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In touch

Up-to-the-minute jumping-off points for sermons, linking the reading to the latest news and global issues

Doubt is good!

Christians experience both faith and doubt – and that’s alright! (Matthew 11:3)

 

Context

Who can take even a casual glance at the state of God’s world in Advent 2025 and still fail to notice that not everything is as (we believe) God wants it to be?

Faced with the suffering endured by so many of our sisters and brothers through conflict, climate change, poverty and pollution, to the overcrowded hospitals, record numbers of homeless people and pressure on food banks, who can honestly not ask themselves what has happened to Jesus Christ’s 2000-year-old words about “life in all its fullness” (John 10:10)?

It's a good question – and I mean a really GOOD question. It’s the kind of question we, as Christians, should ask ourselves for, as American novelist Anne Lamott pointed out, 'The 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. Faith also means reaching deeply within, for the sense one was born with, the sense, for example, to go for a walk.' Anne Lamott, Plan B: Further Thoughts on Faith, Penguin 2004

 

Ideas for sermons or interactive talks

Today’s Gospel reading finds John the Baptist not captivating crowds of people, denouncing the Pharisees and Sadducees or baptising Jesus at the River Jordan, but in prison, facing death, and wondering whether all that preaching and baptising had been a ghastly mistake. Having proclaimed Jesus with prophetic conviction (Matthew 3:11-12), he is now full of doubt and sends his disciples to ask Jesus if he really is the man he’d believed him to be.

What this tells us is profound. While the writer to the Hebrews tells readers, “Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen” (Hebrews 11:1), John’s experience teaches us that doubt and questioning are also a legitimate part of the Christian journey. It’s alright to doubt, especially when we’re feeling trapped or hopeless or facing death. Doubt doesn’t make us “bad” Christians. Given the sadness and suffering and sin all around us, it's a natural part of being Christians. Christianity is not a competition to find out which of us has the most faith. No one should ever feel compelled to be – or pretend to be – joyful all the time. A real Church is a community where, at any time, those who are happy support those who are sad, those who are healthy support those who are sick, those who have plenty support those who have little, and those who are hopeful support those who are doubtful.

Jesus said, “I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly” (John 10:10), and the word “may” (or “might” - Greek: ἔχωσιν, echōsin) is not a guarantee – that would be “will” or “shall” – but an offer. God’s people may have life in all its fullness if they follow in the way that Jesus walked before us.

If Christian faith cannot enable us to face sorrow as well as joy, if it cannot equip us to challenge suffering as well as to celebrate success, then it has little to do with the Jesus Christ who both entertained the children and healed the sick, who both drank wine at a wedding and spoke up for the poor, and underwent his Passion and Crucifixion before his Resurrection and Ascension.

 

Questions for discussion

• What are our greatest concerns at present, as individuals and as a community?
• What doubts do we feel for ourselves and for the world?
• How does our Christian faith equip us to face sorrow and challenge suffering?
• What signs of hope do we see as we approach Christmas?

Robert Beard is an NHS worker and Church of England priest.

 

Check-in

Connecting faith with everyday, real-life issues for young people

Australia has just banned social media accounts for under 16s - some are calling for the same in the UK. There are nuanced arguments for and against a ban but recently I experienced one of the arguments for in an unexpected and somewhat harsh way.

This particular argument goes: social media is detrimental to face-to-face relationships. The truth of this was brought home to me when I went for a hearing test. Members of my family had been saying that I was going deaf. I thought they were mumbling (I have teenage sons!). Turns out we were all wrong. After confirming my hearing was fine the audiologist told me about the research that shows we listen least well to those closest to us. We listen to our close family whilst doing other things and so are less likely to give them our full attention. Sometimes you just need to talk whilst doing life, but at other times it’s more insidious - familiarity can breed contempt and we become more interested in the new things presented to us on social media than we are in the people immediately in front of us.

But doom scrolling doesn’t just stop us hearing from our family, it stops us hearing from God.

It is important to try to resolve problems politically but some things will not be finally solved until Jesus comes again. This Advent, as we approach Jesus’ first coming, our reading reminds us of Jesus’ second coming. It is full of amazing promises of great joy but what leapt out to me was that “the eyes of the blind be opened and the ears of the deaf unstopped” (Isaiah 35:5).

Banning phones for U16s will have some benefits but might also cause other problems and not be as successful as we hope. Jesus’ second coming on the other hand will remove all the barriers to joy and the flourishing of human relationships because it will finally remove the last barrier between us and God.

Dr Gareth Crispin is Tutor for Youth and Children's Ministry at Emmanuel Theological College.

 

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