S20P13 – The obstacles to faith: doubt
Matthew 7:24-27
Anyone who listens to my teaching and follows it is wise, like a person who builds a house on solid rock. Though the rain comes in torrents and the floodwaters rise and the winds beat against that house, it won’t collapse because it is built on bedrock. But anyone who hears my teaching and doesn’t obey it is foolish, like a person who builds a house on sand. When the rains and floods come and the winds beat against that house, it will collapse with a mighty crash.
Doubt can be defined as uncertainty or a lack of conviction. It results when circumstances cause us to question a certain outcome. Sometimes we experience doubt because the circumstance before us is simply filled with unknowns. Other times we experience doubt concerning things about which we should be secure and certain. This is the doubt that gets in the way of our faith.
Today’s scripture tells us what our lives look like when we build them on the foundation known as Jesus Christ. This is not necessarily a picture of all things appearing to work out great and in our favor, but it is a picture of security and reliability. Our issue as human beings is that we constantly try to reconcile the truth of what we know about God with the apparent circumstances through which we must live. At times the physical and finite seem to affirm that which we know to be true of God. Other times the opposite seems true. When this happens, we must remember to fall back on what is firm and reliable. That is the truth that God tells us.
Those things which we have been told by God are objective truth. Those things which seem to call into question what God has told us are apparent truth. You must always understand that the way things appear must bow in submission to the way God says things actually are. The perceptions that bring thoughts of doubt must be placed in submission to the truth regularly so that we may have faith even when all signs indicate otherwise. Remember, our foundation is firm and secure. Because of this, we should have confidence in it. Father, continue to increase in us faith and confidence in You and in your promises so that we may successfully dispel doubt by placing all things in submission to You and your truth.