P)Some of...
Illustration
(P)
Some of the disciples doubted that Jesus was raised from the dead. I'm glad they did. In doubting, they gave us a model of questioning, without guilt, the great mysteries of the Christian faith.
God does not expect us to be computers who take everything that's fed into us and give it back without analysis or scrutiny. He gave us the power to reason and expects us to use it. Along with Scripture, tradition, and personal experience, reason stands as a way to belief. Reasoning embraces questioning and doubting.
C. S. Lewis said he did not consider honest doubt about spiritual matters to be a very serious problem. Doubt may not be a problem at all but, as Will Durant said, a "prerequisite of belief." What one of us, as Dostoevsky, has not had our "hosanna pass through great whirlwinds of doubt"? And what one of us has not come closer to our Lord God because of it.
The disciple I most often identify with is not Peter or James but Thomas. We preachers have given Thomas a hard time, "Doubting Thomas" and such, but I applaud him. He used his God-given reasoning powers to say, "Okay, let's look at the evidence."
God gives us the evidence. Let's look at it. God gives us the power to reason. Let's use it.
-- Barnhart
Some of the disciples doubted that Jesus was raised from the dead. I'm glad they did. In doubting, they gave us a model of questioning, without guilt, the great mysteries of the Christian faith.
God does not expect us to be computers who take everything that's fed into us and give it back without analysis or scrutiny. He gave us the power to reason and expects us to use it. Along with Scripture, tradition, and personal experience, reason stands as a way to belief. Reasoning embraces questioning and doubting.
C. S. Lewis said he did not consider honest doubt about spiritual matters to be a very serious problem. Doubt may not be a problem at all but, as Will Durant said, a "prerequisite of belief." What one of us, as Dostoevsky, has not had our "hosanna pass through great whirlwinds of doubt"? And what one of us has not come closer to our Lord God because of it.
The disciple I most often identify with is not Peter or James but Thomas. We preachers have given Thomas a hard time, "Doubting Thomas" and such, but I applaud him. He used his God-given reasoning powers to say, "Okay, let's look at the evidence."
God gives us the evidence. Let's look at it. God gives us the power to reason. Let's use it.
-- Barnhart
