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{"id":253,"date":"2009-07-28T10:23:13","date_gmt":"2009-07-28T14:23:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/evangelicalgateway.wordpress.com\/?p=253"},"modified":"2009-07-28T10:23:13","modified_gmt":"2009-07-28T14:23:13","slug":"on-the-certainty-of-doubt","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/philosophicalfragments\/2009\/07\/28\/on-the-certainty-of-doubt\/","title":{"rendered":"On the Certainty of Doubt"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

A reflection<\/a> from Michael Patton on the role of doubt in the Christian life is currently up at the Evangelical Portal<\/a> at Patheos<\/a>.<\/p>\n

$\"\"$ <\/a>As Patton writes, \u201cIn a fallen world with fallen people \u2014 and Christians who are still battling the flesh \u2014 should we expect anything else? Do you really believe that once you become a Christian doubt is no longer a foe?\u201d<\/p>\n

Through my studies of Kierkegaard (the subject of my doctoral dissertation), I\u2019ve come to view faith and doubt rather differently than before.\u00a0 I still believe that something like propositional assent (an affirmation that \u201cGod exists\u201d and \u201cJesus died for my sins\u201d) is involved in faith, but I\u2019ve come to believe that it\u2019s more a consequence of faith than the essence or precondition for faith.\u00a0 Faith I have come to see more as a \u201cresting transparently\u201d in God, a relationship of openness, trust and humble receptivity to God\u2019s truth and direction.\u00a0 <\/em><\/p>\n

Yet you must believe God exists<\/em>, you may reply, before you can trust in Him<\/em>.\u00a0 Actually\u2013and perhaps paradoxically\u2013I don\u2019t believe that\u2019s true.\u00a0 Faith is a deeply mysterious thing.\u00a0 Yet it is when I resolve to rest in God and receive Him that He reveals and gives Himself through the Word.\u00a0 It\u2019s not as though you must believe in order to have faith; no, you must have faith in order to believe.\u00a0 I think too many of us doubt because we think that our belief is our own responsibility.\u00a0 This turns faith into another \u201cwork.\u201d\u00a0 If I only work hard enough, will it strongly enough, put together enough pieces of the puzzle, then I will believe in God and Christ and then <\/em>I can rest in God.\u00a0 No.\u00a0 Resolve to rest in the God who is always making Himself known to you, resolve to receive his truth through the word, and then you will have the belief that faith brings.<\/p>\n

$\"\"$ <\/a><\/p>\n

This is not to disagree with Michael Patton, who is actually addressing a different set of questions.\u00a0 But it is to encourage you with this: the seed of doubt is borne in the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil.\u00a0 Grasping at the knowledge of God according to our own efforts and powers will only\u2013inevitably\u2013result in doubt.\u00a0 What product of human effort is not doubtful?\u00a0 Faith is not be found in grasping at knowledge; it is to be found when, striving against the sin of the Fall, we learn to rest transparently and humbly and with absolutely receptivity in God.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"