Clergy/Leaders’ Mail-list No. 1-078

THE ORIGINS OF DOUBT (1)

From ‘Sunrise Sunset’ (HarperCollins/Harper San Francisco), Rowland Croucher’s book of daily meditations. Feel free to use or adapt it.

Truly I tell you, if you say to this mountain, ‘Be taken up and thrown into the sea,’ and if you do not doubt in your heart, but believe that what you say will come to pass, it will be done for you. Mark 11:23.

Doubt has three origins: insecurity, instability, or integrity.

# Insecurity: There are some people who are ‘temperamental doubters’. They are negative thinkers who always see the dark side of everything. They find it easier to doubt than believe, to be negative rather than positive, to be cynical rather than affirmative.

Some with an inferiority complex may try to parade their intelligence by questioning everything and believing nothing. Others seem to get a kick out of upsetting the simple faith of earnest believers. Some use doubt as a cover-up for their own guilt.

A professor said to Billy Graham, ‘I have long said that there were intellectual difficulties to my becoming a Christian. This isn’t true. The difficulties are moral. I’m not prepared to accept the moral demands of Christ.’ This kind of doubt is really dishonest – a failure to look hard at the evidence because the doubter doesn’t want to discover the truth. I have met many intellectuals who are very insecure – albeit clever – people, who use their doubts as a cover-up to opt out of the struggle for faith.

Lord God, if ever I am in bondage to self-doubt, and am fearful about knowing the truth which would set me free, please release me from this burden, so that I may be uncluttered in my search for your reality. Amen.

Shalom!

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