What to Do When a Christian Doubts

What is the doubting Christian to do?

This is why this passage from Mark 9 is so helpful for me. This father shows it is possible to say two conflicting things, neither of which are fully true and both of which are absolutely true at the same time. I believe. Help my unbelief. Both true. Both not all the way true. Both seeming to be in conflict with one another.

I have met a few Christians who have simple faith. They believe the Bible is true, absolutely. They believe Jesus rose from the grave. They believe they are saved. They never wrestle with Scripture in a way that leads to confusion or tension or questions. They simply believe. I know very few of these. The great majority of Christians I know have complicated faiths. They all have a different history behind them that informs their reading and study of Scripture. They all have varying levels of schooling. They have different personalities, different propensities, different desires. And all of these things are informing their belief in some way—and their unbelief in some ways.

The Christian who can say, “I believe. Help my unbelief,” is the Christian who knows with absolute certainty that full, unfaltering faith is possible, and also that they do not have it, not fully. They know they are in progress, going, as Paul said, “from one degree of glory to another” and “the righteousness of God is being revealed faith to faith.” We’re not there yet, is what Paul was saying, farther up, further in, more to go until we arrive on eternity’s shores.

If you’re someone who struggles to believe all the way through all the things you think Christians believe all the way through, I just wanted to say, hey, I’m with you. I struggle with that. My struggles with faith didn’t cease the moment the gospel was unveiled to me. The difference was a difference by degrees: I saw more dimly before, and now less dimly, and will see even less dimly tomorrow. There are so many things about faith and the Bible that seem confusing to me, sometimes even more the more I study and read. I see what seem to be inconsistencies in Scripture, in other Christians, in the world in which we live. I don’t understand fully how justification or sanctification or mortification or vivification work. I don’t always know what I’m supposed to do and what only God can do. Here’s what I know how to do:

I know how to pray, “Lord, I believe. Help my unbelief.”

I’m praying for you today, that you can pray that prayer, believing he hears and heals and finishes what you cannot with mere words and weak faith.