Emma Higgs<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n![\"doubt\"](\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/361\/2017\/01\/doubt.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
Some days I find it really hard to believe in God.<\/p>\n
I sit in church surrounded by the familiar, friendly faces, perusing the\u00a0notice sheet\u00a0as\u00a0the worship band finish their sound check with a chorus of \u201c10,000 Reasons,\u201d and I\u2019m convinced\u00a0we\u2019ve made it all up.<\/p>\n
We\u2019re kidding ourselves, aren\u2019t we? It\u2019s obviously just wishful thinking. A fairy story.\u00a0A diversion from reality, far too good to be true.<\/p>\n
The questions rage, unfiltered, through my mind.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf there is a God, why would he answer our prayers about\u00a0the\u00a0weather for the summer youth camp whilst ignoring the cries of a Syrian mother begging for her three young children to be spared?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cEven if there is a God who answers prayer, how likely is it that we predominantly white, middle class Baptists\u00a0in\u00a021st century Britain\u00a0have him\/her all figured out?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIsn\u2019t it perfectly possible that all our \u2018spiritual\u2019 experiences and answers to prayer can be explained away by psychology and neuroscience?\u201d<\/p>\n
I look around at other people in the congregation and wonder,\u00a0is it just me? Or are there others who have these same doubts but are too afraid to admit it?<\/p>\n
It seems to me that people are walking out of church and losing their faith altogether because they are never given\u00a0space to ask the tough questions. When their worldview expands and the \u201ctruth\u201d they were taught in Sunday School stops making sense, the church responds by praying for their poor, backsliding souls and offering easy answers and carefully selected\u00a0Bible verses.<\/p>\n
We have a tendency to take the deepest\u00a0mysteries of the universe and try to condense them down into straight forward language and neat formulas.\u00a0Of course, there are names, stories, and metaphors that can give us some sense of understanding of God, but they are only useful as long as we remember that we can never really know what we\u2019re talking about. These metaphors can speak deep, transformative truth into our lives, but if we start trying to speak of this truth in terms of factual reality, we start to lose the plot.<\/p>\n
Questions are inevitable. Doubt is a healthy part of faith\u2013it shows we\u00a0are living, feeling, thinking human beings, and if God is real, I think he can handle it.<\/p>\n
I am generally\u00a0suspicious of Christians who claim\u00a0to\u00a0be certain about what they believe. I think religious certainty is one of the biggest problems in the world today, and I think it is driving people out of the church.<\/p>\n
Religious certainty tends to make us judgmental of others. We become very good at categorizing people into those who are \u201cin\u201d and those who are not.<\/p>\n
Religious certainty\u00a0can make us so focussed on the spiritual realm and the afterlife that we ignore, or\u00a0even justify, the catastrophic effect our lifestyles\u00a0are having on the\u00a0planet.<\/p>\n
Religious certainty leads to violence. If any group holds their\u00a0beliefs above all else, eventually destroying the \u201cother\u201d using violence will seem\u00a0justifiable.<\/p>\n
Religious certainty has the potential to tear the world apart.<\/p>\n
That said, I do totally get it\u2013religious certainty feels\u00a0great<\/em>.<\/p>\nI think back to the time when I felt certain about my beliefs,\u00a0the Bible was clear, and I had no need to question it.\u00a0In\u00a0many ways, I really miss that kind of faith. I\u2019m still mourning the loss of the certainty I once felt in Christianity and the cozy sense of security that came with it.<\/p>\n
I completely\u00a0understand why some Christians are so fiercely defensive about their beliefs. They\u00a0insist that we can<\/em> be certain because the Bible is inerrant and infallible. They respond to questions and doubts by putting their fingers in their ears and singing louder, or by shaming the one who is doubting.<\/p>\nLife is\u00a0so<\/em>\u00a0much easier when you\u2019re certain about everything. To let doubt have a voice is to risk losing that certainty, or even losing faith altogether, and that can be\u00a0terrifying.<\/p>\nAs uncomfortable and unsettling as it can be, I am learning to embrace doubt as an essential part of my faith. If\u00a0God exists, he is beyond any of my wildest thoughts, deeper than my deepest fears and able to withstand my most troubling questions.<\/p>\n
Some days my\u00a0faith is strong. I am filled with hope, I sense that I am part of a greater story and I feel\u00a0consumed\u00a0by a love wider\u00a0than the universe.<\/p>\n
Other days my faith feels\u00a0like fumbling around in the dark for a\u00a0rope, or steering in the vague direction of a\u00a0small flicker of light on the horizon.<\/p>\n
And I think that\u2019s OK. It\u2019s scary, but facing up to my unknowing is often exhilarating and always humbling. If my faith is not at its core a deep, unfathomable mystery, then\u00a0I\u2019ve lost my way.<\/p>\n
\u201cI have a lot of faith. But I am also afraid a lot, and have no real certainty about anything\u00a0\u2026\u00a0the opposite of faith is not doubt, but certainty. Certainty is missing the point entirely. Faith includes noticing the mess, the emptiness and discomfort, and letting it be there until some light returns.\u201d \u2013Anne Lamott<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
\n![\"emma\"](\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/361\/2016\/06\/emma.jpg\")
About Emma Higgs<\/strong>
\nEmma Higgs lives with her husband and two toddlers in Plymouth, England. When she finds a minute, she blogs about progressive theology, Christianity & homosexuality, and mental health, amongst other things, at www.emmahiggs.com<\/a>. Find her on\u00a0Facebook<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0Twitter<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Some days I find it really hard to believe in God.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":8615,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[117],"tags":[535,534,386,150],"class_list":["post-8610","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-christian-spirituality","tag-certainty","tag-doubt","tag-emma-higgs","tag-faith"],"yoast_head":"\n
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