Doubt is insidious and like poison; it affects the whole belief system. Who knows where we would be today if Eve had said no to the seed of doubt the serpent sowed, or if Adam had stood strong and refused to listen to it’s effects on Eve. The consequences of accepting doubt have been grave for the human race.
The serpents’ words were like a seed. The serpent was the representative of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, and he was there sowing seed from that tree. The seed of every tree produces after it’s own kind, and the fruit of this seed has affected generations of humanity and has pervaded the thinking of millions.
Doubt pervades our whole society. From childhood we are ingrained with it’s effects, and it is only though Christ that we can get to a place of victory over doubt and enter a place of faith. Today we have professional doubters, people educated in doubt, who openly mock and attack the faith of others. Society is immersed in doubt and we need to be changed on the inside, we need to be immersed in faith.
When Jesus came into this world, there were many issues that He addressed, but chief on His list was His attack on doubt. Many times He rebuked His disciples for their lack of faith. When Peter struggled with walking on water He “reached out His hand and caught him. “You of little faith,” He said, “why did you doubt?” (Matthew 14:31)
Jesus came to undo the work the enemy had done and He attacked the core of his work, Jesus attacked doubt. Some of us have doubt so entrenched in our lives and our thinking that we are oblivious to it. We need an awakening. We need our faith challenged. I remember a young lady translating for us in one of our Campaigns in Bolivia. She didn’t believe in miracles because that’s what her Church had taught her.
Yet, as our translator, she had to witness and translate as countless people received miraculous healing from God. By the end of that Campaign her whole belief system had been shaken. She was totally transformed by what she had witnessed. She was brought to a place of humility and repentance.
I can tell you, before I was a Christian, I was agnostic and it was an encounter with God which shook my unbelief to the core. To this day, when I think about what happened, I am still shaken by it. God calls us to challenge doubt and confront it head on. We need to remove it from our lives so we can be powerful witnesses to the reality of God.
The Bible tells us that whatever is not of faith is sin (Romans 14:23) and we need to be reminded afresh that not only is it wrong to doubt God, in His eyes doubt is sin. When Jairus came to Jesus, his daughter had died. The room was full of people who were crying and wailing, and I believe there is a place for mourning and properly working through the loss of loved ones, but in this situation these people were operating in unbelief.
Sometimes, when we experience things and react with our very human emotion, we can find ourselves at cross purposes with faith. And Jesus removed the doubters. Sometimes in order to receive the miracle we need from God, we need to remove the doubt in our lives. We need to disassociate with those who won’t get into a place of faith with us. God moves in an atmosphere of faith. (Mark 5:21-43)
2 Corinthians 5:5 says “We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.” The battle against doubt is a battle of the heart and mind. And where seeds of doubt have been planted in our lives we need to remove them, cast them out and demolish them.
There are times when we have heard from God, like Adam and Eve, and a thought comes to our mind which causes us to doubt what God has said. Let me encourage you today, that thought is a seed of doubt from the enemy and needs to be cast out. If that thought exalts itself against the knowledge and reality of God it needs to be removed.
Or maybe you have a friend or family member who has challenged your faith stand and doubted what you have heard from God. I believe there is a place for making ourselves accountable to others, when it comes to what we believe and what we have heard from God; but there are also times where those we love the most can be used by the enemy to sow a seed of doubt in our lives.
We need to have a hatred for doubt as much as any form of sin. Sometimes, we need to do whatever it takes to stay in a place of faith. If you’re wondering whether the thought you have is one of faith or not, I would suggest that if you’re in doubt, cast it out.
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