Doubt and Its Many Angles

I have an Instagram account, and on this Instagram account, I follow perhaps not so cool historical photos, like a channel that sort of shows these amazing photos from the late eighteen hundreds and the early nineteen hundreds, and all the weird and wonderful things that were happening at that time. And recently, I saw a photo of one of the first deep sea divers in their suits before they sort of made the, you know, the jump into the water. And I thought at that time, I reflected at that time, what incredible courage this person must have had to have gotten into a lead laden suit, a suit so heavy, so immobile in many ways, with a little bit of a window right in front of their face.

That's all they had. This huge bubble cast iron or bronze helmet on with their only hope being this tube that comes from the helmet. You've seen those old deep sea diving suits. Imagine being the first guy to jump into the water with that thing, hoping and trusting that this thing is gonna work, that they're gonna be able to breathe, that the pressure won't, you know, crush them or that there won't be any leaks in the suit.

And I thought about the incredible trust and, I guess, the opposite of that, the doubt that creeps in would be that they have no other alternatives, no other ways of escape than this little bit of light air that's coming into their suit. Once you're down there, there are no other alternatives of escape. You must rely on this one life giving tube of air. Can you imagine the pressure of that doubt or overcoming that doubt as you're putting on that suit? In those situations where you have to rely on only that one way out.

There is no other oxygen there to grab. There is only one life saving, life protecting option. And in that situation, I believe doubt is at its worst when there is only one option, there is only one escape. You can't put together some sort of solution that's gonna solve this situation.

You have no alternatives. One shot, one escape route. This morning, we're going to talk about the topic or the concept of doubt. Many of us may sit here and we think, it's not applicable to me. I've been a Christian for many, many years.

I don't wrestle with doubt. Or perhaps you also do remember that even as strong believers, there have come times where our hearts, even as we thought of ourselves as strong, strong believers, our hearts have been reduced to troubling, quaking, wavering things. Our minds have been filled with doubts and questions. So today, I wanna explore with you the concept of doubt and its many angles.

And this morning, we're going to look at a wonderful passage that deals very sympathetically with this topic in Luke chapter seven, and it is dealt with by no other than Jesus Himself. We're gonna turn to verse 18 of Luke chapter seven. And like I already alluded to earlier in the worship service, we're dealing with the story of John the Baptist and his relation to Jesus. Luke seven, verse 18. The disciples of John reported all these things to him, all that Jesus was doing.

And John, calling two of his disciples to him, sent them to the Lord saying, are you the one who is to come or shall we look for another? When the men had come to him, they said, John the Baptist has sent us to you, saying, are you the one who is to come, or shall we look for another? In that hour, He, Jesus, healed many people of diseases and plagues and evil spirits, and on many who were blind, He bestowed sight. And He answered them, go and tell John what you have seen and heard.

The blind receive their sight, the lame walk, lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear. The dead are raised up, the poor have good news preached to them, and blessed is the one who is not offended by Me. When John's messengers had gone, Jesus began to speak to the crowds concerning John. What did you go out into the wilderness to see? A reed shaken by the wind?

What then did you go out to see? A man dressed in soft clothing? Behold, those who are dressed in splendid clothing and live in luxury are in king's courts. What then did you go out to see? A prophet?

Yes. I tell you, and more than a prophet. This is he of whom it is written, behold, I send My messenger before Your face who will prepare Your way before You.

Jesus continued, I tell you, among those born of women, none is greater than John. Yet the one who is least in the kingdom of God is greater than he. When all the people heard this and the tax collectors too, they declared God just, having been baptised with the baptism of John. But the Pharisees and the lawyers rejected the purpose of God for themselves, not having been baptised by him. To what then shall I compare the people of this generation and what are they like?

They are like children sitting in the marketplace and calling to one another, we played the flute for you and you did not dance. We sang a dirge and you did not weep. John the Baptist has come eating no bread and drinking no wine and you say, he has a demon. The son of man has come eating and drinking, and you say, look at him, a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners, yet wisdom is justified by all her children.

So far the reading. Well, in this passage, we come to see that there's an interaction, a dialogue that's happening between Jesus and John the Baptist. John has just sent out a message while he was sitting in prison of confirming whether Jesus was the one that he was waiting for, the one that he had been preparing the world for. But this morning, I want us to unpack this message a little bit more, this passage a bit more, to see how doubt played its role in this interaction and how doubt fuelled some of these questions that John had, but how faith also played its role in this passage. And we're gonna break it up into three areas.

Firstly, this morning, we see doubt that comes from disappointment. Like I said, John had been taken captive by king Herod at that time. John the Baptist had preached against the king, that he had been living an immoral life, that he had married unlawfully the wife of his brother, and thereby he was committing adultery. By all accounts, Herod was a man who lived a licentious life, an exuberant life, an over the top life in terms of morality. If you read the stories, you'll get that sort of picture.

And Herod obviously didn't like this sort of preaching being aimed at him. And so he had John the Baptist imprisoned, put him in his own jail cell. From prison, John sends this message. Why does John send this message? Well, it's because John didn't understand what Jesus was doing.

He had no understanding of what this kingdom of God that he was waiting for, preaching about, how it was going to look. Because John had come onto the scene thundering about God's impending judgment. He preached a message of repentance to people. He led the way for thousands of people to be baptised, marking in that baptism a commitment back to the Lord, a returning, a repenting back to God. John was so earnest to do God's will, so sold out to the mission of God that he publicly denounced King Herod.

What does Herod do? Herod doesn't repent. Instead, he takes John captive. As John is languishing in prison, he begins wrestling with doubt. There is only one way out, that door out there.

Why is he in this place? Doubt has come from unmet expectations about who this man Jesus is, who he had been preparing the way for. I've been to the place where Herod's temple was, and we walked underneath the temple courts to see the prisons. We saw the place where John the Baptist would have been kept, and it was right under the great party courts of king Herod. Can you imagine being bound by chains in that prison, having preached to Herod to turn his life around to receive God, and Herod is not receiving it, and Jesus, the one who John had been preaching about and saying, He is the one whose sandals are not worthy to untie.

This Jesus breaks onto the scene as well, but what is happening? Jesus doesn't condemn Herod. Jesus doesn't send guerrilla mercenaries to storm the royal courts. Jesus couldn't even get the religious leaders on His side.

The ones that you would think would flock to a religious man. John knew the Old Testament prophets. He knew that Isaiah had foretold that the Messiah would come to proclaim freedom, to bring freedom to prisoners, Isaiah 61. The Messiah would come and break people out of their shackles and yet, Jesus hadn't freed him.

He knew that Jesus was going to come and on that arrival, the Messiah would bring the vengeance of God, the judgment of God. But there is no trumpet sound. There are no heavenly armies that have descended. There's not even an earthly army following this man. John's disappointment is revealed when he isn't out of prison and God's vengeance has not been poured out on the likes of Herod.

And we see John's expectations about Jesus is probably a little disappointed. Perhaps some of us understand that concept, the doubt that creeps in when things haven't turned out the way that we had hoped. We prayed with a lot of trust, a lot of faith that someone would be healed and they still die of cancer. We trust and we believe that if we remain humble and if we worked hard on our marriage, we could salvage it.

But those partners don't change. We prayed for that job that never turned out the way we hoped it would. We prayed for children that have wandered into troubling waters. We still wrestle with depressions and anxieties which just won't leave us alone. Have you ever found yourself doubting the goodness of God, the power of God, the investment of God to see and know you in those situations?

If you say yes at any time, then you have wrestled with doubt. We need to hear firstly this morning that God, specifically our Lord Jesus Christ, can handle that doubt. And John sends his disciples asking Jesus a really blunt and I mean, you can dare say it's almost a rude question. Are you really the guy we're waiting for? Jesus hears that and He doesn't condemn John and say, you wicked doubting so and so.

Are you crazy? How dare you doubt Me? Jesus is gentle in receiving that news, gentle in receiving that message. And He simply sends a message of confidence, strength back to John. See what is happening here and tell John.

The blind see, the sick are healed, lepers are cleansed. And the good news, a message of hope is being preached to the poor, the down and out. Paul Tillich, a theologian and a philosopher, once said that doubt is not the opposite of faith. It is an element of faith. So firstly, I wanna remind us that we should be aware that doubts may spring up in our hearts when our finite minds just can't comprehend the infinite ways that God might be sorting out these issues in our lives.

Be aware that whatever may happen to us, don't let our thinking stop there. Don't let our doubts have the last say, which leads us to the next point. What happens next in the situation of John? Doubt is restored only when attention is directed intentionally back to the work of Jesus. As John is sitting in that prison, even while he is doubting, John sends his disciples to Jesus.

Think about the options that he did have. He could have sent them to the Pharisees, to the scribes, to these experts who should have known the Old Testament prophecies, who would have sort of been talking and theologising about this and thinking when and where is the Messiah gonna come. He could have sent them to those guys and said, does this stack up with this Jesus? He knows Jesus. He is doubtful of Jesus, and yet he decides to send these messengers to just check in again.

Are you the one? Listen to what happens next. Jesus doesn't say, rather, look at all these things that I have done and cursed is the one who doubts me. Woe is you for doubting. Instead, He says in verse 23, blessed is the one who is not offended by Me.

Verse 23, blessed is the one who is not offended by Me. The NIV puts it, blessed is anyone who does not stumble on account of Me. It is such a comforting way to be rebuked, to be corrected. When as a believer, we're struggling with doubt, here is a way to deal with it. Take it to Christ.

Ask Him. Ask Him. If you need a gentle rebuke, He will give it. But trust that He always has a view of bringing healing. Jesus tells John's disciples too, take a look, to talk to these people that have been healed, to go and take a look at these lepers whose skin has been restored, and then go back to John and tell him what they've seen and heard.

Jesus is saying to them and to John, look at My life and My ministry. These miracles prove the power of God, and it authenticates who I say I am. John, you've been expecting a saviour who is a king, who will take down kings like Herod and crush empires like Rome. You've been expecting a king who's gonna through strength and force and passion and fury, the things that John understood with his passion and his fury, you're expecting a saviour like yourself. Jesus says, I'm showing you a saviour.

I'm showing you that I am that saviour, but I'm doing it through healing and restoration and teaching and humility. And Jesus states in verse 28 that John is the greatest of men. He also adds this, he who is the least in the kingdom of God is greater than he. And what Jesus is saying here is that while John's passion and zeal made him the greatest prophet of that Old Testament generation, that Old Testament era, I mean, we can't underestimate just what a huge role player John was.

We don't get the full impact, I think, from Scripture, but read the historians of that time, and John was a megastar preacher. He had a huge following. As great as John's passion and his fury and his strength was, Jesus says the one who is the least in the kingdom, the gentlest, the meekest, the humblest is greater still. And who is Jesus referring to? Himself.

In many ways, I think Jesus is the opposite of John's character and personality. When John wanted action, Jesus gives teaching. When John sought words of condemnation, Jesus provides words of life and freedom. When John preached repentance in the courts of kings, Jesus preached good news to the poor. In many ways, John could not grasp the meaning of this diametrically opposed method of ushering in the kingdom of God.

But the one thing that John did, and it was the saving grace, is that he goes to Jesus to just check. He still believed. He still hoped that Jesus could provide the answer for his doubts. And so he goes to Jesus with those doubts. And friends, I wanna tell you, if we are struggling at any point, whether that is this week today, whether that is in a year's time, if we are struggling with doubt, go back to this question: who is Jesus Christ?

Who is Jesus Christ? And I wanna guarantee you, you will find faith for that doubt. The Old Testament prophecies, go and read them. Go and read what these prophets hundreds of years before said this Messiah would be. Go and read the Gospels, the teaching, the work that Jesus Christ Himself did.

Could He have been a charlatan? Could He have been a fake? Go and read and listen and reflect and ask yourself, don't these messages ring true? John chapter six. Jesus asked His disciples this very question when after some, it was probably the worst preaching disaster of all time. Jesus preaches about how His disciples will eventually eat His flesh and drink His blood.

In John chapter six, it says that many left Jesus. They said, this teaching is too hard. Who can believe it? And then Jesus turns to the twelve. And the picture is like it's pretty much just the twelve that are left.

And He says to them, will you also leave Me? And Peter, obviously Peter, it is always Peter, says to Him, Lord, where would we go? Where would we go? You have the words of eternal life. We believe and we have come to know that You are the Holy One of God.

When you struggle with doubt, look to the person of Jesus Christ. You may doubt creation. You may doubt the authenticity of the Old Testament. You may doubt that there is a Creator who knows and cares for you, but in Jesus Christ, those things will be answered. Keep going back to Jesus when you have those doubts.

But then lastly in our passage, we see Jesus finishing with a warning. And it's also a warning that we need to hear, and then I wanna dare say our friends need to hear as well. Jesus highlights doubt which may be fake, doubt which may be fake. There is a phenomenon in which we as human beings use doubt really as a way of excusing or rejecting following Christ.

We use doubt not simply because we struggle to believe, but because we don't want to believe. You see, faith in Jesus means you must give your life away. It means you must die to yourself daily, take up that cross daily. Faith in Jesus means that your life will be radically reoriented around the will of God, not your will, not what works for you, not how you can manipulate your situation.

There's some debate of the words of verses 29 and 30 in our passage, whether that was the words of Jesus or whether that was the word of Luke. I think it's probably Luke's words that he's added like the way our ESV has written it down here in parentheses, in sort of like a side note. But it is highlighting in this parenthesis two groups of people listening to Jesus at this time. Luke says one group is made up mostly of commoners or poor people who Jesus was preaching this good news to. In this group of poor people are the notorious tax collectors that Luke identifies specifically.

But Luke says that through John's ministry, this group has been baptised. Remembering that John's baptism was a baptism of repentance, a preparation, a turning back to God. It meant that these people had acknowledged God's justice and that God's judgment was true, that they were sinners. In other words, when John thundered in his preaching against their sins, in their hearts they said, God is righteous and I am not. I am guilty before the throne of the holy God.

And then there's a second group. And these were the very people who knew Scripture and who should have welcomed John's message of repentance, of preparation. They should have welcomed the message of the Messiah that John is pointing to, but they do not. They reject God's purpose. They refuse to humble themselves to be baptised by this radical.

Their pride kept them from acknowledging themselves as sinners and therefore refused them participating in the baptism of repentance. They thought, we're better than these people. We know more. It's surely not as simple as this. We don't need this.

And so they missed God's purpose through John's ministry. But in missing John's message, they missed Jesus as well. And Jesus uses the parable that he preaches here in verses 31 and 32 to expose the root problem. Have a look at that. Those who had rejected both John and then Jesus, Jesus says, were like children playing games in the marketplace.

Jesus paints a picture of kids saying to each other, just playing around somewhere, let's pretend we're at a wedding and we'll dance. And the other kids say, no, we don't feel happy like that. We don't wanna play that game. And so the other kids, the first group says, alright, well, how about we pretend to be at a funeral and we'll sing a sad song.

We'll sing a dirge. And the other group says, we don't wanna play that game either. Jesus says, in other words, you can't please them no matter what you do because they don't want to participate at all. And this is why Jesus holds them up as the example of both John the Baptist and Himself. Jesus explains that John comes into the world sticking to an austere life.

He's the dirge of the parable. He's the sad song, that he's the man who wore camel hair, who lived in the desert, who lived the simple life, who reflected on his life and his way of living in relation to Scripture all the time. And there were certain people, among them the Pharisees, who said, he's a radical. He's got a demon. He's out of his mind.

We won't listen to that. Then Jesus says, then Jesus comes, the son of man. And he comes and he eats and he drinks like a normal person. He spends time with friends. He doesn't live in the wilderness by himself as a hermit.

And you say, he's a drunkard and a glutton. You can't have it either way. And then, therefore, you won't have it in any way. The problem is not for these men the messengers of God. The problem is the message of God.

The problem lies in the proud hearts of these people. That is what Jesus is saying. And this passage we read is so wonderfully given to us because it is all about doubt. Honest doubts in John, fake doubt in the Pharisees. One goes to Christ without doubt and is comforted and is strengthened and his faith is restored.

And the others, they don't even know what they're missing out on. Be careful of the concept of fake doubt. Using doubt as an excuse to reject Jesus. And as a pastor, I've been in the worst of situations. I've seen people do the worst things knowingly.

And when I've been confronted with that sin, I can't tell you how many times people will say, I don't really believe in this anyway. I've got no way to prove whether they do or not. It's easier to say, I don't believe, than to say to Jesus, I am a sinner. Forgive me. Heal me.

Be careful of fake doubt. Romans 1:20 says that all of humanity is actually aware of God. All of humanity is aware of God. And one day, we will all stand before Him and none of us will have an excuse. We won't say, in that day, I didn't know.

I couldn't believe. The Bible says people will say, I did know and I should have. So we are challenged to weigh up in our hearts whether our doubt is really doubt or whether it's fake, needing an excuse. Legend has it that a man was lost in a desert one time, absolutely parched and thirsty. He had been there for days, and he was at the point of dying of thirst when he stumbled upon a ramshackled, windowless, weather beaten cottage.

He went inside to find a little bit of shade from the heat, but inside he noticed an old rusty water pump. He stumbled over to it, grabbed the handle, and started pumping up and down, but nothing came out. Disappointed, he staggered back. But then he noticed to the side of the pump an old jug, and he picked it up and he wiped away the dust. And there on the jug was a message that read, you have to prime the pump with all the water in this jug.

PS. Be sure to fill the jug again before you leave. The man popped the cork on the jug and sure enough, it was full of water. Suddenly, he was faced with a decision. If he drank the water, then there would not be enough to prime this pump.

But if he poured all that water onto the rusty pump, well then maybe it would bring out fresh cool water from down deep in the well, all the water that he wanted. Would he really be willing to throw away all that water for the chance that it may not work? Could he trust these flimsy instructions written on a note from long ago? Reluctantly, he poured all that water onto the pump.

Then he grabbed the handle and began to pump, but nothing came out. Squeak, squeak, squeak went the pump as he desperately tried. And finally, a bit of brown came out. So he tried again, squeak, squeak, squeak, and a little stream came out. He kept pumping and then finally cool, clear, delicious water came out.

Overjoyed, he filled the jug and drank and drank until he couldn't drink any more water. He filled all the containers he could find in the shed and put it in his backpack. And then finally, he grabbed that old jug, filled it to the brim for the next traveller. And placing the cork back on, he added this little note onto the label. Believe me, it works.

You have to give it all away before you will receive back more than you can handle. Friends, that is the call of our faith. Placing your hope and your trust in the Lord Jesus to have been what His ancient word says He was. To trust that He really accomplished on the cross for you, for me, what He said He would. Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.

Lord, are you the one who was to come or should we look for another? Jesus says, the blind have received sight. The paralysed walk. The lepers are healed. The deaf hear.

The dead are raised, and the gospel is preached to the poor. Look around this morning. These are the same people that Jesus was talking about. Maybe not all of us have been healed of these sort of things physically. Perhaps a few more of us have been healed in that way emotionally, but all of us have been healed in that way spiritually.

Go and tell what you have seen and heard, Jesus says, of this incredible work. Will you take that jug of faith, that jug that we only have one of? Will we pour out that jug of faith on the one thing, the one man, Jesus Christ? Will we take it and commit it to Jesus? Friends, this morning, I want you to see Him.

I want you to believe in Him, and I want you to bind your heart and your trust on Him. We have to give it all away before we will receive anything back. But when we do, it'll be more than we can handle. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we thank you for this just wonderfully succinct, wonderfully written, explained version of these events.

The dramatic irony, the paradox of two groups of people wrestling with doubt, wrestling with faith. Help us, Lord Jesus, to trust that we may come to You, to receive from You water of life. Father, forgive us for our doubts. Forgive us when we have turned to other things, other saviours, perhaps our self, perhaps other people to make meaning, to make purpose, to problem solve the things that we are worried about. Lord, we pray that You will, in Your gentle way, forgive us and comfort us this morning again, that You will restore to us the joy of our salvation and that we may trust again wholeheartedly that You are the one who You say You are, the Saviour who has come to take away the sin of the world, the one who has ushered in the kingdom of God.

Thank you, Lord, that we know that all the sufferings and the hardships we go through now are not worth comparing to the riches of the glory we will one day experience. Help us to hold onto that. Help us to see that and believe that. We thank you, Lord, for Your patience with us along the way. Give us faith again.

In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.