3 ways to thrive in your Christian faith when doubt creeps in.
Reuters/Danish Ismail
In the Christian walk, a believer will inevitably face temptations, experience intellectual challenges, and even doubts. The battle can impede a flourishing relationship with the Lord Jesus. Yet He will still be there, for even “if we are faithless, he remains faithful — for he cannot deny himself” (2 Tim. 2:13).
Triumphant Christian living is the will of God for every genuine believer.
So here are three essentials that I believe can contribute to a believer’s pursuit of a flourishing Christian faith. The first one should be highlighted because, in contemporary culture, we need discernment more than ever over the “flaming darts” that are electronically relentless. Paul’s caution thus remains relevant: “Take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming darts of the evil one” (Eph. 6:16).
1. Knowing how doubts differ from unbelief
There is always someone or something lurking online to try and talk Christians out of their faith. It’s important to know that being challenged to doubt Christian faith is not the same as unbelieving it.
Take, for instance, the persistent and fallacious critique of skeptics, which is intended to create unbelief: “You are a Christian because you were born in a Christian culture.” Such “flaming darts” can cause debilitating doubts as they suggest that a Christian’s beliefs are not necessarily true, but conditioned by upbringing. This challenges a believer to respond by rationality, by counter-questioning, and by exercising discernment of the rhetoric. As one social scientist added,
“The times of wrestling with your faith and doctrine are part of what moves you along the pathway to better loving God ... our doubts, questions, and probes into the mysterious waters beneath the tip of the iceberg are often what God uses most to change us so that we can be part of the changing world.” [1]
Believers will inevitably experience some doubt while maintaining belief in the centrality of Christian faith, but one can emerge even stronger than before. Of note, the foregoing favored critique of skeptics is a classic genetic fallacy. How one comes to believe in something is immaterial to the veracity of the claim. A truth claim is evaluated by its own merits, independent of how, where, why or when one accepts it. Sceptics know this too. Yet fallacies are still used as a rhetorical and emotional “flaming dart.”
I am of the persuasion that genuine believers indwelt by Christ will not fall away in unbelief. Jesus said, “I know them, and they follow me ... and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand” (John 10:28). In Christ, doubts shouldn’t be deemed as unbelief but as part of a maturing process.
2. Knowing that Jesus is really precious to us but not to skeptics
When the grace of God regenerates believers, Jesus becomes personally precious beyond anything previously known. The initial opening of “their eyes,” and a personal experience of the unmistakable shift “from darkness to light” (Acts 26:18), cause an indelible impression that a skeptic could never understand. Even our good family members, polite friends and neighbors, do not appreciate Jesus as does a “born-again” believer. “The natural person,” wrote Paul, “does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them” (1 Cor. 2:14).
It's a huge mistake to think that what is so clear and wonderful to us about the Lord Jesus should also be to everyone else.
We have experienced how the Lord has given us something special that is opposed by the world. As Jesus prayed, “I have given them your word, and the world has hated them ... I do not ask that you take them out of the world, but that you keep them from the evil one” (John 17:14-15). In Western culture, aspersions to our Christian faith are rampant and we will routinely experience cynicism towards our scriptural beliefs.
We should live in the realization that Christ is special to us and persevere with it daily.
3. Knowing that perseverance is vital
The hallmark of faith is Hebrews 11. It should be studied carefully. It’s a wonderful chapter that exemplifies how generations of believers overcame by persevering in the promises of God. The author inspired us by those stalwart examples and then he pivoted to encouraging us to also persevere: “Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also ... run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith” (Heb. 12:1-2).
When the Lord Jesus seems distant, a believer should realize that it’s not Him who moved. Some personal reflection will reveal what is required to draw closer to Him. “Draw near to God,” encouraged James, “and He will draw near to you” (4:8). I have endeavored to persevere for decades with many trials and tribulations. I can honestly testify that by personal reflection and the Spirit’s guidance I have always received strength and wisdom to overcome. Multitudes could also testify along with me.
Altogether, flourishing Christian faith is essentially taking the time to learn about what the grace of God has truly accomplished for us and how nothing in this world can substitute it.
1. David A. Livermore, Chap Clark, ed. Cultural Intelligence: Improving Your CQ to Engage Our Multicultural World (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2009), 190.
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