We run our website the way we wished the whole internet worked: we provide high quality original content with no ads. We are funded solely by your direct support. Please consider supporting this project.

Is There Room for Doubt in Faith?
Many Christians today assume that faith is the antithesis of doubt. In this view, a person’s faith is thought to be strong to the extent that they don’t question their beliefs or struggle with God in whom they believe. As widespread as this view is, I believe it is unbiblical and profoundly unhelpful.
My experience as a pastor and professor has taught me that when people assume faith and doubt are incompatible, they invariably try to avoid the latter. Indeed, when faith is equated with psychological certainty, the experience of cognitive dissonance—an experience that is the precondition for almost all learning—easily gets interpreted as something that is evil and therefore is to be avoided at all costs. For obvious reasons, those who are afflicted with this unfortunate model of faith understandably find it hard, if not impossible, to honestly acknowledge, let alone feel the full force of, the merits of perspectives that challenge their belief system. They rather quickly embrace whatever “solutions” that are available to them, not because these perspectives adequately address the challenges, but simply because they are then enabled to enjoy the certainty that their views are correct.
To challenge this tendency, consider the name God gave his covenant people, “Israel.” According to the Genesis narrative, this name goes back to a rather bizarre event that took place at a turning point in Jacob’s life. This forefather of the nation of Israel apparently found himself wrestling with the Lord, in the form of a man, for an entire night (Gen. 32: 24-32). Oddly enough, we are told that the Lord “could not overpower him” and that Jacob would not let the man go until he “blessed” him (v 25). It was because of this tenacity that the Lord renamed him “Israel” (Yisra’el), which, according to this narrative, signifies one who struggles with God (v. 28). It was for this reason that God’s people were called “Israelites”—people who tenaciously wrestle with God, just as their forefather had done.
The scriptures are filled with examples of Jacob-like wrestling matches with God. The biblical “lament” genre – including the “complaint against God” tradition – is found throughout the Old Testament. Many Psalms boldly raise questions, express doubts and even level accusations about God’s faithfulness while challenging the justice of his providential rule (e.g. Psa 89: 19-44). Similarly, as his pain and anger grew, Job did not stop short of accusing God of grossly mistreating him and others. Though God eventually chastised him for his theological misstatements (for which Job himself repented, see Job 42), God nevertheless commended the honesty and gutsiness of his talk. Unlike his pious-sounding “friends,” Job’s speech was honest and authentic (kûn, 42:7).[1] Yahweh clearly appreciates raw truth more than pious platitudes. Similarly, the prophet Habakkuk boldly charged God with treating the wicked better than the righteous (e.g. Hab. 1:3-4, 13), while Jeremiah had the audacity to accuse God of deceiving and torturing his own people (Lam.). Most importantly, Jesus himself endorses this tradition both in his teachings (e.g., Luke 11:5-9; 18:1-8) and by example (i.e., in his “cry of dereliction” on the cross).
While expressing doubts and challenging God may be antithetical to the modern, popular notion of faith, it is perfectly compatible with the biblical understanding. The essence of “faith” in the biblical tradition is not blind, unthinking submission or even an unwavering psychological certainty. Rather, faith is fundamentally a covenantal concept that expresses one’s willingness to trust another and to be trustworthy in relation to another.
—If you want to explore this topic more, check out Benefit of the Doubt.
Click here for a sermon series on this topic.
[1] The Hebrew word kûn has the connotation of being “straight.” See R. L Harris, G. L Archer and B. K. Waltke, Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament, 2 vols. (Chicago: Moody, 1980), I:433-34. For further discussion on the theology of Job and the role Job’s inaccurate depictions of God play, see G. A. Boyd, Satan and the Problem of Evil: Constructing a Trinitarian Warfare Theodicy (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 2001), 221-26, 403-06. On Job as an example of the OT complaint-against-God (or “faithful revolt”) tradition, see Kynes, “Trials of Job.”
Category: General
Tags: Benefit of the Doubt, Doubt, Faith, Jacob, Q&A, Wrestling with God
Topics: Faith & Doubt
Related Reading

Why Does God Need Prayer?
Greg Loves Questions. In his best selling book Letters from a Skeptic, he responds to questions from his father, who was then an atheist. Tomorrow Greg will be hosting a AMA (Ask Me Anything) on Reddit. We hope you can join us! Here is an adaptation of one of Greg’s responses to a question from…

Why Did Jesus Curse The Poor Fig Tree?
Why Did Jesus Curse The Fig Tree? One of the strangest episodes recorded in the Gospels is Jesus cursing a fig tree because he was hungry and it didn’t have any figs (Mk 11:12-14; Mt 21:18-19). It’s the only destructive miracle found in the New Testament. What’s particularly puzzling is that Mark tells us the…

Are Christians supposed to tithe?
Question: I and my husband have become increasingly uncomfortable with the many sermons on tithing we’ve been recently hearing at our church. Our pastor insists we tithe 10% to the church regardless of what else we give to other ministries. It seems like it has been reduced to a formula: Give ten percent and be…

The Good News That’s Really “Good”
Often we view our relationship with God in terms of a legal contract. For instance, people often ask questions about salvation in this way. They see God as the judge, we are defendants, and salvation is about staying out of prison. With this perspective, questions about salvation and the Gospel—which means “good news”—are about the…

The Suffering of God
NYC.andre via Compfight This seems like a good follow-up post from what Greg posted yesterday. Charisma posted this reflection on the problem of evil and the suffering of God. It’s a great summary of our thinking about what accounts for the kind of world we see where tragedies like Newtown occur. From the article: C.…

How do you respond to Jeremiah 29:10–11?
The Lord says to Israel, “Only when Babylon’s seventy years are completed will I visit you, and I will fulfill to you my promise and bring you back to this place [Jerusalem]. For surely I know the plans I have for you, says he Lord, plans for your welfare and not for harm, to give…