what he was studying, but I did know he was really smart.
I stumbled through the basic concepts of Christianity I had been given, somehow thinking that to be effective I needed to be sure of what I was saying, and convicted in the correctness of my position. Only later did I realize that I hadn’t thought through what I had been taught, wasn’t sure if I believed it or agreed with it, and that this made for a less than effective presentation of certainty.
Then Jerry said something that baffled me. “I think we come to faith through doubting.” I was perplexed, because they hadn’t given us an answer for that thought in the lectures. In some vague way, it felt like not being faithful to even question the validity of Christianity. I ran my stock answers past him one more time, trying to speak them clearly enough that he would understand what I was saying. I could see he remained unconvinced, and somewhere deep inside me, I felt unconvinced myself.
It took me many years to understand what he had said. Only after I had gone through doubting phases did I realize the strength of the concept he was trying to share with me. And the irony of that didn’t escape me.
I reached a point where I had tried all the Bible Studies I could sign up for – to try to better understand God. I had been very active at our church, involved in singles ministry, working as a counselor with the high school kids. I had even gone on weekend prison ministries – where we would spend the majority of the weekend inside a Texas prison unit, only returning to our motel rooms late at night – witnessing to the prisoners about our faith.
I later realized that what I was trying to do, particularly with the Bible Study – was to understand God well enough that I could quantify Him, put Him in a box, and essentially, not have to trust in God. I began to wonder if I agreed with all I had learned, and felt that all the effort wasn’t allowing me to feel more convinced when it came to my faith. Did I really believe the things I had learned and thought I knew about God?
Somewhere during that time, I also attended a Great Books study group, and heard a wonderful quote by Socrates. Paraphrased – “the beginning of wisdom is to know we don’t have wisdom.” I translated that to be free to give up trying to understand and quantify God – because it couldn’t be done. I relaxed a lot after that.
But I was still left questioning my faith, my direction, and my relationship with God. As I realized that there were unresolved issues from my childhood that had broken my trust in God, I began to see why I was not giving myself more freely. The essential question was: “If you’re an omniscient, omnipotent God like I’ve been taught – where were You when the bad things were happening, and why didn’t You stop it?” I didn’t find a simplistic answer to that question – I’m not sure if one exists – but I made peace with the fact that there had been abuse and violence that had caused me to doubt. Wait – caused me to doubt? So did I come to trust more and have more faith, through doubting? Sure seemed like it.
So now Jerry’s statement took on a whole new meaning. “We come to faith through doubting.” I didn’t understand until I had gone through it myself. But it gave me a whole new appreciation for the faith process. By questioning what I had been taught, by doubting God because of my past, I had come to that certainty that had been missing earlier about my faith. By giving up the need to know everything – more accurately, by admitting the futility of trying to know everything – I came to a greater peace about accepting life as it was, and taking faith as “the evidence of things unseen,” and relying on them as I went about my life. It freed me to a more pure spirituality – not religiosity – that allowed me to connect with God in a way I had never done before. And if I doubted occasionally – I was fine with that now, and knew it would eventually strengthen my faith.
Photo Credits
“sensitive noise / obvious 2” milos milosevic @flickr.com Creative Commons. Some rights reserved.
“Question mark.” Marco Bellucci @flickr.com Creative Commons. Some rights reserved.
As an incest survivor, I have asked that same question of God. At some point in looking at my doubts, I learned that God gave us free will. Having free will means that I can do whatever I want and God isn’t going to step in and stop me. That means He isn’t going to stop me from doing good. It also means He isn’t going to stop me from doing bad, if I choose because if He did stop me from doing either, it wouldn’t be free will. I do believe that God rejoices at some of our choices and that He cries at our other choices. I also believe that any time that we try to describe God that we limit Him with our words. He is so much more than we can ever imagine. I believe that many paths lead to God rather than just one. I have more of a spiritual outlook on life rather than any certain religion as well.
Patricia, I agree very much with your thoughts on free will, and have come to those same conclusions. “I also believe that any time that we try to describe God that we limit Him with our words.” You just captured my frustrating attempts to put God in a box as I described in this post. Once I gave that up, things shifted pretty dramatically in my world. One of my buddies used to focus on AWM – Awe, Wonder, Mystery, using it as a way to remember that God is bigger than we can know! Thanks for sharing your thoughts here, Patricia! 🙂
I love your sense of true faith and what life is all about–good job Dan
Thank you Laura, for your wonderful words! This was a healing post to write! 🙂
Hi Dan. Nice post and great story. I wondered if I could give you a different perspective on “doubting.” Faith can certainly come through though questioning… this is something the the Bereans did in Acts 17:11. So I think I understand where you’re coming from. The word ‘doubt’ though is used specifically by Jesus in scriptures. For example, James 1:5-8, Mark 11:23, & John 20:27 From how I understand it (respectively) it’s not used in a good tone.
I so agree with you that we must ask tough questions, and not make up answers to things that are reasonable or unreasonable to accept. No, we continue to struggle, fight & wrestle with those issues we’ve yet to understand; until God reveals the answers we are needing. That’s not a heart of doubt my friend. That is a man believing in yet, questioning the nature of who God is. “Who is this God that would allow me to suffer so much?” We see Job’s family struggling with it, too. We all go through that… and I still go through it. I’d say the more personal, the more we do it. But since Adam & Eve, the evil one has used doubt as a method to get us off trusting & relying on God. So unlike ‘doubting Thomas’ in the book of John, we must trust & believe in Him even when we don’t understand. Think of it like our kids do with us or we did as kids. – I like to say sometimes, “I don’t know everything, just the one Person who does.” Ha!
Anyway, again I loved your story and I’m sorry to hear of your past. I was just initially confused by a thought that you were saying it’s ok to doubt, yet I read from Jesus his chastising followers and the Apostles for their doubts. Reminding them to believe or to have faith. I hope that makes sense? But again, I understand where you were coming from.
I am blessed to have met you and be impacted by your life story. ~ EB
Thanks for your kind comments Elisha. Sometimes the nature of questioning our faith has different perspectives in even the words that are used to describe it – I’m comfortable with the use of the word doubt in this context. Thank you for honoring how I characterized it in my life! 🙂
Hi Dan,
Your article really resonated with me, as I have come to learn, in the process of developing faith, that I know very little. At first that thought led me to feel deficient, but, over time, I came to understand it better and it gives me comfort now. I’, too, was a victim of abuse as a child and wondered, if there was a God, where He was during that time. I believed that since He wasn’t there to help me, He didn’t exist. That has been what I have worked through during the course of my sobriety. And what I have learned, each time I question or doubt, is that my faith is strengthened each time. Each time I come out of my doubt with greater peace and awareness of God in my life. I see the “bad” times as periods through which God is teaching me. Doubting leads me there and I forget it each time I doubt. If I remembered that, I could save myself some grief… 🙂
Carolyn CJ Jones
http://www.gatelady.com
Carolyn – How wonderful that this post resonated with you – I thought it would from your blog entry I commented on. I do understand about figuring out how little relatively I know compared to what I used to think I understood! 🙂 It does sound like the process of building your faith through the adventure of the doubting times has been a part of your journey as it has for me.
I am thoroughly delighted that we are sharing this healing journey together!
Warmly,
Dan