Dealing with doubt

The bus itself is nearing 30 years old, and for it’s age, it’s doing really well for itself - hardly causing any significant problems. Although, as you might expect, when a vehicle gets that old, there are always some problems.

Well, until this most recent Thursday, there has been one little problem that we’ve had for at least two years, possibly longer. The boot has been locked shut with the key not working.

Now you might think, well that shouldn’t be too hard - but we have had many people trying to fix it. We’ve even had a lock smith have a look, and he couldn’t even get it to budge.

Well, after many attempts, I had reached my conclusion. The only way that we’re getting in, is by destroying the lock. Something in the locking mechanism has moved, and no amount of twisting or prodding is going to make any difference, we’re only getting in by making some damage.

Well, on Thursday, Ron and James had the bus out dealing with some of the rust, and James thought he might make another attempt at getting it open.

He thought it couldn’t be too hard - but ah… I’ve heard that before. Plenty of people have sounded confident before - and they’ve all finished the same way… defeated!

Anyway, I was working on other things at the time so I left them to it for a while - and to my astonishment, when I came back, I couldn’t believe it. The boot was open!

In my astonishment, I asked how it was done. I was told James climbed into the boot and fixed the problem from the inside. Oh… you mean he got his arm down there? … No, he climbed in there. He got his whole body inside the boot and fixed it from the inside.

You know, sometimes when some things don’t sound plausible, we have a hard time believing it. In the end, I believed the story but it took a bit of convincing that it was true.

Throughout the whole process I had doubts. First, doubt that it could ever be fixed. And then doubt in the story of how it eventually got fixed.

Nature of doubt

Now doubt is natural. It occurs whenever there is a more plausible alternative.

When someone tells you a story that doesn’t quite seem plausible, there is going to be some level of doubt.

Sometimes someone will tell you they will do something. If you deem that there is a reasonable likelihood that they won’t do it, doubt will occur.

Doubt is not always bad. In fact, I’d suggest that it is part of the process of discerning things well.

It’s certainly a useful thing in an age of fake news, when we have to sift through what is real and what is not.

When doubt is bad

But while doubt can be useful, it can also be harmful.

When there is reason to think a given proposition is true, then doubt can be harmful.

Take for example,

For example a doctor tells you to take a certain medication. You trust the doctor because he had a medical degree and many years of experience. Doubting that advice is bad.

Or take a healthy marriage where both husband and wife have remained faithful for many years. When doubt creeps in that your spouse is being unfaithful, particularly when there is no good evidence, then this will be very harmful for your marriage.

Link with Abram

This morning we are continuing the series on Abraham (or Abram as he is known at this point in the story). He is our great example of faith, and yet, as I’ll explore this morning, we’ll see when doubts come into play.

I want you to pay attention to a few things in this. First, how God interacts with his doubts. But second, the damage that can be caused when the doubts move beyond what is reasonable.

When the promise doesn’t come

Well let’s first recap what’s happened.

I introduced you to Abram a few weeks back. Actually, on his name - it is will be next week when we see his name change from Abram to Abraham, so I’ll explain the significance of that then.

But we’ve seen how Abram heard God speak, and in faith he stepped from the land of his people and into a land that God promised to him and his descendants.

Now there were a few elements to the promise that God made to Abram that we’ve looked at over the last few weeks. Significantly for today, he was promised that he will become a great nation that will inherit the land God shows him.

To become the father of a great nation, there is of course something which is kind of essential - that is, offspring.

Now that seems a bit of a problem right from the start when we learn that Abram is 75 years old, and that his wife, who is ten years younger happens to be unable to conceive.

I mentioned before about what doubt is. When you are told something that doesn’t quite seem to add up, you will naturally have some doubt. That’s not necessarily bad, as long as it helps us to be discerning.

So certainly, when you’re told that you will be the father of a great nation, and you’re 75 without kids, it is natural that you would start doubting.

But he was 75 when God first gave him that promise. By the time we get to chapters 15 and 16, it becomes apparent that over a decade has passed. In fact, we’re told at the end of chapter 16 that Abram is in fact now 86 years old.

With each year, surely that level of plausibility is dropping.

Now here is where it becomes interesting. You see, while from a natural perspective everything is pointing to the fact that God’s promise is not going to work out, this last decade or so of Abram’s life have been a testament to God’s faithfulness.

Two weeks ago, we saw when Abram was overcome by fear and made some bad choices, but God proved faithful in looking after Abram.

Last week we saw a very dramatic demonstration of God’s faithfulness, bringing about an against the odds victory, keeping the foreign influence at bay.

Abram’s doubt

As we move into the start of chapter 15, it’s almost as if God is reminding Abram of what just happened with this victory. He tells him that he, (God himself) will be his shield and reward.

But despite this great reassurance and recent memory, Abram can’t help but let that doubt take a hold. And I must admit, I can’t really blame him.

It’s not exactly that he doesn’t think God can deliver, but he’s certainly doubting the means by which he’s assumed it will happen.

And so his doubt leads him to do what we often do when things don’t add up - start to think outside the square.

The first place to start in his re-thinking is perhaps he misunderstood what he meant by descendants. After all, we know from last week that Abram has many servants.

Maybe this is what God meant.

In verses 2 and 3 you can see Abram’s line of thinking. The way he says it sounds like his not quite convinced this is the way it should be - but maybe?

You see, Abram has even figured out which one of his servants would take the inheritance.

This is what doubt can do. It leads us down different paths.

Sometimes that can be good - particularly if we’ve heard wrong in the first place.

Now you might notice that when God responds, he actually doesn’t respond with a rebuke, but rather with a correction.

God speaks with him clearly telling him that it not going to be a servant who will get the inheritance, but in fact someone from his own flesh and blood.

Belief amongst doubt

With this correction, we again see Abram’s belief, and in fact, verse 6 is a verse that often gets quoted in the New Testament.

You see, verse 6 says that Abram believed the Lord, and he credited it to him as righteousness.

This verse is important for us in this whole chapter. You see, I’m arguing that these two chapters that we have today are evidence of Abram’s doubts, and clearly there is doubt there, but in the centre of it all, Abram has a faith to drive him through it all - and I want to come back to this idea later.

But before I do that, you’ll see this tension between faith and doubt within Abram.

You see, while this underlining belief is there, it doesn’t stop Abram asking about how he will know that he shall truly gain possession of the land promised by God.

God’s covenant

Now, what happens next will sound really weird to our ears. Now, I’m going to try to explain it, but what is really important to see is how God is responding to Abram’s doubt.

There is no sharp rebuke, but rather a really significant moment of God confirming his promise to Abram in a really deep way.

He does that by providing what is known as a covenant. Essentially a special promise.

Covenants

Now it’s the means by which the covenant occurs that might seem odd to us.

But various scholars and historians have shown that what we’re about to see follows a familiar pattern for people in that day when they entered into an agreement with one another.

Today, we’d write up some sort of contract or something boring like that, and each party would sign the paper.

But back then, it was done quite differently.

An animal would be cut in half and placed either side of a path. The two parties making an agreement would then walk through these pieces, and it was all about the symbolism.

The symbolism was that any person who failed to live up to their part of the promise would be like that of the animal they walked through.

But there is something slightly different with what God does and what the normal custom of the day was.

You see, normally, both parties to a deal would walk through, but if you look at verse 17, we actually see a smoking brazier with a blazing torch moving between the pieces.

This brazier and torch represent God himself - but Abram himself doesn’t walk through.

In other words, this is a promise God is making and it is a one-way promise.

At other points throughout the Bible, we do see two-way covenants being made with God. That is, God promises to act in a certain way if his people act in a certain way - but that is not the case here.

While this practice might seem primitive to us, the reality is, this is a very significant thing that is happening.

God is essentially formalising what he has already promised.

As I move into chapter 16 in just a moment, we will see the destructive side of doubt, however, in this chapter, I want to highlight how when we doubt, God will respond by re-enforcing who he is.

In the midst of doubt, our job is to pay attention to how God is moving. Something that is not always easy, but so very important.

Destructive doubt

And so this brings us to chapter 16, and despite the formalisation of this covenant, the doubts remain.

At the start of chapter 15, Abram was wondering whether the promise might have been applied to his servant.

But now the doubt leads him down another path - this time being led by his wife who seems to be feeling quite a bit of guilt in the whole process.

Perhaps while the promise won’t be through a servant, it could still be Abrams flesh and blood if he father’s a child with one of the female servants.

And so

Now this is going to sound abhorrent to our ears, and it is important to note that God does not condone this behaviour, but that being said, this was not an unusual practice during this time and place.

Having a child through one of your slaves was considered an acceptable way to get an heir if you weren’t able to get one by other means.

And so, Hagar enters thee scene.

Now it’s worth making a general remark about the Old Testament here. You see, it is sometimes suggested by some that the Old Testament supports polygamy based on a number of prominent Old Testament characters taking multiple wives. But if you look closely, you’ll notice that while these examples exist, the bible never says it’s a good idea, in fact in (I think) every instance, the bible describes the mess that comes with having more then one wife.

And this is no exception.

Abram is able to conceive with Hagar, but rather than fixing a problem, it only causes problems.

It starts with intense jealousy from Sarai. It gets to the point that Hagar has no choice but to leave - and so she takes off.

God’s intevention

Now essentially what we are seeing is the result of doubt. Doubt took Abram down a path he should not have gone and we get a mess.

But thankfully, as I’ve maintained all along, God always remains faithful. And so we see God coming in to make something of the mess that is happening.

Interestingly, the one who God appears to is Hagar.

This is interesting because in this age, the slave woman would have had the least rights of all. But God doesn’t operate to the ways of this world. He loves everyone, and that includes the mistreated slave girl.

Now this is where it gets a little interesting. You see, it’ll become explicitly clear later that this baby that is to be born to Hagar is not the one of the promise, yet despite this, it is still a child of Abram and so it will be blessed as well.

In verse 10, the promise to have many descendants is also given to this woman and her child.

But then we get this little poetic bit in verse 11 and 12, and in hindsight with what we know of this childs descendants, it is very interesting.

You see, Hagar has a child called Ishmael. Ishmael does indeed become the father of nations - nations which we trace to the Arab regions. Of particular note is that the Muslims trace their lineage through Ismael.

That’s particularly interesting when you read in verse 12 that: “He will be a wild donkey of a man; his hand will be against everyone and everyone’s hand against him, and he will live in hostility towards all his brothers”.

Application

What this highlights is just how far things can go when we allow doubts to take our eyes off what we should be doing.

This is the big problem with doubts. Doubt take us away from clinging to the promise by faith. And when we stop clinging to the promise, we start clinging to whatever else we can find.

Churches going off track

Unfortunately, there are lot of examples of churches who have gone down a path that eventually lead to their demise. I’m not going to point out any names because it’s not my intention to shame anyone, but just to see what happens when doubt creeps in.

You see, in Australia, the number of people attending churches have dropped over the last few decades. A common reason given is that the church is just not relevant any more.

Now this of course sets off alarm bells. Some people have predicted that it won’t be long before the church in countries like Australia will be completely gone.

I strongly believe however that God will not let this happen.

Nevertheless, you can see how people will let doubt creep in.

As they do, they then need to cling to something else. That something else is whatever they think might be relevant to others. Maybe doctrines that are in line with what people want to hear.

But as they change, it quickly becomes evident that they are not clinging onto God’s promise but on their own efforts.

What becomes evident is that when churches do this, they start to lose what is distinctive about them. They become just another club. And like all clubs, they come and go with changing trends.

The clear message for us is to not allow our doubts to take us off course.

Individuals

As individuals, it’s the same thing.

We live in a world where there are so many options. We are always weighing up our options, and so it isn’t surprising that we constantly weigh up where we stand with God.

Spending time with God becomes just one thing among many other choices we can do.

We could spend time with God - or go shopping… or maybe a bit of exercise… or maybe even time with the family.

We might be able to see some benefit of spending time with God - but those other activities seem to become more urgent.

Now this is where doubt comes in. While on one level we can see the benefit of spending time with God, we can begin to doubt it’s effectiveness. Particularly if we’ve been praying for a particular issue for a while and nothing has happened.

Just like Abram, the longer we wait for something to happen, the more our doubts grow, and the more our doubts grow, the more we lose a grip of holding onto the promise.

We need to become aware of when our doubts are having this effect.

It’s not to say that we can never have doubts. After all, Abram, our hero of the faith, had doubts. But we can’t let them take us off track.

Conclusion

I believe what we need to do is focus on what God is doing for us.

As we focus on this we will see that God has not forgotten us but that he is always faithful. Sometimes his timing is just very different to ours.

And that is what we see with Abram.

The strange thing is that in this chapter, Abram has felt that he has been waiting a long time. The truth is, he hasn’t been waiting half the time he will eventually wait.

As we will see soon, it is not until he is 100 that he will finally have the promised offspring.

I started talking about my doubts over whether the bus would ever be fixed. Really, that sort of doubt doesn’t really matter, because at the end of the day, it was fairly inconsequential. But when we let our doubt grow over things that do matter, the results can be really noticeable.

Thankfully we’ve got a God that works through our doubts and showing us a better way.