Faith After Doubt

 John 18:33-37  (CEB)

Pilate went back into the palace. He summoned Jesus and asked, “Are you the king of the Jews?”

Jesus answered, “Do you say this on your own or have others spoken to you about me?”

Pilate responded, “I’m not a Jew, am I? Your nation and its chief priests handed you over to me. What have you done?”

Jesus replied, “My kingdom doesn’t originate from this world. If it did, my guards would fight so that I wouldn’t have been arrested by the Jewish leaders. My kingdom isn’t from here.”

“So you are a king?” Pilate said.

Jesus answered, “You say that I am a king. I was born and came into the world for this reason: to testify to the truth. Whoever accepts the truth listens to my voice.”

When I thought about doubt --- I always thought it was a matter of belief.

If I believed the “right” things --- I could not have doubt.

And if I didn’t believe the right things --- I would be run out of the church.

And on top of that --- I was taught that removing someone from the faith community for incorrect beliefs (what is called excommunication in some circles) was not cruel. but necessary.

Because that was just a part of following the rules and those that threatened the rules needed to be removed like a cancer.

I tried to believe correctly

I hung on for as long as I could --- sometimes it seemed like I was just barely hanging on by my fingernails.

But slowly, doubts began to grow the more seriously I read and studied the bible.

I struggled with the reality of at least two --- very distinct and different creation stories.

But what probably pushed me over the edge was when I began studying the birth stories in detail.

Raymond Brown’s now classic, commentary The Birth of the Messiah opened the flood gates to doubt.

And then along came Marcus Borg and John Dominic Crossan --- and their works finished me off.

I was forced to synthesize my doubt and try to build a new coherent theology based on my faith AFTER doubt.

What Borg and Crossan, and later McLaren helped me realize was that it wasn’t of utmost importance (eternal importance) that I BELIEVED the stories as FACTUAL --- but to learn to read beyond the text --- some might say to read between the text or behind the text.

To grasp the meaning each individual story carried

Not only to the early church, but to me

To learn to let the stories breathe in me

The word McLaren uses --- is to let the stories “animate me”

And that made sense to me.

It wasn’t of eternal importance if the story took place exactly like it is written, but what was important was what the story is trying to teach us --- teach me

McLaren writes:

The meaning was the hidden treasure, the hidden pearl, the spirit of the story hidden in its letters and words and punctuation.  Whether I considered the stories factually accurate was never the point; what actually mattered all along was whether I lived a life pregnant with the meaning those stories contained.

Today is Christ the King Sunday --- the last Sunday of the year --- next Sunday will be the first Sunday in Advent

It is fitting that we end the year with a statement of allegiance to the one who reigns over us. 

We declare our ultimate allegiance not to a nation, not to a denomination or even a particular church, --- not to an ideal or dream, but to a person. 

Do I need to repeat that again?

Because I imagine if we look at our allegiances we do not align very well with that statement.

Our faith is to be all about a relationship with Jesus of Nazareth, whom we have experienced as the Messiah or the Christ.

Jesus is the one who reigns over us, the one in whom we find our identity and our being. 

But when I read this story of Jesus and Pilate --- I must admit --- I have my doubts whether it actually took place the way the author of John reports it.

I could go into a lengthy argument about my doubts --- about concerns the way the story is recorded --- but that is just an exercise of missing the point.

The point is --- why --- why was this story preserved and passed down to us today in this way --- and why has it become the cornerstone of the concluding Sunday of the Christian year --- the culmination of all we believe.

Not because Pilate actually declared that Jesus is King of the Jews but because we are being called to look at what we honor and hold above all others.

Is Jesus most important? --- Is Jesus the King of our lives? --- Do we put Jesus first? 

or are the Colts?, 

or the Pacers, 

or Butler, IU or even Duke basketball?

Does Jesus reign over us --- or do our investment accounts?

If we focus on the literalness of the story and not the meaning --- it is much easier to create rationalizations (that a lot of us are all doing right now in our heads).

But once we take the meaning to heart --- everything changes.

I have mentioned the name Rachel Held Evans many times to you over the years.  Her influence on my life has been profound --- and she has led me to a variety of other biblical scholars and theologians who are not afraid to wrestle with the doubts in their faith journey.

What attracted me to Rachel Held Evans was her vulnerability.

She NEVER claimed to have figured it all out

And she was unafraid to share her struggles.

I want to pause for a minute and share a piece of my worldview.

One of the greatest gifts that my older brother gave me was to open up the possibility of participating in High School Debate --- I have no idea what attracted him.

About three or four years ago --- my debate coach (George Stege) showed up here on a Sunday morning (you want to talk about a humbling experience)

And before the pandemic we were reconnecting in a wonderful way.

What debate taught me was to look over, under and behind an issue.

That nothing --- in reality --- is black and white.

Following High School --- I went off to college and studied History and Political Science.

The history department had hired a number of professors who were black-listed during the McCarthy era.

The Political Science department was extremely conservative and ideologically aligned with Ronald Reagan.

Both viewpoints can’t be right --- can they?

What I learned from that experience has shaped my life --- and that is that ideology is not linear --- with the extremes at polar opposing ends

Instead, it is much more like a globe

And the far right and left are a heck of a lot more similar than either wants to believe

That experience taught me to doubt --- to not take things for granted --- but to try and understand the meaning.

I also learned to try and listen and, too not only see but also understand, other points of view.

I don’t always agree with them --- but I try my darndest not to make it into a wall that separates us

Rachel Held Evans in a blog post wrote:

David Kinnaman explains in his enlightening book, You Lost Me, one of the top six responses among young adults is that they left the church because they didn’t feel like their pastors, mentors, and friends took their questions about faith seriously. 

“Young Christians (and former Christians too) say the church is not a place that allows them to express doubts,” writes Kinnaman. “They do not feel safe admitting that faith doesn’t always make sense. In addition, many feel that the church’s response to doubt is trivial and fact-focused, as if people can be talked out of doubting.” 

As I’ve said on multiple occasions, most young adults I know aren’t looking for a religion that answers all of their questions, but rather a community of faith in which they feel safe to asking them.  A good place to start in creating such a community is to treat young adults like the complex human beings they are, and to take their questions about faith seriously.

I don’t think it is simply young people who wrestle with questions and doubts about faith.

Moreover --- I am convinced that doubt does not need to be the end of faith.

Instead, it offers to us a re-birth into a new kind of faith.

A faith that expresses itself in radical love.

In the Letter to the Galatians, crusty old Paul sums it up nicely when he told them:

“The only thing that matters is faith expressing itself in love!”

My hunch is that most of the people in Galatia started doing what we often do --- the WHAT ABOUTS

What about the non-observant?

What about the gentiles?

What about the . . . you can fill in the blank.

But Paul says emphatically:

“The only thing that matters is faith expressing itself in love!”

Faith after doubt acknowledges that we don’t have it all figured out --- but that LOVE is the only way to treat each other.

We seek to live in harmony with one another.

Brian McLaren closes his book with a beautiful benediction based on the beatitudes, that I want to end with today:

Blessed are the curious, for their curiosity honors reality.

Blessed are the uncertain and those with second thoughts, for their minds are     still open.

Blessed are the wonderers, for they shall find what is wonderful.

Blessed are those who question their answers, for their horizons will expand forever.

Blessed are those who often feel foolish, for they are wiser than those who always think themselves wise.

Blessed are those who are scolded, suspected, and labeled as heretics by the gatekeepers, for the prophets and mystics were treated in the same way by the gatekeepers of their day.

Blessed are those who know their unknowing, for they shall have the last laugh.

Blessed are the perplexed, for they have reached the frontiers of contemplation.

Blessed are they who become cynical about their cynicism and suspicious of their suspicion, for they will enter the second innocence.

Blessed are the doubters, for they shall see through false gods.

Blessed are the lovers, for they shall see God everywhere.

Is Jesus first in your life?

What does that look like to have Jesus as our King?

Are you willing to fall in love with Jesus?

Paul would tell us quite simply

“The only thing that matters is faith expressing itself in love!”