doubt

I wonder if Jesus wanted his disciples to have faith like a child's because children don't ask questions? Well, let me rephrase that, since anyone who's ever met a child knows they are full of questions. What's different about children is that almost any answer will do. Children are easily suckered; maybe that makes them the best religious prospects.

Or so a popular line of reasoning goes. Today, this line of reasoning is pressing on my mind, much as it has been for many days. I used to think that more conservative Christians were wrong to fear questions and to fear uncertainty; I thought that the more I sought after truth, the more I would find it. Today, I feel pressed to take back that claim. I think the search for truth is dangerous. I fear that searching after God is going to make me lose my faith.

I've lately experienced a trend where the further away from "godly" things I am, the more faith I have. Hoping this trend wasn't true, I went to Bible study tonight. It ended; now I am writing this blog. It didn't help that we are currently studying Ecclesiastes, but Ecclesiastes made an interesting claim: that being overwise is destructive (7:16). This rings true to me: the more I study my faith, the more doubts I have.

This might not be a law, indeed, being fairly postmodern, I don't generally belive in laws which can be applied to every context. In fact, I am sure this is not a law. What is it, though, is an unsettling trend I have noticed in my personal life. It strikes me as unfair or at the least a bad strategy on God's part. Doesn't God want to lead me closer to him/her/it?

Faith replies that I have no right to question God, and even if like Job I still choose to I should not expect an answer I can understand. Job didn't seem to get one. I have often consoled myself in these times of doubt that this is precisely the case: there is no intelligible answer, therefore I must trust the God revealed in the person of Jesus Christ and the love and hope he proclaimed in his death and resurrection. This is the core of my faith.

Right now, though, I don't know if I have any faith left. I should ask you to forgive my honesty, especially since I tend to understand doubt as contagious and corrosive and better left unsaid. The search for truth is dangerous; those in the pursuit should not speak about it, as it were. Still, in the spirit of blogging, let me continue. It occurs to me that I'm not sure what doubt is. Though I know I am dragging on in words, I'd like to think about this for a while.

Doubt is not a positive statement. I've often heard it said that doubt is a choice, as in those who do not believe in God have chosen to believe that God does not exist, just as those who have faith have chosen to believe that God does exist. Thus, everyone has faith, might as well put it in God. Well, I think that depiction misses the point that doubting God is not the same as believing in God. Doubt is an unconscious choice to not affirm. Doubt is subjective; it's like a cloud that hangs over you, pointing out logical flaws in the arguments being presented to you. To go back to the beginning, I don't think anyone is born in doubt. People are born to discover the world, doubt seems an unnatural side-effect of the failure of this venture. And it seems safe to say that this venture always fails when left to its own devices.

I've often thought that this is where revelation comes in; on our own, we won't discover anything absolutely true so we need truth told to us from beyond. A beyond perspective, as it were. I still hold this as being true. I'm increasingly finding that the more I think about my life and faith, the further away from believing anything I get. This seems futile, a chasing after the wind. Problem is, I don't know of any revelation I can trust.

It would be nice if Scripture were perfect and free of human imperfections, but its not. Because of that, I don't know what to do. I don't seem to trust anything these days besides my own understanding. It thus is entirely plausible why I'm in this trap I'm in, but I don't know how to get out. Maybe I need a childlike faith, but I haven't valued being childlike in a long time. Maybe, however, none of us really outgrow our childhood. We just keep realizing more and more how very childlike we really are.