Monday, May 4, 2015
442 - When in Doubt ...
Spirituality Column #442
May 5, 2015
Current in Carmel-Westfield-Noblesville-Fishers-Zionsville
My purpose in getting up early Sunday mornings and attending church is to worship God and share in the fellowship of the Christian faith.
It’s not because I have religious doubts and need reassurance that Jesus is still Lord, God is still good, the Spirit still dwells among the faithful, the Bible is still true and the church is still there. All those doubts are long gone. What I have is truth.
So … I get up and go to church. I love church. I love Jesus more, but I love church and my fellow fallen Christians and all that it means to gather in faith and communion in the truth of creation, salvation, and the lordship of Jesus Christ.
But these days it seems something beyond impolite to assert truth – as in, the absence of doubt – in public. It’s arrogant. It’s unbecoming. It’s disrespectful.
“You must have doubts!?” “How can you be sure?” “That’s crazy!”
Well, in a fallen world where Satan busily works to replace the plain truth of God with the muddled veracity of human opinion, it’s easy to see the daily difficulties attendant to the witness of truth, especially when the apologetics of doubt are the intellectual coin of our modern world.
Is Christian truth really …
Arrogant? No, just the opposite. Christian truth is humble. The truth of the power of God is actually the humility of Jesus Christ. People who want power want to be God. Nobody really wants to be the saving, servant Christ on the Cross. Is faith the key to the eternal Kingdom of God? Yes, but does my possession of that faith, by God’s grace, make me less of a sinner? Not in this life it doesn’t. It just gives me a story I desperately want to tell.
Unbecoming? I’ve seen no greater beauty than the raw splendor of God’s creation, and believe there is no greater beauty than the image of God installed in our humanity which we see perfected in Jesus Christ. We work awfully hard to ugly-up that beauty with our worldly desires.
Disrespectful? The world insists we respect ungodly things; you know, “One man’s terrorist is just another man’s freedom fighter”? Right? Uh … no. When I respect God’s truth because God is truth, then I guess I’m disrespecting the world’s opinion. My aim is to respect God, which means respecting Jesus Christ, because I don’t see any better option for humanity – mine or anyone else’s.
Doubts? Long gone. Questions? Sure. I don’t understand everything so I pray, study, trust God’s Word, beg His wisdom and peace, and follow a simple rule:
When in doubt, tell the truth.
Walters (rlwcom@aol.com) sees the sinner in the mirror.
May 5, 2015
Current in Carmel-Westfield-Noblesville-Fishers-Zionsville
When in Doubt …
By Bob WaltersMy purpose in getting up early Sunday mornings and attending church is to worship God and share in the fellowship of the Christian faith.
It’s not because I have religious doubts and need reassurance that Jesus is still Lord, God is still good, the Spirit still dwells among the faithful, the Bible is still true and the church is still there. All those doubts are long gone. What I have is truth.
So … I get up and go to church. I love church. I love Jesus more, but I love church and my fellow fallen Christians and all that it means to gather in faith and communion in the truth of creation, salvation, and the lordship of Jesus Christ.
But these days it seems something beyond impolite to assert truth – as in, the absence of doubt – in public. It’s arrogant. It’s unbecoming. It’s disrespectful.
“You must have doubts!?” “How can you be sure?” “That’s crazy!”
Well, in a fallen world where Satan busily works to replace the plain truth of God with the muddled veracity of human opinion, it’s easy to see the daily difficulties attendant to the witness of truth, especially when the apologetics of doubt are the intellectual coin of our modern world.
Is Christian truth really …
Arrogant? No, just the opposite. Christian truth is humble. The truth of the power of God is actually the humility of Jesus Christ. People who want power want to be God. Nobody really wants to be the saving, servant Christ on the Cross. Is faith the key to the eternal Kingdom of God? Yes, but does my possession of that faith, by God’s grace, make me less of a sinner? Not in this life it doesn’t. It just gives me a story I desperately want to tell.
Unbecoming? I’ve seen no greater beauty than the raw splendor of God’s creation, and believe there is no greater beauty than the image of God installed in our humanity which we see perfected in Jesus Christ. We work awfully hard to ugly-up that beauty with our worldly desires.
Disrespectful? The world insists we respect ungodly things; you know, “One man’s terrorist is just another man’s freedom fighter”? Right? Uh … no. When I respect God’s truth because God is truth, then I guess I’m disrespecting the world’s opinion. My aim is to respect God, which means respecting Jesus Christ, because I don’t see any better option for humanity – mine or anyone else’s.
Doubts? Long gone. Questions? Sure. I don’t understand everything so I pray, study, trust God’s Word, beg His wisdom and peace, and follow a simple rule:
When in doubt, tell the truth.
Walters (rlwcom@aol.com) sees the sinner in the mirror.
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