“None of these things move me.” Acts 20:24.
Having questions is not the same as having doubt.
My thoughts and comments today are about “questions and doubts.”
Questions are natural and normal; asking the right questions often plays a vital role in discovery and learning. Questions can push you beyond the known and previously understood to what was not formerly considered. Medical and scientific discoveries happen because someone asked questions no one had bothered to consider. But to any honest heart, life can also present questions that trouble. Life introduces situations that make you ask, “Why?” With our imperfect knowledge and limited perspective, there are things that won’t make sense at the moment.
Questions arise in everyone. If you never ask why, then you just have not lived long enough or faced anything tough enough to leave you puzzled or struggling. Read David’s painful questions in Psalm 71:2-17. There is a time and place – “in the sanctuary of God” – where God, Who “declares the end from the beginning,” makes everything make sense. See Isaiah 46:10. Some questions are discomfiting. But God is neither nervous nor threatened about sincere inquiry. In your spiritual life, questions do not have to be the precursor of nagging doubt. Nor do questions have to be an opponent to faith. Faith can look at the hardest questions and though without every answer, simply trust God’s character, love, and wisdom. Read Hebrews 11:1,3,6.
Questions are not particularly unspiritual, unless they begin and end with doubt. Doubt can be different than questions, or doubt can easily become a belief of the heart rather than a question in the mind. You can be without doubts even while wrestling with the toughest questions, maybe even unanswerable ones – unanswerable except for God. Paul did not say that was easy to do, but he does evidence that it is possible to do. “Chains and tribulations await me. But none of these things move me.” Acts 20:22-24. Paul did not have all the answers about his future, but he knew jail and suffering were ahead for him. Acts 21:10-14 NIV. He had questions. I would; you would. But he rested assured in the purposes of God for his life and ministry.
When you are uncertain and questions trouble your mind and steal your peace, shift your focus to what is certain and unchanging; rest your questions there. Paul wrote, “Now we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when that which is complete comes, what is partial will be done away . . now I know partially, then I will know fully just as I am fully known.” 1 Corinthians 13:9-13 NIV. When there is much that you do not know, be sure in what you can know. Dwell on what you know; let God deal with what you don’t.
After Paul’s expansive defense of the Resurrection, he summarizes this way, “Therefore, [in light of the Resurrection], be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord.” 1 Corinthians 15:58. Those character qualities – “steadfast, immovable, and always abounding” – are the marks of a mature Christian who has asked their questions then trusted their doubts to God. Even with sincere questions, you can still trust with no doubts about God or His truth. Paul found a safe place to surrender his ill-founded questions and affirm his well-founded convictions. “I am suffering . . but I know Whom I have believed, and am convinced that He is able to guard what I have entrusted to Him [until the day of His return].” 2 Timothy 1:12 NIV.
Today, my prayer for you is that you surrender your questions to God, and be steadfast in faith.