Belief: Faith And Doubt Together

“I do believe; help me overcome my unbelief!”

Mark 9:24

All that Christ stood for boiled down to this one great theme: Believe. “‘Don’t be afraid; just believe’” (Mark 5:36). “‘Believe that you have received it, and it will be yours’” (Mark 11:24). “‘Just believe, and she will be healed’” (Luke 8:50).

All that Christ asks of you and me is simply, “Believe.” Over and over and over again, the Lord issues forth His one simple injunction: “Believe.” No matter where this bidding is heard, however, there is doubt. Everywhere He went they answered, “But who is this one? Could He be the Christ?”

Let’s be honest. It is a hard thing to believe. When you are waiting for the biopsy results, when the car breaks down the same week the refrigerator dies, when the boss hands you a pink slip, doubt is more natural than belief. In fact, if only one characteristic could be used to describe the average response to Jesus, even by those of us who know Him, it would not be belief, but doubt.

This should not strike us as unusual, for the closest associates of Christ struggled with the demon of doubt. They deserted Him in the garden. After the eleven disciples (now deserters) heard of His resurrection, they still doubted. So He came to them and “rebuked them for their lack of faith and their stubborn refusal to believe those who had seen him after he had risen” (Mark 16:14).

In the last scene of the gospels, the eleven disciples gathered at the mountain where Jesus had told them to go. In a few moments, He would charge them with the Great Commission, “‘Therefore go and make disciples of all nations’” (Matthew 28:19). They would witness his ascension. But even then, “When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted” (Matthew 28:17, emphasis added).

Jesus did not cast the eleven deserters out of the kingdom because they doubted; instead, He rebuked them. He knows our human frailty. He knows when we will doubt before we know it. He knit us together in our mother’s womb and has numbered each of our days. He does not reject us because we doubt. Rather, He exhorts us, “‘Don’t be afraid; just believe.’“

Perception Versus Reality

The difficulty of belief is the difference between the physical perception and the divine reality. The physical perception is always hopeless—the deformed child, the broken marriage, the money which is lost and gone. A snapshot of the situation is hopeless, but a snapshot is only one frame of a moving picture. A snapshot freezes time and is part of the reality but not all of it. Life is a moving picture. The snapshot is not reality and, taken alone, it is an inaccurate perception.

The divine reality is always hope. The hindrance to our hope is our doubt. Now, faith will not cure every problem that we want cured. But doubt will cure none of them. So it is better to believe and hope in God than to doubt and languish in despair.

The divine plan is concrete. When we believe, we release His power to help us in ways He wants, even longs, to help us. The divine plan is always for the good of those who love Him and are called according to His purpose. It is the ultimate reality.

Are you a doubter? Does your faith wither when the dry winds of fate blow harshly across the landscape of your life? Jesus says, “Don’t be afraid; just believe.”

Two Kinds of Belief

There are two kinds of belief. The first is belief to become a Christian, and the second is belief to live by. The great hurdle is the first one. Passing over the first hurdle lands you into an eternal kingdom. But then there are hundreds and thousands of daily living hurdles—marriage conflicts, health problems, career decisions.

The issue for the Christian is this: Did you believe the first time? If you did, then your job is not to make the believe-or-not-believe decision a thousand more times. Your task is to learn the right response based on the fact of your first belief. If you believed, then you became co-heir with Christ to the kingdom of God. Once you first believe, you are eternally connected to the goodness of God. He has plans for you, plans which go on for ever and ever.

But in the emulsion of daily life, globules of doubt are suspended all around our faith. Jesus said to the father of the demon possessed boy, “‘Everything is possible for him who believes’” (Mark 9:23). But the father lived in the emulsion of daily life; physical perceptions were suspended all around the divine reality. That is why the the father of the boy exclaimed, “‘I do believe; help me overcome my unbelief!’” (v. 24).

What son is it that you are desperate to have the Lord heal? What sorrow languishes in your soul? Can Jesus heal you? Jesus says, yes, “‘Everything is possible for him who believes.’”

I SURRENDER

Lord Jesus, I live in the emulsion of daily life, doubting Your power to heal my life. Sometimes I wonder if You are really there. I pray You will remove doubt from my life. Restore the solid belief in my life of the divine reality. Lord, I do believe; help me with my unbelief! Amen.