Doubters of Biblical Proportion: I Believe, Help My Unbelief

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    Where are you at spiritually? Have you put your trust in Christ as your Savior yet? When I asked him why not, he said that he still had a lot of unanswered questions. What are your questions? If I can provide satisfactory answers to your questions, would you then become a Christian? He got a wry smile on his face, as if I had found him out.

    A few months later, he did yield his life to Christ and I had the joy of baptizing him. Doubt is often just a smokescreen for a heart that wants to play by its own rules. God has given sufficient evidence that Jesus Christ is who He claimed to be. So the first step for dealing with doubt is to turn from your sin and rebellion against God. Acknowledge that God, as the Sovereign Creator of this universe, has the right to run your life.

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    Accept Christ as your Savior and Lord. Yielding your heart to Him will remove many doubts. As I said, many weighty commentators refuse to attribute doubt to John, since he was such a great man of God. Jesus gives John the highest imaginable commendation 7: Unlike the reeds that swayed in the breeze along the Jordan River where he preached, John was a man of unswerving conviction.

    John was a prophet, and more than a prophet. He was the very messenger whom God promised in Malachi 3: Note, by the way, that Jesus sent this rebuke directly back to John, probably without the multitude hearing. Then He praises John to the multitude. We often err by praising a man to his face and running him down to others behind his back.

    The second reason I think that John was doubting is that even the greatest men of God are still men of flesh, subject to times of doubt and despair.

    The mighty prophet Elijah wavered in his faith and ran from the wicked Jezebel, whose prophets he had slain, asking God to take his life. Ironically, he was one of two men who did not ever die, but were taken straight to heaven! Why did John doubt? The Old Testament prophet saw God work many powerful miracles. In his duel with the prophets of Baal, he called down fire from heaven to consume his saturated sacrifice and then he took up a sword and slew all of them.

    Later, when the wicked son of Ahab and Jezebel sent a contingent of 50 soldiers to take him captive, he called down fire from heaven and consumed them. When a second group of 50 came, he did it again. Yet John the Baptist had performed no miracles. Your adversary, the devil, prowls about like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour. Your trials do not mean that God does not exist or that He has lost control as the Sovereign of the universe.

    Beyond Today -- I Believe, Help My Unbelief

    Hang on by faith, knowing that He will use your trial to strengthen and establish you. As Peter instructs just a few verses before 5: Not only was John going through a difficult trial that would shortly result in his martyrdom, he also was dealing with disappointed expectations. He was bold enough to rebuke even King Herod for his immorality. Also, John knew that Isaiah prophesied that Messiah would proclaim freedom to the prisoners and bring in the day of vengeance of our God Isa.

    William Barclay points out that John may have wrestled with the answer Jesus sent back through his disciples.

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    He told them to go and report to John the many miracles they saw and the fact that the poor had the gospel preached to them. Caesarea, the headquarters of the Roman army is about to fall. The sinners are being obliterated. John had to deal with his mistaken expectations of who Jesus is and what He came to do.

    You thought that Jesus would solve all sorts of problems for you, but instead, the problems have grown worse. You thought that He would make life easier and more abundant, but it has been more difficult and destitute. So you prayed more, but the problems persisted. John may have died without resolving some of his theological confusion about Messiah. But even though John may not have understood everything, he still clung to Jesus. He teaches us two things about dealing with doubt:.

    John sent his disciples straight to Jesus. He could have sent them to the scribes and Pharisees, and they would have only deepened his doubts and perhaps added a few more reasons to doubt. He went directly to Jesus and Jesus gave him a solid answer, along with a gentle rebuke.

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    Make sure your heart is in submission to Him. Then pour out your confusion or difficulty to the Lord. If you need a gentle rebuke, He will give it, but always with a view of bringing healing. If you read Bible critics, they will not usually strengthen your faith. Reading solid, Bible-believing commentators may help you clarify a matter, and so this can help. But in all your study, you need to lay hold of Jesus Himself. So bring your doubts to Him. He preached the good news of salvation to the poor whom society disregarded.

    Also, He affirms here that John was the messenger predicted by Malachi, which also affirms that Jesus is the promised Messiah. John lived in the era of promise; the one who submits to Jesus as king lives in the era of fulfillment. In explaining why the least in the kingdom is greater than John, William Barclay ibid. Some have said that it was because John had wavered, if but for a moment, in his faith.

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