Biblical images of doubt
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Doubt in the Bible: analogies and images
The New Testament doesn’t use one single word throughout to represent ‘doubt’. Rather, it uses a range of words, each of which illuminates one particular aspect of what doubt really is. Each is like a snapshot of a landscape or a building: it’s not good enough in itself to give a total picture, but it can give an excellent idea of what one aspect is like. And a series of snapshots builds up to give a total picture. The New Testament uses four main images, each of which illuminates one angle of the concept of doubt.
1. Hesitation. After his resurrection, Jesus appeared on a mountain to his disciples. Matthew describes the scene thus: ‘When they saw him, they worshipped him; but some doubted’ (Matthew 28:17). Although all the disciples encountered the risen Christ, some clearly had difficulty in accepting what had happened. Perhaps they felt it was too good to be true. Perhaps they were frightened and shocked by what happened. The Greek word used here (distazō) has the sense of ‘to hold back’ or ‘to hesitate’.
The same word (and the same idea) may be found earlier in Matthew’s Gospel (Matthew 14:31), in the description of the storm at sea. Here, Peter’s lack of faith is shown in his hesitation to put his trust in Jesus. Hesitation betrays a lack of trust. If you hesitate to accept an offer, it’s because you have misgivings about it. You may not trust the person who is making the offer. You may not understand what it implies. You suspect that there may be something wrong with it. Our reluctance to accept the gospel whole-heartedly, with the enthusiasm of little children, reflects a basic lack of trust in God and his promises. We hesitate to accept them. We hold back.
2. Indecision. In stressing the importance of faith to the individual believer, Jesus points out the need not to doubt (Matthew 21:21). Paul notes how Abraham trusted in God’s promise: ‘No distrust made him waver concerning the promise of God, but he grew strong in his faith as he gave glory to God’ (Romans 4:20). The Greek word used here (diakrinō) originally had the sense of ‘argue with’, ‘be at odds with’ or ‘take issue with’. This older meaning can still be seen in Acts 11:2, describing how Peter found himself in disputation with Jewish sympathizers in Jerusalem. However, in the New Testament, a more subtle, developed meaning can be seen – to argue with yourself. The word now refers to an internal mental debate reflecting indecision and a lack of conviction. The same idea and word is used in James 1:6, with a powerful image – a wave tossed by the wind in a stormy sea – which we shall explore further in a moment. You are divided within yourself, unsure of what to do.
In his letters, Paul frequently speaks of having ‘put off your old self’ on becoming a Christian (Ephesians 4:22, NIV; cf. Romans 6:6; Colossians 3:9). Part of the problem that many of us have is that our former unconverted self seems to live on! It is almost as if there is a debate going on between the ‘old self’ and the ‘new self’. The former is highly sceptical of God’s promises, while the latter wants to embrace them wholeheartedly. The result? Indecision. Hesitation. Wavering. A lack of confidence in God. The very existence of doubt reminds us how easy it is not to allow God into every part of our lives. We are reluctant to allow God to take control of us. It is as if we have opened the door of our life to the risen Christ (Revelation 3:20), but only allowed him a toehold in our home. We are reluctant to admit him fully. We treat him like a guest, when we ought to be treating him as the Lord. Doubt is thus a symptom of our lack of commitment to God.
Doubt is a way in which God is able to deepen our faith by showing us our lack of faith. The existence of doubt is like a signpost, showing us how far we have to go before we have fully committed ourselves to God. It shows up as sheer illusion any temptation we may have to rely upon ourselves, rather than God. It is therefore with a sense of relief that we read Paul’s words (Romans 3:3–4), reminding us that our lack of faith in no way alters God’s faithfulness towards us! We can always turn to him in prayer, and ask him to help our unbelief. Like the man who came to Jesus, we can pray, ‘[Lord,] I believe; help my unbelief!’ (Mark 9:24).
3. Being in two minds. Doubters are described as ‘double-minded (dipsychos)’ (James 4:8, NIV). To doubt is to be in two minds about something. It implies indecision, hesitation, and a resulting lack of progress. When I studied medieval philosophy at university, I remember being intrigued by the problem known as ‘Buridan’s Ass’. (Actually, the medieval philosopher John Buridan really tells the story about a dog, not an ass.) Suppose you have a hungry donkey placed midway between two piles of food. If it’s going to survive, it will need to make a decision to eat one of them. But what happens if it can’t make up its mind? In the end the unfortunate donkey dies, having been unable to make a decision about which pile of food to eat.
There’s an obvious parallel here with doubt. We are confronted with two different options: to believe, or not to believe. It is very difficult to postpone a decision on this one. Each has its own different rewards. Yet those rewards are gained only by commitment. For example, it would be difficult for someone to adopt an ‘eat, drink and be merry for tomorrow we die’ attitude to life, if he half-believes in the resurrection and future divine judgment. Likewise, it would be difficult for a Christian to take the great gospel promises of resurrection and eternal life seriously, if he half-believes there is nothing after death. Each of these individuals is in two minds; they have a foot in each camp. People like that are in the same position as Buridan’s ass – they can’t benefit from either pile of food.
Doubt means not having resolved an inner conflict between unbelief and faith. It means keeping options open long after we ought to have closed them. Jesus told his disciples that they were to be in the world but not of the world (John 17:6–16). They live in the world, but their hope lies beyond it. They do not conform to its standards and its unbelief. There will always be a tension between the believer and the world. In part, doubt arises through having feet in the camps of both the world and the gospel, and being reluctant to make that break. For many people there is security in staying within something known (however unsatisfactory) just as there is unease about confronting the unknown. ‘Play safe!’ is the motto of many. Some are reluctant to commit themselves to the gospel because it seems other-worldly. But the New Testament sees commitment to the gospel as the essential starting point for developing a right attitude to the world. No longer need we be frightened by death; no longer are we hypnotized by wealth (Matthew 6:19–21). We are enabled to live in the world without giving in to its standards and anxieties.
4. Doubt as a state of mind. Thomas found it difficult to believe Jesus had risen from the dead. Jesus, knowing this, spoke these words to him: ‘Do not doubt but believe’ (John 20:27). The Greek phrase used is quite difficult to translate into English. Greek has two forms of imperative. In other words, you can tell somebody to do something in two different ways. What is known as an aorist imperative means, ‘Do this action once.’ If I asked somebody to open a window, I would use this form. A second form, however, is the present imperative. This means, ‘Keep on doing this! Don’t just do it once!’ The Greek verb used in John 20:27 is a present imperative. It doesn’t mean, ‘On this one occasion, don’t doubt – believe instead!’ Rather, it means, ‘Stop doubting now, once and for all. And keep on believing.’
In other words, doubt and faith are both states of mind or attitudes. Doubt is a constant attitude of questioning towards God, where faith is a constant attitude of trust and openness. We are being asked to develop a permanent attitude of openness and trust towards God – not just to be open to him and trust him on any one occasion, but to be like this all the time. And as we saw above, this results in conflict at times, since our old tendency to doubt God surfaces, underscoring our need to commit ourselves more fully to him.
Biblical images of doubt
Two images are particularly helpful in thinking about the nature and effects of doubt, and beginning to develop ways of handling it.
The first is the idea of walking in the dark. ‘Salvation is nearer to us now than when we became believers; the night is far gone, the day is near’ (Romans 13:11–12). These phrases from Paul invite us to think of the Christian life as walking in the dark. The dawn is now nearer than when we first began that walk; but it has yet to happen. In the meantime, we have to cross an unknown landscape, hoping we shall arrive safely at our destination. We cannot fully see the road ahead; nevertheless, we trust in the Lord to guide us home, ‘for we walk by faith, not by sight’ (2 Corinthians 5:7).
Imagine you are a traveller in medieval England. You decide to travel to the city of Oxford from the nearby village of Witney. Darkness falls as you near Oxford, so you cannot see the landscape around you. You decide to keep going along the road, despite the darkness. All you can see is the road ahead of you, which you know is signposted to Oxford. At times, there are things about that road that puzzle you. The road may turn abruptly to the left at one point. You wonder why. At another point, it becomes very muddy. Again, you wonder why. But you don’t know. You can’t see the full picture. You’re in the dark.
Of course, when dawn breaks, you can see the landscape fully illuminated. Then the real state of things becomes apparent. You might suddenly notice the road swerves to the left to avoid an open mineshaft, invisible to you in the dark. You might see that at one point the road passes close to a raging torrent, which might have swept you away, if the road had not led you away from it – as it turned out, all that happened was that your feet got a bit muddy. Although you could not understand what was happening at the time, you subsequently realize the road led you in safety in the darkness through a series of dangers. Your initial bewilderment turns to relief.
The basic point here is that we don’t see the full picture. God does; we don’t. As Paul puts it, ‘we see in a mirror, dimly’ (1 Corinthians 13:12). It’s like being inside a car on a dark night, with the windows misted up. Or trying to make sense of a snapshot taken by a camera that wasn’t properly in focus. It is blurred and fuzzy. The same problem arises: we can’t see properly. And so often, we begin to doubt what lies beyond the window or the camera lens because the means of knowing things doesn’t give us the clarity we believe we should expect. ‘In faith there is enough light for those who want to believe and enough shadows to blind those who don’t’ (Blaise Pascal).
There are many things about the Christian life that puzzle us. Yet we have to learn to live with the fact that we shall never see the full picture, and, for that very reason, shall have to put up with areas of experience that seem contradictory and confused. Doubt arises partly because we feel frustrated at not being able to understand everything. We want to stand in the place of God, and be able to survey the landscape across which the path of faith must travel. Yet we can’t. In fact, we can’t really see further than the end of our spiritual noses!
We believe passionately and rightly that there is a road there, that it will lead us safely to our goal, and that Jesus Christ has been along that road before us, like a pioneer or trailblazer (Hebrews 12:1–3). But we don’t understand exactly what is going on at points. Our place is on that path, not above it. One day, we firmly believe, all will be made clear – but this will be on the far side of our resurrection! For the moment, however, we must walk through the darkness in faith and hope.
However, the landscape is not totally dark. The image of light is used frequently by scriptural writers, reminding us that God has not left us completely in the dark! Scripture itself guides us as we walk. ‘Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path’ (Psalm 119:105). This helpful image suggests illumination of an area around us while we walk, but not of the entire landscape. ‘Faith is taking the first step even when you don’t see the whole staircase’ (Martin Luther King, Jr).
Again, it’s like being in a car at night, with the headlamps illuminating a small area just ahead of us. The important thing is that we find our way home, not that we understand exactly what is happening at every point along the way! The road really is there, tried and tested by previous generations of travellers.
The famous gospel image of a city on a hill (Matthew 5:14–16) makes the same point: a light shining in the darkness can guide us home. Take one step at a time, and don’t be frightened by the thought of how long or difficult that journey might be. God will be with you, travelling alongside you and lighting your path as he accompanies you on your way.
So it is understandable that doubt should arise on account of our less than total grasp of the situation. We aren’t fully in the picture. But how important is this? Isn’t what really matters the fact that God promises to be faithful to us, to remain with us as we travel, to guide us and support us? And that Christ has gone before us, to prepare a place for us? The gospel doesn’t pretend to explain every aspect of our life as believers – it does, however, promise that God will be with us throughout that life (Psalm 23). In the end, it is the saving presence of God in the life of believers that matters more than a complete explanation of the way things are. Anyway, how could we finite creatures ever hope to gain a total understanding of our situation?
For Christians, we are walking a road that leads to the New Jerusalem. But we aren’t on our own. Jesus has gone ahead of us, blazing the trail, and accompanies us as we travel. Like a shepherd, he is with us throughout every moment of that journey. His loving care never changes nor falters. Even when we travel through the valley of the shadow of death, he is there. We may not fully understand the details of that journey. But we know he is with us, by our sides, as we travel.
The second image is that of a rough sea: ‘the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea, driven and tossed by the wind’ (James 1:6). This is a powerful image, especially for anyone who has ever been violently seasick! The image evoked by James is of lack of stability. The sea – along with anything that happens to be floating in it – is tossed to and fro by the wind. Seasickness is basically caused by a disruption of the human sense of balance. You lose your bearings. Life is miserable. Doubt in the Christian life is rather like permanent seasickness on a long ocean voyage. So how can stability be regained?
God’s faithfulness is like an anchor (Hebrews 6:18–19). He is true to his promises, giving us something we can hold on to. Just as a ship being blown off course by a storm might lower its anchor, so faith in God gives us direction and stability in life. It’s like a lifeline thrown to us in a raging sea: in the midst of this storm, we can find peace in the trustworthy promises of God. It offers us stability and safety. The death of Jesus Christ on the cross of Calvary demonstrates both God’s overwhelming love for us, and his commitment to us. Nothing can cancel his faithfulness to us. Like a harbour, he offers refuge from the storms of life. Doubt means having nothing to hold on to in this situation. It means a lack of trust in the security God is offering us. Faith, on the other hand, is trusting the faithfulness of God and the reliability of the assistance he offers us (Psalm 119:35–40). And that really is the point. After all, if we can’t trust God, who can we trust?