Worldview and Perspective on Faith And Doubt

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Certainty vs. Vulnerability

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Keywords

Scripture

Galatians 5:6, John 20:27, Mark 9:24, 2 Corinthians 4:18, Romans 8:24-25, James 1:5-6

In this excerpt from his book Faith in the Shadows, pastor and author Austin Fischer shares a surprising truth about the need to be vulnerable with our own faith if we are likely to have a positive im...

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What Trust Looks Like at its Brightest

Author

Peter Enns

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Scripture

John 20:24-29, Mark 9:24, Job 23:3-4, 8-10, Job 19:25-27, Psalm 23:4, Psalm 13:1-2, 5

When most of us grow up in a faith tradition, we begin with an assumption that faith is good, while having doubts is bad. As we mature however, we realize that faith and doubt are not opposites, but i...

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Author

A. W. Tozer

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Scripture

Colossians 3:2, Isaiah 26:3, Hebrews 12:1-3, Psalm 16:8, Hebrews 11:1, 2 Corinthians 5:7

Faith is a redirecting of our sight, a getting out of the focus of our own vision and getting God into focus.

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Doubt is a Felt Tension

Author

Travis Dickinson

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Scripture

Isaiah 40:22, Romans 1:28, Psalm 73:, Mark 9:14-29, Matthew 14:22-33

Doubt is really the felt tension that exists between a belief you have and a contrary claim you do not yet believe…Simply put, doubt is that experience of one of our beliefs seeming like it might be f...

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The Root of the Word Doubt

Author

Travis Dickinson

Keywords

Scripture

Genesis 22:1-19, Numbers 13:14, Job 1:42, Matthew 14:22-33, Psalm 43:

The root of our English term doubt has to do with duplicity. It is being divided or doubled up in our thinking. But this isn’t a matter of simply being confused or unable to make up our mind or ...

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Let Questions and Doubts be Adequately Expressed

Author

Travis Dickinson

Keywords

Scripture

Genesis 18:10-15, Numbers 13:14, Job 1:42, Matthew 14:22-33, Psalm 73:

It is quite common for Christians to experience doubts from time to time. Unfortunately, doubts about our Christian beliefs are often treated in the same way we would treat a common cold. We wait it o...

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Consider the Culture

Author

The Pastor's Workshop

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One of the areas often missed in a lot of Christian apologetics is the social setting in which a person encounters the gospel. For example, it is far easier to espouse "rational arguments" f...

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Author

Parker J. Palmer

Keywords

Paradox

The deeper our faith, the more doubt we must endure; the deeper our hope, the more prone we are to despair; the deeper our love, the more pain its loss will bring: these are a few of the paradoxes we ...

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The Madman and Killing God

Author

Brian Zahnd

Keywords

Scripture

Genesis 11:1-9, Exodus 32:1-35, Amos 8:11-12, Matthew 27:45-46, Romans 1:18-25, Psalm 14:1

In 1882—seven years before his descent into madness—Friedrich Nietzsche published a parable called The Madman . In the parable, a madman comes into a village on a bright, sunny morning holding al...

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Author

Robert Frost

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Scripture

Proverbs 18:19, Ecclesiastes 4:9-12, Micah 6:8, Galatians 3:28, Psalm 133:1

Before I built a wall I’d ask to know What I was walling in or walling out, And to whom I was like to give offence.

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Author

Friedrich Nietzsche

Keywords

Scripture

James 1:5-6, 2 Corinthians 5:7, 1 Corinthians 2:5, Romans 10:17, Proverbs 3:5-6, John 20:29, Hebrews 11:1

Faith: not wanting to know what is true.

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Certainty vs. Aiming at Confidence

Author

Travis Dickinson

Keywords

Scripture

Genesis 15:1-6, Exodus 14:10-14, Job 1:42, Matthew 14:22-33, Psalm 23:

We should aim for rational confidence in these sorts of pursuits because certainty is a mere will-o’-the-wisp. Finite minds simply can’t pull it off. Though the distinction between aiming at certainty...

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Should We Trust the Virgin Birth?

Author

Malcolm Muggeridge

Keywords

Scripture

Genesis 18:10-14 , Isaiah 7:14 , Exodus 4:1-5, Psalm 139:13-16 , Luke 1:26-38, John 20:24-29, Matthew 1:22-25

To a twentieth-century mind the notion of a virgin birth is intrinsically and preposterously inconceivable. If a woman claims–such claims are made from time to time–to have become pregnant without sex...

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When the Minister is the Skeptic

Author

James Bryan Smith

Keywords

Scripture

2 Timothy 3:5, 2 Timothy 4:3-4, Titus 1:16, Galatians 1:8, Jeremiah 2:13

I grew up as a Christmas and Easter Methodist. Our family called ourselves Christians, but it was not an important part of our lives. I found church boring. When I turned eighteen, something happened ...

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Author

Phillip Yancey

Keywords

Scripture

Job 23:1–9, Exodus 33:12–23, Habakkuk 1:2–4, Matthew 27:45–46, Acts 17:22–27, Psalm 42:

“If there is no God, never was a God, why do we miss him so much?” asked one agnostic European Jew as he looked back on the horrors of the twentieth century.

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An Atheist Pines for Eternity

Author

Theodore Dalrymple

Keywords

Scripture

Ecclesiastes 3:11, Isaiah 55:1-3, Job 14:13-14, John 4:13-14, Romans 1:20-21, Psalm 42:1-2

In an article entitled, What the New Atheists Don’t See , the British author Theodore Dalrymple shares his honest struggles with atheism. The subtitle of his article is fascinating, “To regret re...

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Heavenly Father, forgive us for delving

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Scripture

John 20:24-29, John 8:1-11, Luke 15:11-32, Romans 8:26-27, Matthew 11:28-30, Isaiah 41:10

Heavenly Father, forgive us for delving so much into our own lives that we forget the love and purpose with which you have created us. When we are faced with doubt and despair, help us to turn to you ...

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Dear Heavenly Father, We are grateful

Author

Memorial Drive Presbyterian Church

Keywords

Scripture

Mark 9:24, James 1:5-6, Psalm 34:17, Philippians 4:6-7, Jeremiah 33:3, Matthew 21:22, 1 Peter 5:7

Dear Heavenly Father, We are grateful that we can come to You at any time, about anything. We know that You listen to the earnest cries of our hearts. We know that You have great power; You are the Cr...

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Back in Flatland: Sermon Illustration Tuesday

Author

Stuart R. Strachan, Jr.

Keywords

Mystery

In 1884, an English schoolmaster named Edwin Abbott Abbott wrote a story about a two-dimensional world called Flatland, inhabited by various shapes (circles, squares, etc.). In Flatland, there is heig...

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Adapted from Psalm. 46; Matt. 7:21–29

Author

Kimberly Bracken Long

Keywords

Scripture

Psalm 46:null, Matthew 7:21

God, our rock and refuge, there are plenty of things that we allow to erode our faith in you. When life gets stormy, we let our uncertainty cloud our trust in you. We think we know better and start re...

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God—Father, Son and Holy Spirit—our

God—Father, Son and Holy Spirit—our Loving Creator, Redeemer and Guide: We praise and thank You for being with us wherever we are on the journey of faith; whether we feel You or not—You are here wit...

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The Many Houses Analogy and the Problem with the Attic

Author

Joshua Chatraw and Jack Carson

Keywords

Scripture

John 10:6, John 17:21, 1 Corinthians 3:11, 1 Corinthians 1:10-13, Revelation 7:10

Before he was a household name, C. S. Lewis was a hardened atheist. From his teens to his early thirties, he vocalized many of the objections to Christianity that animate doubt in our age. After his s...

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Eternal and Generous God, Every good

Author

Memorial Drive Presbyterian Church

Keywords

Scripture

Psalm 23:1, Romans 8:32, Luke 6:38, Psalm 34:10, 2 Corinthians 9:8, Philippians 4:19, James 1:17

Eternal and Generous God, Every good gift comes from You. Your generosity is expressed best Through Jesus, the Crucified and Risen One, Who gave Himself for us. We acknowledge we often doubt Your will...

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Love that Believes in Resurrection

Author

Alan Jacobs

Keywords

Norman Malcolm was an American philosopher who became close friends with Ludwig Wittgenstein (the founder of Analytic Philosophy, one of the most popular schools of philosophy up through today). In 19...

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Preaching in a New Key: Crafting Expository Sermons in Post-Christian Communities

Author

Mark R. Glanville

Keywords

Kate's Crisis: Values vs. Church One damp afternoon during the fall of 2016 I was sharing a pastoral conversation with Kate, a professional artist in her late 20s. Over years of meals and convers...

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His House of Cards

Author

Austin Fischer

Keywords

A few years ago, a pastor of an evangelical-fundamentalist church with whom I’m acquainted announced on the Sunday after Easter that he had become an atheist. He told his stunned congregation that he ...

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The Church Losing its Place as the Center of Attention

Author

Tim Wu

Keywords

The Church was the one institution whose mission depended on galvanizing attention; and through its daily and weekly offices, as well as its sometimes-central role in education, that is exactly what i...

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If birds could write books, their story of creation

Author

Barbara Brown Taylor

Keywords

Scripture

Genesis 1:2, Exodus 14:21, 1 Kings 19:11-12, Psalm 104:3-4, Acts 2:2-4, John 3:8, Matthew 6:25-34

If birds could write books, their story of creation would no doubt read quite differently than ours. In the first place, I expect they would make quite a lot out of that wind of God that swept over th...

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The Lord calls us to examine the wounds

The Lord calls us to examine the wounds of the Risen One and to see there the depth of his love for us. Let us therefore approach the throne of God in confidence as we pray for the people of God in Ch...

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Author

Flannery O'Connor

Keywords

Scripture

Psalm 46:10, John 20:29, Psalm 23:4, Proverbs 3:5-6, Isaiah 50:10, 2 Corinthians 5:7, Hebrews 11:1

People...think faith is a big electric blanket, when of course it is the cross...You arrive at enough certainty to be able to make your way, but it is making it in darkness. Don’t expect faith to clea...

worldview and perspective on Faith and Doubt

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