Help My Unbelief

Week 3 Session 3

Week 1 and 2 Recap

Evidence isn’t enough to convince someone about truth. There has to be faith.

The basis for doubt is running out of understanding and getting to the point of “I don’t know.” This is the foundation of doubt. This foundation will either lead us to faith or lead us to unbelief.

Here are a few implications:

We are all doubters because we are all limited.

The world is broken and that creates a context where questions will rise because things are not the way they are supposed to be.

While we live in the period from Eden to New Creation we will run into suffering, ailments, death, loss and pain, broken relationships and depression etc.

Only in the fire, can we determined if our faith is real.

Faith leads to understanding, not understanding leads to faith.

To doubt is human. It's how we respond when we doubt that determines whether or not it's a sin. You can doubt in a way that draws you closer to faith in God, or you can doubt in a way that undermines and dissolves your faith.

There can be no faith without doubt. But there can be doubt without faith. This is the doubt that destroys faith and is what I call "unbelieving doubt."

When unbelieving doubt poses a question, it's not interested in the answer for any reason other than to disprove it. If you're experiencing this kind of doubt, you're not asking questions to learn; you're asking in order to undermine and don't want to progress to an answer.

Unbelieving doubt isn't working toward anything true but merely against belief. These doubts are the wild monsters that wreck faith.

Ultimately the answer is this: unbelieving doubt is placing your faith in the wrong thing. That's right; unbelieving doubt is based on faith. It may refuse to have faith in God or His Word, but it absolutely functions on faith-faith in self. Doubt that destroys our faith in Jesus is actually faith in ourselves.

It takes faith to doubt God just as much as it does to believe in God. Except that this faith is based on a finite, sinful person who will inevitably follow in the footsteps of Adam and Eve.

Unbelieving doubt is foolish rebellion against the living God. It's not a mere exploration of ideas but rather a rejection of the truth that gives life.

Believing in God is hard. Believing in God can be confusing. Sometimes it's scary-so is fearing the Lord. The difference is that the fear of the Lord brings into account the love of the Lord, which drives out other fears and is the way of wisdom, life, and hope.

When we struggle to find hope in God, we are like the fool who says in his heart, "there is no God" because a God we don't trust might as well not even exist. This is unbelieving doubt.

We must learn to bring our doubt to Jesus…

Week 3 Introduction Bring your Doubts to Jesus

We are going to begin tonight by looking at the story of a doubting man from Mark 9. We will begin to see how his response to debt led him to help, hope and faith in Jesus.

Doubts thrive when we keep them to ourselves instead of taking them to Christ.

What it makes abundantly clear is that the man faced an overwhelming problem, struggled with doubts, and brought them to the feet of Jesus.

The father approached Jesus unabashedly. Not tentatively or privately. Not leaving his son behind lest he cause a scene. Not in secret and embarrassment like the religious leader, Nicodemus (John 3).

The father was a model of obedience and faith. He modeled the kind of faith Hebrews 11:1 describes, "the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen."

He approached Jesus with boldness (assurance) and asked for help with clarity (conviction) in spite of the doubts he carried. He embodied faith. This story depicts how we should respond to doubt and the actions we should take.

Doing the hard, faithful thing is right, even when it's scary or exhausting.

Any solution to a struggle that does not depend on God is dependence on self.

Humility isn't hesitance; it's an attitude of belief that acknowledges His greatness, our need, His perfection, and our sinfulness.

Faith isn't the absence of doubt but the right response to it. This prayer models that by first confessing belief in Jesus and second confessing doubt, struggle, and need. "I believe; help my unbelief" is a prayer of faith, for and from faith. It's a prayer for those mired in doubt and for those in a place of peace. It's a prayer for you.