What If I Find Myself Doubting That Christianity is True?

Have you ever found yourself doubting that Christianity is true?

I have.

After an event like an earthquake killing over 41,000 people made in God’s image happens, I tend to get rattled. My wife and I were talking on Monday, and she said something that has stuck with me all week. Putting this in my own words because she said it differently but the thought resonates still. When a tragedy happens, normally these things are caused by people so it’s easy to let God off the hook. A mass shooting stems from a person doing the shooting. But when it’s an earthquake, or a fire, or a tsunami, or hurricane, no person can cause that. That’s something beyond our power or control. These things happen because of a higher or greater power.

So cue in the doubt. If God is in charge of everything, that includes these natural disasters. Why is God, who is supposed to be good and loving, letting people die like this? It’s easy to have doubts if you have a brain.

I don’t have a quick answer to this. If I did I’m not convinced an easy answer is a satisfying answer to this sort of question. So if you’re interested in reading on to learn and think with me and have our brains hurt a bit, let’s go.

Some Thoughts On Doubt

Sometimes I think doubt is something created by our own constructs. We tend to think of doubt as the opposite of faith. And because it’s faith’s opposite, it is opposed to faith or against faith.

So we’ll put them in these matter-of-fact categories: faith is this, and doubt is not this.

So either you believe wholeheartedly or you are an unbeliever. This thinking is very problematic, to say the least.

But the Greek word for faith has to do with trustworthiness. For example, if someone in Roman and Greek culture had faith, or embodied faith, they would be someone who was a reliable person. They were honest, they did not lack integrity, and they were true to who they were.

A postmodern equivalent of this would be how we often use the word authentic. Millennials and Gen Z can smell bull. We can tell if something isn’t real or authentic because we’ve been let down so many times by older institutions and older people.

Maybe the Christmas movie Elf is a deliberate social commentary on this. When Will Ferrel’s character Elf walks into the diner and says, “Congratulations! You did it! World’s BEST coffee” all because he read an advertisement on the side of the building that said “World’s Best Coffee.”

Later on that famous date with Zoey Deschanel’s character, Jovie, she replies “It tastes like a crappy cup of coffee…[eyes open to behold a diner quality cup of Joe]…It is a crappy cup of coffee.”

Millennials and Gen Z know that you can’t slap “World’s Best Pizza” on the front door of a lousy pizza shop to get us in the door. It doesn’t work. We can tell if you’re sitting on a throne of lies.

How do we know if a pizza place is good, and is operating in good faith? How is it trustworthy? Well, they make good pies with real ingredients, and by word of mouth that news travels far and wide and when you get there you just know it’s going to be good. The smell is there, the taste is on point. Maybe they have an original brick oven that’s been around since the 1920s. Like Pepe’s Pizza in Connecticut. Everybody on the East Coast knows it’s worth visiting. Heck, everyone in the world knows. When I went last year I met people from England trying it out for the first time.

I apologize for my tangent here but I love pizza. In my darkest of times, of questioning the existence of God I think it’s possibly an apologetic for the existence of God. If God doesn’t exist, then how come there is pizza!? As Ben Franklin once put it, “Beer is proof that God exists and wants us to be happy.” My creed is “Pizza is proof that God exists and wants us to be satisfied.”

Back to faith and doubt as constructs, I don’t view doubt as fundamentally opposed to faith.

Faith is composed of three things: knowledge, assent, and trust. There is a cognitive element to faith, but it’s not just that because even the demons believe that God exists and yet they don’t possess true faith. True faith has knowledge, agrees with that knowledge, and actually places personal trust in the object of that faith (in the Christian faith, that is in the person and work of Jesus).

So if we say that faith is more complex than merely believing, I think doubt can also have complexity to it.

Making Room for Doubt

In Matthew 28:17, we have this picture of people bowing down to worship the resurrected Jesus. And then we see, “but some doubted.” Even in the face of just straight facts, people still doubted. They did not personally trust that Jesus was really who he said he was and is.

Now to bring this into everyday conversations that people have in the church or about the church. We might hear people saying silly stuff like:

-You need to pray more, that’s why you doubt.

-You need to read the Bible more, that’s why you’re doubting.

-Is the Bible not good enough for you?

-Is there some unconfessed sin in your life that you’re not fessing up to? That’s why you’re doubting God. Repent!

And with these statements, people are pouring more and more blame on a person who is struggling and feels overwhelmed with doubt.

Ramming Bible verses down people’s throats will not fix a person wrestling with doubt. Saying, “You’re like that person being tossed to and fro that James speaks of, ye of little faith” “You just need to have more faith!” None of these weird responses or reactions have ever helped real people.

Don’t believe me? Let’s look at something that’s hard to accept.

It appears that one of the greatest reasons for doubt in and outside of the church isn’t because people are actively trying to find reasons to doubt Christianity. Contrary to popular belief, not everyone is trying to become an atheist (Only 7% of the world’s population identifies as being positively atheist/agnostic). Often it’s because people have been driven away from trusting the church because of harm that’s been caused to them by people in the church.

We have the Roman Catholic clergy sexual abuse scandals that everyone knows about—so much so that Hollywood made a movie to Spotlight it. We also have all of the sexual abuse scandals in Protestant circles, like when the Houston Chronicle reported over 700 cases of sexual abuse and assault within the SBC. Or the statistic that 86% of those who identify as LGBTQIA+ were formerly part of a faith community and 54% have subsequently left.

It’s this sort of data that has me thinking we have done a very poor job handling people who have expressed doubts.

How have we handled people who are wrestling with questions? Do we allow for any breathing room here? Do we make room for doubt?

Thinking back on James's comment and how it can be misused to compare a doubting person to be like a wave tossing that person into the sea…

Sorry, but we just can’t do that. The text won’t allow us to.

In his letter, James is actually picking up on a story that you find in the Gospels. It’s that story of the disciples who are in a boat, and there's this big storm that comes and Jesus is sleeping. And they rush to wake Jesus up in the middle of the night, and they're freaking out that the boat’s gonna sink or whatever, and Jesus just tells them, you know, basically, keep calm and carry on.

He says, “Take heart” or “Don’t be afraid. And I think what's interesting about this is people always focus on the “Oh, ye of little faith. Why did you doubt?” part when Jesus is using that older sense of the word doubt in this passage. Meaning he’s not speaking about them having a lack of conviction or lacking trust, necessarily, but of being full of fear.

So to sum that up, Jesus is not attacking the kind of doubt someone might have when we are just wrestling with serious questions or having questions about faith. I don't think the Bible is excluding people who are wrestling with things at all.

I think that instead what we find is an invitation. Much like with the story of doubting Thomas.

This is someone whose first name is now literally replaced with doubt. First Name: Doubting. Last Name: Thomas.

I mean, he's known for the rest of all time as being the doubter. But Jesus doesn't condemn him for doubting. Instead he has great empathy for this struggling man. I mean, sure Jesus says it's better if you believe rather than having to look at this, but he still invites Thomas to look at his his scars, at his hands, and at his feet. Very clearly he’s giving Thomas space to check these things out. That's an invitation.

And a final comment on this comes from a letter in the New Testament that probably nobody ever preaches on, and nobody really ever reads except maybe a single verse. But in Jude, verse 22 says, “and have mercy on those who doubt.”

There is a specific call for us to show mercy toward those who find themselves a Doubting Thomas in this world.

Jude says, “save others by snatching them out of the fire” and “have mercy on those who doubt…waiting for the mercy of Lord Jesus Christ that leads to eternal life.”

I mean, goodness gracious, show mercy to those who are wrestling.

Could it possibly be any clearer for us to be patient with people who have questions?

If Someone Killed Themself, Would They Go to Heaven?

*Disclaimer: This article may contain content that is sensitive and could be traumatic or even triggering to a person. Please consider getting help immediately if you or your loved one has had thoughts of inflicting self harm. You’re not alone, and you matter. There is hope and help available.

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“If someone killed themself, would they go to heaven?”

My son asked this question this morning.

He’s ten.

Yup.

He was watching a show on Netflix yesterday called The Extraordinary Woo. This show follows the career of an autistic Korean attorney, and in that episode, a man attempted suicide by hanging himself by the neck.

So now my ten-year-old's wheels are spinning, and he’s trying to make sense of suicide and it’s implications not as an end to this life but he’s wondering what might happen in the life to come.

Since he’s not alone in wondering about this question, I want to offer some encouragement to anyone who has ever lost a loved one to death by suicide. Suicide is not the “unforgivable and unpardonable sin” like we learned at catholic school or in evangelical camps.

People who have misused the Bible to shame others have taught this. The logic is, “since a person is unable to repent because that sin is committed and there’s no opportunity to ask for forgiveness for it, then the person must be damned forever.” How silly is this logic though? For many of us, we are going to die someday without knowing the exact moment of our death. So it’s probable that many of us head into death with numerous unconfessed sins, and if that’s true then God help us all with this silly logic. How many sins are there that we have committed that we aren’t even aware of (theologians call this sins of omission)? How is it possible to repent for a sin that I don’t even know I committed? This reasoning is absurd.

Rationality aside, the Bible does not teach that suicide is an automatic expulsion from the gates of heaven.

So what does the Bible say about suicide?

Let’s take a look.

Some have tried to use Mark 3:20-35 as a proof text for suicide as the “unforgivable sin” of blaspheming the Holy Spirit, but this is just flat-out wrong. The only unforgivable sin Jesus has in mind here is not suicide, but it’s calling the work the Holy Spirit does “satanic” (for example, when the Pharisees try to say Jesus “has a demon” when he just healed a person—that would be pretty unforgivable to done mess that up, A—aron).

In the Bible, suicide is mentioned only six times when six different people die by suicide.

• To avoid an embarrassing death at the hands of a woman, Abimelech dies by forcing his armor-bearer to thrust him with a sword (Judges 9:50-57).

• Taking a bunch of Philistines with him and while offering a prayer to God, Samson pulls the pillars of a house down upon himself and everyone in it (Judges 16:28–30). The mighty King Saul, wounded, doesn’t want to die by wounds from his enemies. So he asks his armor-bearer to kill him as Abimelech did in his story, but the servant refuses to do it. So Saul falls on his own blade and dies (1 Sam. 31:1–6).

• Ahithophel hung himself under a tree (2 Sam. 17:23).

• Zimri ignited a fire around him to die (1 Kings 16:18–19).

• Judas Iscariot bought a field for himself with his murder money (the silver he won for turning in Jesus), and just like Ahithophel, he hung himself (Matt. 27:5; Acts 1:18–20).

In every one of these stories talking about each person dying by suicide, there is never a moral evaluation and determination made about their death by suicide. For Saul, there is plenty of moral evaluation about his wasted life and how he disobeyed God in other ways, but suicide itself is not listed as any reason for his fate and God’s displeasure with his life.

In the absence of anything in these texts, what then does the Bible say about suicide?

We do have God’s prohibition in the sixth commandment, which is a blanket statement about murder and maybe we’ve heard it said like this: “Thou shall not kill.” The commandment is clear: you shall not murder. This commandment forbids taking any person’s life and encourages us to seek and promote life to everyone around us. But of course, with just war theory there are exceptions if you are a soldier in a war and you must fight for your nation. And there’s also self-defense or protecting others around you from harm (which is the greater sin, allowing a person to murder you and several others or taking out the guy about to do it first?). That commandment while true, has a certain kind of flexibility with it in actual practice.

So going back to the topic of suicide, if we apply the sixth commandment to it we do know that murdering yourself (i.e. killing yourself) is a sin before God. We are depriving ourselves of the life that God has given to us, we are not protecting the sanctity of life, and in effect, we are saying that we know better than God when we should live and when we should die. In that way, there’s also a kind of hubris involved in it. So yes, suicide is a sin. But is it the sin above all sins? Is it the sin that separates us from God eternally?

There’s nothing here that would suggest to us biblically that suicide is an unpardonable sin, to a degree that is worse than any other sin that we could commit. What we know from the Bible is that suicide is a sin, just like any other sin like lying, stealing, committing adultery, coveting, and the rest.

I think where people get confused on this topic, it isn’t our misunderstanding of the Bible on this but it’s our misunderstanding of God on this. Fundamentally, we don’t get God. Our problem isn’t biblical, it’s theological. Many of us are convinced that our repentance—the amount of saying I'm sorry to God about x, y, or z, is what justifies us before God and makes us acceptable enough to walk through those golden gates. So if we just say the right thing, throw up enough Hail Marys or whatever, then we’re going to be good with God and get in.

The thing is, that’s all a big lie.

The only way we are ever acceptable before God is through repentance, yes, but there’s something even more important than that part. Turning away from our pet sins that we love so much is a part of it, no doubt, and turning away from trusting in our own way of doing this is a part of it, to be sure. But the most important part of acceptance with God is faith in the person and work of Jesus Christ.

We don’t just turn away from ourselves, but we turn toward God. We don’t just say I’m sorry, God. But we look to the only One who can take away all of our sins—past, present, and future. That kind of forgiveness can only be found in Jesus. It’s not our measure of repentance that seals us into the heavenly kingdom, but it’s the Holy Spirit who seals us for heaven (Ephesians 1:13, 4:30) when we trust in Jesus to take us to be with him forever.

The reason I said earlier that we don’t get God, is that we believe the lie that God is a kind of petty god who takes into account a list of rights and wrongs, and like Santa Clause, he’s just waiting up at the North Pole wondering if we made the naughty or nice list. But the kind of God that the Bible talks about isn’t petty, and he isn’t making a list and checking it twice to find out if we are naughty or nice—but he’s this kind of deity who would do anything to save us from our sin and misery. He’s this kind of God who doesn’t look down at us in judgment, but he actually went down to be with us and to be judged for us himself, taking on the penalty of our sins on our behalf. This God is a rescuer, not a ridiculer.

So when my son asks, “If someone kills themself, will they be in heaven?” my answer isn’t a direct “no” or “yes,” but it’s, “In whom did this person believe and trust?” If the person was a Christian and they died by suicide, I have no reason to doubt that they are with Christ forever. That’s not even a question. Not even suicide can stop the precious and perfect body and blood of Jesus from giving us the full and complete forgiveness of all of our sins.