Doubting my Doubts
“Our doubts are traitors and make us lose the good we oft might win, by fearing to attempt.”
–William Shakespeare, Measure for Measure
“Why do you say, ‘If I can?’” Jesus asked pointedly, “Everything is possible if someone believes it is.”
The father exclaimed in desperation, “I do believe, but I need your help with my doubts!”
–From Mark 9:17-27
It’s been a long time since I doubted.
I do have doubts about all kinds of things, spiritual and non-spiritual, but it’s been a while since I doubted my beliefs in Jesus. I don’t doubt that God exists—that’s quite obvious. I don’t doubt that Jesus walked the earth, did great miracles and died at the hands of the Romans. It’s my simple beliefs that I’ve started to question: whether God really intervenes in our lives when we ask him to, if simple faith in evangelical conversion really decides eternity for individuals, or if God actually hears our prayers and talks back.
I have been so steadfast in my faith over the years that I have probably created a hostile environment towards doubters. I have encouraged doubt as one of the ingredients of true faith, but I’ve never felt like this before. I survived my mom’s cancer—resolute that everyone dies and however difficult, I must accept it. She made it through the nausea, hair loss and endless needles, with the dignity and grace that only someone of her character could.
I’ve survived many fallen heroes—people that had such influence on me that I would not be a believer without them. But a new round of fallen heroes brings a re-evaluation of everything I learned from my heroes. I’ve survived vicious attacks on my own character and ministry that every person in the ministry has. My faith in humanity has been decimated in times of confession by others where even the strongest and the best among us show incredible weakness and deep, dark personal lives.
My faith has withstood a lot of hits.
But the diagnosis of my son’s autism has wounded me so deeply that I’m no longer sure of anything.
For so long, I have shown some level of compassion for those who have struggled to keep the faith, but I have to admit that I have always seen it as a sign of weakness. The under-educated are easily swayed by attacks on the veracity of the Christian belief system, I’ve thought. The prisoners of their own emotions experience crisis of faith when the tough times come, I reasoned. Not me. I have been broken, betrayed, trampled on and more, and come out unscathed—or at least nearly unscathed.
But this time is different. The exoskeleton that has protected my convictions from all external attacks provides no defense from the internal onslaught of my own distrust. My son has an incurable condition and despite my prayer and fasting, the remedy won’t come. Maybe, just maybe, it’s because the concept of an interventionist God is merely a comforting creation of desperate people who need hope. My son’s need is my open wound that won’t heal. Perhaps, my faith is broken beyond repair.
As I write this chapter, I’m on a small twin prop plane over the Caribbean after a week of speaking to almost every student on the small Island of Exuma. The plane is a little scary—I’ve never been in one this small—but the view is the most unbelievable sight I have ever seen. I want to be an intellectual, but somehow, believing that this countless chain of islands 15,000 feet below my window, with the most amazing turquoise blue water the eye has ever beheld, came about without a designer, is a leap of faith I can’t make. It’s as if the sand below the shallow water is a white canvas that has been painted with watercolors. If it were a photo, I’d swear it was photoshopped. The idea that this art came about without an artist is unacceptable.
But my doubts persist. If I am God’s child—if the father/son equation is the same dynamic that I share with my son—then why wouldn’t he heal my boy? All things being equal, I’d step in front of a train if I thought it would better Declan’s chances at a normal life. So why? It’s the question I have never allowed myself to ask no matter how painful life has gotten. I am hurt and angry and I am racked with guilt for feeling hurt and angry . Most of all, I am numbed by ever-present throbbing of my doubt.
I am hardly unique among fathers. I have met many fathers who are facing far worse. I have even caught myself feeling better about my challenges when observing others. I have counseled fathers after the deaths of their sons, and never pretended to understand what they were going through. But the fact that others are going through what I’m experiencing, and unthinkably more, doesn’t keep me from asking where Jesus is in my time of need.
What would he say to me if he were walking the earth today? I wonder. But it’s not a rhetorical question. Some 1985 years ago (give or take a few years for errors in the Gregorian calendar), he had a chance to answer the tough questions.
A Tough Day for a Dad
A man came to Jesus and said, “Teacher, I brought my son to you so you could heal him. An evil spirit has complete control over him and it won’t even let him talk. When it takes over, it brutally throws him to the ground and he becomes completely stiff, foams at the mouth and locks his jaw. I asked your disciples to free him of the evil spirit’s control, but they couldn’t.”
Jesus was frustrated. “You all lack faith! I have had it with you! How much do you need to see to build your faith? Bring the boy to me.” When they brought the boy to Jesus, the spirit saw Jesus and caused a seizure and the boy fell on to ground, thrashing and frothing from his mouth.
“How long has he been like this?” Jesus asked the dad.
“Since he was little. The spirit that controls him even throws into fires to kill him or into water to drown him. If you can help us, please have compassion and do whatever you can.”
“Why do you say, ‘If I can?’” Jesus asked pointedly, “Everything is possible if someone believes it is.”
The father exclaimed in desperation, “I do believe, but I need your help with my doubts!”
Jesus noticed the growing crowd of spectators and spoke directly to the evil spirit, “I’m talking to you, the spirit that has made this boy deaf and mute. Leave his body and never come back.”
The spirit shrieked and the boy reacted violently as the evil spirit left him. The crowd thought he was dead but were astonished when Jesus took by the hand and he stood up.[1]
And as I read the story, it’s like I’m standing there watching people speak uncomfortably about my son. I wouldn’t blame them. I might do the same if I were them. Declan makes weird noises and does strange things. When people don’t know he has special needs and they get annoyed, irritated or upset by something he does, I’m not sure if I should explain that he’s autistic, knowing they will feel guilty, or keep it to myself, knowing they’ll continue to feel annoyed, irritated or upset.
The boy in story was, no doubt, infamous in his community. He was a source of fear, blame and derision. Having a demon-possessed boy in your neighborhood was scary. Having one in your family was not only scary, but it made you an outcast.
Depending on your faith tradition, you may see this young man in one of two ways. Either this boy is literally possessed by a demonic entity or the story is told from the perspective of the people of Jesus’ day. In the latter case, the author of this story is telling the story of a boy who has epilepsy and/or some other condition. The people of the 1st century have no context for mental illness, epilepsy, autism or any other such condition. In that context, the truth of the story is in how people see this boy. I choose to take the story at face value.
No matter how you read this story, the key figure of this story is not the demon-possessed boy. It’s the father.
The father once had dreams for his son, but from the time his son was just a little boy, he had a terrifying condition. The son was unable to speak and had terrible seizures. He had almost drowned when the demon had thrown him into the water and had been burned by being thrown into fires. He was probably covered with horrific scars. It is hard to imagine anything more terrifying. Add that the entire community probably had the same attitude as the villagers at the end of Frankenstein, and you begin to understand the father’s situation. His son was a real-life monster living among them. Believe me, parents of kids with special needs feel this all the time.
When you live with little hope, you learn to cope. Coping and hoping are not mutually exclusive, but the energy for one usually takes from the other.
This father had learned to cope, but when he heard Jesus was coming, he redirected some of his energy into hope. If you don’t have a child with special needs, it’s hard to understand what it can mean to take them out in public. In the case of this boy, the effort was probably monumental. The risk of what could happen was huge. I know. Making sure our son is safe is an unbelievable effort for my wife and me. 4 years of diarrhea, his complete lack of personal safety awareness, unwillingness to eat most things, combined with the willingness to eat dangerous things–all of this just gives a small picture of what it takes to go and do normal things. Unless you’ve been there, it’s hard to understand what an undertaking it was to brave the crowds to find Jesus.
This father decides to channel some of his coping energy into hoping that maybe, just maybe, Jesus could change the tragedy of his son into something resembling normalcy. But hope doesn’t eradicate doubt. When Jesus tells the father that believing is the key to change, he is speaking directly to the heart of doubters. He knows that the father may have brought his son to him hoping that something could happen, but that the father is far from an absolute belief that Jesus can help.
Overtaken by Doubt
In 2004, I read a story entitled Upon this Rock by John Sullivan, a young freelance writer for GQ Magazine. He had become a Christian in his teens, after what he described as the inevitable experience of anyone who becomes friends with a Christian – the invite to church. In his case, it was a youth oriented small group, and he was amazed at how cool and smart the pastor of the church was. The small group met in the pastor’s house and included apologetics and hanging out afterwards. The church became the intellectual and spiritual home he had been looking for, and he was being trained to become a leader.
But during his junior year, “unsanctioned” books and a few bad experiences caused him to fall away from his relatively new faith. The crass commercialism and inartful performance of a well-known Christian Rock band at concert where he volunteered because it was framed as a ministry opportunity was the final straw. After packing up the final gear from the show, he gathered his friends to announce he was no longer a Christian. “My doubts have overtaken me,” he explained to the others in the group.
However, for the GQ story, he found himself “embedded” in an RV with a group of young evangelicals from West Virginia, heading towards Pennsylvania where the largest Christian music festival in the US, Creation, takes place. Along the way, he remembered what it was like to be around these kinds of people. Devout but open, resolute but non-judgmental, believing but honest—these guys were just trying to get it right as flawed humans. And they loved each other and were brought together by their common beliefs. His condescension towards his former faith was slowly replaced with longing. His defensiveness gave way to brotherhood. He knew intellectually that he could no longer believe what they believed. He knew that time in his life had been a stage of adolescent spiritual confidence that had been useful. He also knew it was one to which he could no longer acquiesce.
Still, something was happening. Through these guys, he was experiencing Jesus again.
He felt betrayed by his own longing. Emotionally, he was still captivated by Jesus, but intellectually, he knew that he couldn’t go back. He didn’t believe in Christianity anymore. He knew that Jesus was just an extraordinary man. But the internal conflict of spiritual longing was profound. The explained in the article:
“Once you’ve known Him as God, it’s hard to find comfort in the man. The sheer sensation of life that comes with a total, all-pervading notion of being—the pulse of consequence one projects onto even the humblest things—the pull of that won’t slacken. And one has doubts about one’s doubts.”
Belief wrapped in Unbelief
Jesus said that faith and mustard resemble each other. It seems to me that if the end of faith is a 30-foot tall mustard bush, with a 20-foot wingspan, then the mustard seed stage might just be doubting one’s doubts. But here’s the thing: that mustard-seed, doubt-doubting faith is the kind of faith that Jesus said can relocate mountains.
Hebrews 11:1 says that faith is the reality of hope and the evidence of the unseen. It was inferred to me as a young man that this is the closest thing to a Webster’s dictionary definition of the word faith. But I have always thought that most concepts are best understood through narrative. And this story of the man with the belief-unbelief juxtaposition is the narrative that explains it to me. A father who seriously doubts that Jesus can help his son makes the effort anyway, because it just could be possible. He has serious doubts Jesus can help, but he doubts his doubts just enough to try. “I believe but help me overcome my unbelief” is the definition of faith that sticks in my brain like an itch that can’t be scratched. Whenever I’m not certain, it causes me to doubt my doubts.
Sullivan makes the statement about Christian indoctrination that “Belief and nonbelief are two giant planets, the orbits of which don’t touch.” He argues that if you look outside the belief system of Christian dogma, you will lose your faith. It’s one or the other. But most of us find that faith is found in the overlap of belief and unbelief. Faith isn’t necessary if you have unchallenged beliefs.
And you don’t need to go looking for challenges to your belief. Why would a loving God allow a beautiful little baby boy named Declan to have his brain wired wrong by a condition called autism that has an unknown cause, but a profound effect? It isn’t a demon that throws him into the fire, but it has caused him to endanger his own life so many times, that it might as well be a murderous evil spirit.
The painful irony is that I haven’t felt the presence of God in 4 years. I preach almost every week somewhere. I pray. I do what I know I need to do. Behaviorally and intellectually, I am a devout and thoroughly orthodox Christian. But, emotionally, I am an agnostic. Life itself has caused me to doubt absolutely everything, but still, I move towards Jesus. I doubt my doubts. And my doubts about my doubts are very formidable.
Epilogue
I wrote most of this section in 2009. My son had just been diagnosed with autism 4 years earlier. It’s uncomfortable for me to read 10 years later.
I had never talked about it publicly. I felt nearly hopeless and I still hoped the doctors were wrong. They weren’t. But I was.
My son is still very autistic, but he’s also very awesome. God has shown me more things through my son than through any other person. Ever. He is handicapped, disabled, challenged or whatever else you want to say about him, but he is also loved beyond measure. I look out for him and love him, including his weaknesses and oddities. I want to help him, but I no longer want to change him. He is a better person than almost anyone else I know.
During the most profound time in my struggle to come to grips with my son’s condition, someone suggested that Declan had made us all better people. I cynically shrugged it off at the time, but now I know it’s true. More than anything, I now understand how God the father feels about me.
I am profoundly disabled. I have secret fears and sins that only God knows. I might even look unlovable to some. Certainly, there must be some that feel sympathy for God that he has such a flawed son and that he must take such time and energy to protect and care for me. But now I understand why he does what he does for me in a way that you might not be able to. I now know things I couldn’t have known without having Declan in my life. Doubt has confirmed my faith.
I hope that you allow the things that challenge your faith to teach you what you can’t learn by unchallenged belief. I hope that you are overcome by doubts.
Then,
I hope you doubt your doubts.
For me, those doubts define my faith.
Jesus met people where they were. He demanded a huge leap of faith from his closest followers. He asked for a small step of faith from people just starting the faith journey.
The common denominator was that he delivered a what felt like a huge challenge of faith. He demands ever-increasing faith from us. Faith is never easy. That’s the nature of faith. Just when you achieve one level, Jesus calls you to a higher level.
Change how you think about Jesus:
Jesus had conversations about doubt with people consistently. He doesn’t punish doubt, he engages doubt. What conversations do you need to have with Jesus?
Challenge your Assumptions:
What doubts do you refuse to engage out of fear that you will lose faith or that others will think you less of you?
Choose to Live Differently:
How do you live a life of fully authentic and honest faith in ways you aren’t living now? What would be different about your life if you had more faith than you do now?
Footnotes:
[1] From Mark 9:17-27