Understanding Doubt
Written by Ed Allen
Saturday, 29 July 2000 19:00
Jeremiah 20:7-18
The Bible never instructs us to doubt. It doesn't have to. Doubt comes very naturally to us. I like what Henry Drummond said, "We are born questioners. Look at the wonderment of a little child in its eyes before it can speak. The child's great word when it begins to speak is "why." Every child is full of every kind of question, about every kind of thing that moves, and shines, and changes, in the little world in which it lives. That is the incipient doubt in the nature of man. Respect doubt for its origin. It is an inevitable thing. It is not a thing to be crushed. It is a part of man as God made him. ... Doubt is the prelude of knowledge."
The point is not that doubt is a good thing ? only that it is inevitable. We are certainly able to rid ourselves of doubt ? by committing intellectual suicide. If we lock away all sense of reason, and our longing for justice, if we look at the world in a kind of stupefying denial, then maybe we can be done with doubt. But this kind of blind-faith is not what the Bible calls for. The Bible calls for a vital, robust, honest faith that conquers doubt, not by disavowing it and holding it at arm's length through determined self-delusion. The Bible calls for honest faith that conquers doubt by walking through it without succumbing to it.
As I said, the Bible never instructs us to doubt, but it is full of doubters. That's right. The Bible is full of the testimonies of men and women who lived by faith in the midst of doubt ? men and women who faced down their doubts and their fears and their mind-numbing despair with honesty and continued to live by faith. People like King David and Moses and Peter and Gideon and Elijah and the prophet Jeremiah. Their doubts are frightening. "How long, O Lord, will you delay?" they cry. "I can't do it anymore, God," they confess. These confessions are frightening because they are so real and because they remind us so much of our own internal struggles. We don't want to hear our darkest sentiments pronounced out loud.
But this morning let's bring them into the light. After all, God works in the light, and there's no point in trying to hide from Him. We cannot. Besides, we cannot be honest with ourselves and with others until we are honest with God. So let's get honest with God. I believe we will find that He can handle it. And once we have brought our doubt to the surface and faced it, we can grab on the electrifying truth that God's great work in us is much bigger even than our doubts.
You must prepare yourself this morning. The writing of the Bible covers every emotional hue and this morning's passage is black. Let's listen in as the prophet Jeremiah drags up the dreary doubt from the dregs of his forlorn spirit. His is a frightening and desperate cry. But it is also an honest cry ? a cry of faith commingled with doubt. This is powerfully comforting. This is exactly where most of us live. Some of us have been fooled into believing that the life of following Jesus would be a great triumphal march of victory after victory. We would, we believed, overcome our weaknesses and burn down our temptations like Sherman burned down the south. And we would be blessed by God all the while. Certainly, we reasoned, good things should happen to us if we try to be good.
But somewhere along the way something went wrong. At least for Jeremiah it did. He did what he thought he was supposed to do, he did what God told him to do, but nobody else followed the script. His life went from okay, to really bad, to worse. So doubts began to plague him. Deep, dark, very real doubt. As we look at Jeremiah's testimony this morning, I hope you will find some consolation in his honesty with his own undeniable doubt. But I hope you will also feel deeply inspired by his unshakable faith.
Jeremiah 20:7-18
7 O LORD, you deceived me, and I was deceived; you overpowered me and prevailed. I am ridiculed all day long; everyone mocks me. 8 Whenever I speak, I cry out proclaiming violence and destruction. So the word of the LORD has brought me insult and reproach all day long. 9 But if I say, "I will not mention him or speak any more in his name," his word is in my heart like a fire, a fire shut up in my bones. I am weary of holding it in; indeed, I cannot. 10 I hear many whispering, "Terror on every side! Report him! Let's report him!" All my friends are waiting for me to slip, saying, "Perhaps he will be deceived; then we will prevail over him and take our revenge on him." 11 But the LORD is with me like a mighty warrior; so my persecutors will stumble and not prevail. They will fail and be thoroughly disgraced; their dishonor will never be forgotten. 12 O LORD Almighty, you who examine the righteous and probe the heart and mind, let me see your vengeance upon them, for to you I have committed my cause. 13 Sing to the LORD! Give praise to the LORD! He rescues the life of the needy from the hands of the wicked. 14 Cursed be the day I was born! May the day my mother bore me not be blessed! 15 Cursed be the man who brought my father the news, who made him very glad, saying, "A child is born to you--a son!" 16 May that man be like the towns the LORD overthrew without pity. May he hear wailing in the morning, a battle cry at noon. 17 For he did not kill me in the womb, with my mother as my grave, her womb enlarged forever. 18 Why did I ever come out of the womb to see trouble and sorrow and to end my days in shame?
There were a parade of preachers on the scene in the Jeremiah's Jerusalem, not to mention a host of advisers and counselors to the king's court, so Jeremiah was just one voice among many. And all of the other voices were pronouncing a bright and blessed future for the nation of Israel and its capital city. Jeremiah alone was sounding a grave warning. The heart of Jeremiah's early sermons is found in 19:10 "This is what the Lord Almighty says: 'I will smash this nation and this city.'"
Not exactly the kind of stuff designed to win friends. Little wonder that the sunny, optimistic reports of the other prophets and preachers were greatly preferred. But Jeremiah did stir up the crowd enough to draw the attention of the temple officials, including Pashur the temple security officer. Considering some of Jeremiah's criticisms, I suppose Pashur could have had him killed for treason against the king. But he did not want to make a martyr out of him. Instead Pashur had Jeremiah beaten to disgrace him and then he had him put in the stocks in a very public place so that passersby could throw their derision at him. Imagine young children throwing tomatoes and heads of lettuce. "What was it the Lord Almighty said, Jeremiah?" Jewish merchants who depended on Jerusalem to ply their trade would have been greatly comforted to see the prophet of doom so completely disgraced. They would have been happy to add their insult to his injury as they passed by on their way out of town.
"O Lord, you lied to me, and I was naturally completely deceived. I thought you were believable. I thought, certainly you would tell the truth." This word 'deceived' is sometimes used in contexts where young people are led astray especially into sexual sin. It would not be inappropriate for us to read this as, "God, you seduced me and I fell for it."
"You overpowered me, God, and certainly prevailed." Isn't this what God is supposed to do to the bad guys? You see the nation of Israel during Jeremiah's day had become a haven of bad guys - a melting pot of religious and moral expression that very much mirrored the other nations around them. God had told them to be different. God had told them to handle the poor with justice; to deal with one another fairly and in love; to show mercy and kindness; to trust in Him and not in the Gods of their neighbors. But Jeremiah's countrymen had violated God's desires on every count.
So Jeremiah proclaimed God's message. "'Return to me faithless Israel, I will frown on you no longer, for I am merciful,' declares the Lord. 'I will not be angry forever. Only acknowledge your guilt ? you have rebelled against the Lord your God, you have scattered your favors to foreign gods under every spreading tree, and have not obeyed me,' declares the Lord." But the people did not return. Jeremiah was ignored. There was no spiritual revival in the land. So Jeremiah's pronouncements intensified. And neglect turned into annoyance and then public anger. Finally, Jeremiah was beaten and made a laughingstock in an attempt to silence him.
"Don't be ridiculous Jeremiah. Are you the only one hearing from God? All of the other preachers and advisors say that things are good and getting better. Are you so special that you alone have a pipeline to God?"
And what is the response of the great prophet. "God, I am ridiculed all day long; everyone mocks me. Whenever I speak I cry out violence and destruction. So the word of the Lord has brought me insult and reproach all day long." (v. 7,8)
Did you notice that Jeremiah twice repeats the phrase "all day long" in this short section of his complaint? In his mind there is simply no reprieve from his rejection. I heard one commentator suggest that Jeremiah had picked up a nickname during this period. The public may have taken to calling him "The Universal terror!"
"I hear many whispering, 'Terror on every side! Report him! Let's report him! All my friends are waiting for me to slip saying, 'Perhaps he will be deceived; then we will prevail over him and take our revenge on him." The phrase "terror on every side" rolls off the tongue in Hebrew. It is Magor-Missabib. This is the name that Jeremiah had given the temple officer Pashur. "When Pashur released him from the stocks, Jeremiah said to him, 'the Lord's name for you is not Pashur, but Magor-Missabib.'" But perhaps the name had returned back onto Jeremiah himself in an ironic turnabout of ultimate mockery.
"Listen God. Whenever I speak I proclaim the coming violence and destruction which you have promised is the penalty for our current behavior. And what has my integrity brought me? The crowds call me 'the universal terror.' Oh there goes old magor-missabib again. Got anything encouraging for us today, magor-missabib?"
The ridicule is almost unbearable for Jeremiah. And who can blame him? But I don't believe Jeremiah is suffering simply from a case of hurt feelings. Certainly his pride was hurt by the scorn. Who wouldn't be hurt? But Jeremiah is facing a far more ominous enemy than his own hurt feelings. Jeremiah had had an encounter with Yahweh, the God of his forefathers, the God of the Torah. In this encounter he had felt called to be a prophet. He writes beautifully of this life-altering experience with God in the opening chapter of his prophecies. His whole life, everything he did and said, grew out of this encounter. It had literally changed his life. Jeremiah had to face the question: "Is my life based on a lie?" He does not ever doubt that God exists, but he doubts his goodness and his truthfulness. He must be wondering if everything he has ever thought and believed is groundless, based on self-delusion or worse divine delusion.
The emotional and spiritual rug has been pulled out from underneath Jeremiah. "Cursed be the day I was born! May the day my mother bore me not be blessed! Cursed be the man who brought my father the news, who made him very glad saying, 'A child is born to you ? a son!' May that man be like the towns the Lord overthrew without pity. May he hear wailing in the morning, a battle cry at noon. For he did not kill me in the womb, with my mother as my grave, her womb enlarged forever."
"This life is not worth living God. I wish I had been aborted rather than have you deceive me. What a silly man my father was to think that my birth was good news. My life is so very worthless, my birthday is a day of gloom rather than rejoicing."
If we were therapists listening to Jeremiah, we might be tempted to hospitalize him. Has he threatened suicide here? Probably not, but he has come very close.
Surely this is not the voice of faith. Aren't we supposed to rejoice in our trials? Doesn't Jeremiah know that all things work for the good for those who love God?
In fact Jeremiah does rejoice in his trials. He does feel the swell of faith even in the midst of doubt. But he does not deny that he is in the midst of doubt. He is honest with God. He does not avoid his own questions. He asks them plainly. God, after all, knows his heart.
You see, doubt is not the opposite of faith. In fact, in a sense doubt confirms our faith, because we can only doubt what we actually believe. If we have not invested in a thing, we won't doubt it; we will simply discard it. In some situations absolute despair is the opposite of faith. In some situations self-reliance is the opposite of faith. In some situations paralysis is the opposite of faith. But doubt is not the opposite of faith. Doubt is the inevitable consequence of living in a world from which the fullness of God's presence has been withdrawn. One day, our faith will become sight. We will know as we are now known. And then all doubt will be swallowed up in knowledge. But until then we hold onto our relationship with God and we live obedient lives by faith.
Now somebody here is thinking I might be wrong about this whole business. You remember reading somewhere in the Bible that when we pray we must not doubt. And that's exactly what James says. "But when you ask, you must believe and not doubt, because the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea blown and tossed by the wind." But James is not encouraging us to be dishonest. He is not advocating that we deny our own inevitable questions. James is warning us against embracing our questions. He is warning us against giving up the fight. He is warning us against switching sides, so to speak. I know what this is like. In my early 20's I tried not to believe in God. I became convinced that you could not really know one way or the other whether or not there really was a God. I came to feel that it was intellectually sheek to live in doubt. So I decided I would live based on that uncertainty. "Such a one should not think they will receive anything from the Lord; that one is a double-minded person, unstable in all he does."
Jeremiah does not make that decision. His faith is not so easily extinguished. Even in the midst of inner turmoil, Jeremiah fights the fight of faith. In fact, it is Jeremiah's faith that causes the turmoil. If his faith were not a reality, he would have simply given up. He would have quit. "Oh well. Enough of that. I'm going back to the farm." Maybe someone here today has done just that. Maybe you have given up. The kind of faith you were investing in was not the kind that could weather the questions and difficulties of life. Maybe today, you are looking for the genuine article. God is here to show you that.
Because genuine faith in God is born within us based on the very real work of a very real God. We see clearly what was before unnoticed. We feel a new pulse. We are driven by a new operating system. And that system will not crash. It will not fail because it is based on God's unchanging love. No wonder the reformers called God's grace irresistible.
"But if I say, 'I will not mention him or speak any more in his name,' his word is in my heart like a fire, a fire shut up in my bones. I am weary of holding it in; indeed, I cannot." Jeremiah would give up his message. He would give up his faith. His doubts had risen to such a level that he had had all he could take. But he simply cannot. God's word is within him like a lidded pot of boiling water. The fire of God's spirit wells up within him and will not be contained.
And some of you have had exactly that experience. If we were to ask you how you were doing spiritually, you might say, "rotten. I'm terrorized by self-doubt and I wonder if God is doing anything at all in my life." And in just that set of circumstances you find yourself serving out of the deepest part of your life; or you find yourself giving comfort or counsel or offering a testimony about what God has done in your life. You have been surprised and encouraged at how powerfully He used you. And you have experienced exactly what Jeremiah is identifying. The very real God cannot be contained. Even our gravest doubts cannot keep Him in.
So in the middle of this inner turmoil, Jeremiah rises up in faith to the pinnacle of praise. "But the Lord is with me like a mighty warrior; so my persecutors will stumble and not prevail. They will fail and be thoroughly disgraced; their dishonor will never be forgotten. O Lord Almighty, you who examine the righteous and probe the heart and mind, let me see your vengeance upon them, for to you I have committed my cause. Sing to the Lord! Give praise to the Lord! He rescues the life of the needy from the hands of the wicked."
If you are looking in your Bible at the text, you have probably noticed that this pronouncement of faith comes not at the end of the passage, but in the middle. Some commentators have been bothered by this arrangement. Some have suggested that we have the wrong order for this passage. But there is no textual evidence for a different order, nor do we need any. Jeremiah is not bothered by the order. God does not seem to be bothered by the order. So we should not be.
We are tempted to tidy up Jeremiah's doubt. We want it to have a happy ending. We don't want the passage to end with "Why did I ever come out of the womb to see trouble and sorrow and to end my days in shame?" But it does end that way! It ends with Jeremiah's haunting question ringing in our ears ? But not really.
You see, Jeremiah continues to preach. He continues to deliver the message that God has given him. And in the end, all of the other preachers and advisors and counselors were wrong. In the end, God did what he said he would do. In the end Jeremiah was right.
And almost half of Jeremiah's prophetic ministry was given over to some of the greatest words of comfort and hope ever delivered. God devastated Jerusalem and Jeremiah is given the privilege of assuring the people that God would restore it. You see, Jeremiah's life proves to be an arrow moving in a single direction. He is not moved left or right by his difficulties. He does not turn back on himself and change directions because of his doubt. Neither does he feel the need to run from his questions or to deny his doubts, even those of the most gravely serious nature.
"God are you good?" "God are you real?" "God do you care about me?" "God are you operating in my life?" "God is there any purpose to what I am doing?"
Jeremiah's testimony assures us that we should not run from these questions. We should face them honestly. Be honest with God. Authentic Christianity is not about giving up our search. It is about intensifying our search. "Seek and you will find," Jesus said. We do not have to let go of the truth and cling to myths in order to be a Christian. Jesus is the truth and we come to him by coming to the truth.
Whether your questions come from intellectual confusion, or from overwhelming trial take them to God. This will not diminish your faith. In the end, it will confirm the supernatural character of your faith. Take your internal struggle to God. Have it out with Him. In those instances when you need comfort, He will give it. In those instances where you need direction, you will find it. In those instances where you need to be rebuked, to be shown your real place in the scheme of things, He will show you that. And in all instances you will feel that internal pulse quicken in His presence. You will sense the clouds pealing back if only for a moment. You will find yourself longing for the day when faith will give way to sight.
But, be assured, these times of clarity will not last. So in between the times of clarity how should we live? We should seek, ask, and knock. We should be honest with God. It may be a struggle. You may have to cry out like Jeremiah did. Your doubts will be reoccurring, they are undeniable. But if your faith is in God, it is unshakable. So don't be afraid of your questions and let your life be like an arrow, moving out in the same direction.