So 5 posts on ‘doubt’?… Why not just one and move on? Doesn’t this simply open people up and make them more vulnerable?

Well I don’t think so. I wanted to expand the various ideas a bit and consider what shape doubt takes and how it affects us if we don’t confront it. I know many of us doubt in different ways and maybe we are even feel afraid of where it may lead – like pulling on a thread that may unravel and destroy everything…

Then again some have no space to doubt and this is sad – genuinely sad – the end will be outward conformity along with inward dissent. You can only live in that dissonance for so long before you blow a gasket. If you’re in a ‘no doubt permitted’ community then find one that allows for questions. You will either become a person who is ‘obnoxiously certain’ about everything (because you can’t question) or you will eventually lose heart.

Others will quit and walk away because they can’t ‘make the numbers add up’. An ‘imperfect’ Bible, a world where God doesn’t deliver on cue and a bad experience of other Christians is often enough to make people give it away. If it ‘doesn’t work’ as we once thought then clearly we got something wrong and should move on… Or maybe the stuff you believed was just folklore and superstition anyway?

And then some will wander into a form of spirituality +/- Jesus – a hazy, often nebulous belief in a higher power, but minus the centrality of Jesus and the conviction that goes with a more focused and specific form of faith. This is the flavour of most contemporary (non-Christian) spirituality and is probably one of our greatest challenges. At the end of the day while we may have doubts and questions, we cannot forgo central tenets just to make faith more palatable to this culture.

My sense is that those who navigate doubt well will find a way of coping with complexity, disappointment and mystery. This may require an unravelling of many old beliefs and superstitions to make room for genuine faith. These core convictions will be the anchor that holds when the rest doesn’t make sense.

We certainly aren’t the first to struggle with doubt.

I feel for Jesus’ disciple Thomas, who is pretty much known only for his ‘doubting’ when in truth it might be fairer to say he was ‘checking the evidence’. I’d be with Thomas. People don’t come back from the dead every day. You have to do your homework.

And then Jesus didn’t rebuke the Father who had the demonised son when he said ‘I believe, help my unbelief’. That was fine with him. Jesus recognises that a belief in the things we are about runs contrary to popular thinking.

But doubt is not the enemy. In fact when managed well it could be the first step to a richer knowledge and experience of God as we let go of simplistic understandings and explanations and accept that some stuff is just beyond us. That’s not a cop-out. Its a belief I hold – that some stuff I just won’t get, but if my core conviction is that God is good then I can ride thru that stuff.

I remember a long time ago I heard someone speak on doubt and their advice was to ‘doubt your doubts’ to not be so fast to dismiss mystery and challenge in the life of faith. How do you ‘doubt your doubts’? I suggest you raise your questions with a trusted friend who has a steady faith and ask for a conversation around what is bothering you. If you get listened to and taken seriously then chances are you will walk the path well. You will be able to talk through the issues that concern you and often the conversation itself lightens the load and another perspective helps you see things you didn’t see previously.

Doubt is not sin and the church’s job is not to erase all trace of doubt from your mind. It is to lead you towards Jesus and to let him speak into those questions and challenges. For some, that won’t be enough. That’s just a hard cold reality. Sometimes people doubt and never find their way back. But plenty feel shame at their doubt, feel alone in it and see their only option as to abandon ship altogether, when a bit of time with a wise friend might be all it takes to light a path into a richer future.