Let's Parent on Purpose: Christian Marriage, Parenting, and Discipleship 146 Dealing with Doubt
Do you ever have doubts about your faith? Do your children? Whether it’s doubting the existence of God altogether or doubting whether you have everything particularly right in Scripture, we all go through times of doubt. Today I want to share some insights on how you can walk forward as you’re dealing with doubt.
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Show Highlights
Recently I put out in our youth group an “Ask Anything” box. In doing so, I got a number of questions and several of them seemed to deal with “How can I know there is a God?” or “How can I know that I’m a Christian?” or “Why did God do this or that?” So, I started a series called Dealing with Doubt and I want to share some of those principles because all of us deal with doubt and we don’t always understand everything in Scripture. As a parent, we want to model devotion to Jesus and that God can be trusted, yet there are times when we, as adults, struggle with our own doubts. So I would like to give you a couple of bullet-point ideas for understanding doubt and then go a little deeper into the question of “How do I know that God exists?”
Three things to remember when thinking about and dealing with doubt:
- It’s normal to have doubts about God.
If you have your brain engaged, you need to realize that if you don’t go through some kind of wrestling over the validity of these decisions, then you’re not really owning your faith. You have someone else’s faith that you’re just taking at face value, but you need your own faith because you’re going to have to rest in that faith. Again, it’s normal to have doubts about God.
- It’s biblical to be honest about your doubts.
This is such an important concept to understand, live, and model for our kids. Not that we should go to our kids with every doubt we have, but we should be honest at times and say: “I don’t know the answer to that yet.” It’s biblical to be honest with your doubts. David was honest, the prophets were honest, even the disciples doubted – especially Doubting Thomas. We’ve never seen Jesus, yet we believe. Sometimes our belief is strong and sometimes our belief is shaken and it’s biblical to be honest. I think the worst thing is to pretend like you have it all together, pretend like you have all the answers, and to lie because you feel and believe that you are alone in your doubts.
- It’s foolish to walk away when you don’t understand everything.
We have this dichotomy that we only have two possible solutions:
- I either fully understand it, so I am fully engaged. Or, I don’t, so I walk away.
- I don’t understand. I do have doubts, but I am going to fake it.
You’re surrounded everyday by things that you don’t understand, that you still use, you still trust, you still walk in. It’s foolish to walk away when you don’t understand everything. So, what do you do? You learn to hold on to what you do know to help walk you through the times when you don’t.
Let me give you one line of reasoning for why I believe God must be real:
You are a masterpiece of very particular design. It’s not just that you are brilliantly designed; it’s that your every cell is brilliantly designed for a specific purpose in a miraculous way. You tell me how that could possibly happen without a God? Tell me how that could happen by chance? For me, that takes far more faith to believe than the existence of God.
You will go through many seasons of doubting God in your life. Remember:
- Don’t chastise yourself for your doubt. Don’t run away from it. Don’t live in denial of it.
- God is not afraid of your doubts.
- When you don’t know something, hold on to what you do know and be patient.
I hope these words of encouragement help you as you walk through whatever season of doubt you or your kids are in right now. Don’t be afraid of questions. God is bigger than your questions and your doubt, and He will be here on the other side of it. Don’t give up hope. Don’t doubt in the darkness what God has shown you in the light.
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If you have your brain engaged, you need to realize that if you don’t go through some kind of wrestling over the validity of these decisions, then you’re not really owning your faith.
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It’s foolish to walk away when you don’t understand everything. So, what do you do? You learn to hold on to what you do know to help walk you through the times when you don’t.
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Don’t doubt in the darkness what God has shown you in the light.
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Resources Mentioned
There’s Only One by Caedmon’s Call
A Brief History of Time by Stephen Hawking
An Elegant Universe by Brian Greene