This week we gave our students the chance to voice thier doubts. Each person was handed a note card and asked to write down thier greatest doubt concerning thier faith and the list below is a compilation of all of those thoughts. Our hope is to start an on-line conversation here on Going Public. Please read through the list and respond in any way you see fit. Then respond to the responses of others, thus creating a conversation.
I Doubt…
-God exists
-God really answers every prayer
-God really loves me after all of the stupid things I’ve done
-The rest of my family will find faith
-That some of the people I know will ever find God
-The people in this church
-That His plan is better than mine
-God’s reason for letting things happen
-Myself as a Christian
-That I can live up to who God wants me to be
-My own faith
-People’s honesty
-God cares about slavery
-That He always is with and listens to me
-That Jesus and God are one person. I think they are two people
-That He is everywhere all the time
-How He loves everyone the same, (like criminals)
-That there is eternity to spend with God
-That some words in the Bible are not true
-That God is really that powerful as they say He is
-That everything is going to be ok, that God will always be there for me
-God’s forgiveness
-That He is watching my every move
-God’s views on homosexuality
-That He is always with me
-That God loves us even when we mess up really bad
-He is always near
-How it’s possible to be perfect
-All those miracles, why doesn’t He do them anymore
-Hell, I think when people die they go to heaven and get a second chance
-You have to be a believer to go to heaven (babies that die)
-How the earth was made
-That atheists could be saved
-That God doesn’t hate anybody
-That people who believe in other religions cannot live a good life
-That all Muslims, Jews and other non-Christians go to hell
-Why things happen and how God will ultimately work it out
-When things get really hard or stressful that His hand is always guiding me
-Heaven and hell
-Things I don’t see, I have to see to believe
-That Christ is always with you
-People who think their interpretation of Scripture is correct and everyone else is wrong
-That people will listen to me
-That God is there when I see horrible things happen to good people
-God when I don’t feel like worshiping
-God’s plan when bad things happen to good people
-What the Bible says; is it all true
-There is a hell; hell is on earth
-That it is that simple to get into heaven
-That He cares about me amidst all the crap of the world
-Some of the stories of the Bible
-We care more about God than our religion
-Churches today are what God wanted His following to be like
-What we learn in Church is what God really wants
-What it feels like to be a Christian
-Sometimes that He knows what His plan is for me
-The Lord understands me
-He created the whole universe
-If I have really accepted Christ
-He will make my sister a good person as she gets older
-That as things change I can continue to have a strong faith
-The Bible is true
-People really hear the voice of God, especially whey they murder people b/c of it
-There is a life after this
-God can talk to you and hear you
-Everyone is created for a purpose
-That everyone who is Mormon or Jewish or doesn’t believe in Jesus Christ will go to hell
-That every sin we do is rightfully forgiven, but still forgiven if we ask
-That all church people will go to heaven
-God sometimes, and it scares me
-How a whale swallowed a man named Jonah and Jonah lived
-That He is as good as people say
-That ‘manna’ fell from the sky and fed people
-God can be with everyone at once
-When dinosaurs were introduced
-We are not supposed to believe in magic, yet a guy levitated up to heaven
-The expanse of eternity
-God is always looking out for my best interests
-That all my problems matter to Him
-Religion
Your response?
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Wow. It’s pretty amazing to see all of these doubts, knowing that I doubt some of the same things.
Wow im gald i just know that my family has the same doubts ive been struggling with my doubts and what to do about them and this has really helped you guys dont even know i love yall and thanks for the service sun it helped alot
this is awesome guys.
this one stuck out to me-
“People really hear the voice of God, especially whey they murder people b/c of it”
i’ve struggled with the issue of hearing the voice of God for a long time. last weekend i went on a kind of rise of fall -esque trip with my church here in nashville and one of our sessions was on prayer. i learned a lot about listening for the holy spirit in prayer. its incredibly necessary to be in complete rest and free from distraction during prayer in order to truly hear what the spirit is telling you. i think the problem comes when we are so involved in our own interests that we really think that we are hearing is a word from the spirit that is only our self-interest.
hope some of that made sense.
i love and miss y’all.
can’t wait to come back at thanksgiving.
-stephen
i am so glad that we can all come together and share our doubts and not be judged.
at times,i can relate to every single one of those doubts. its even sort of scary.
mine was that can god really forgive us?
ive struggled with this one for soo long and i think that i have to apologize for everything that i do wrong every day….like i am kinda still apologizing for something i did in june. then i talked to vanessa at wild weekened and she made it all clear for me and i still struggle with my doubt sometimes, but i know, now, that once god has forgiven me, my sin is like at the bottom of the ocean buried under sand, but i guess the thought that it still happened, and it hurt my relationship with god at that point, it still gets to me-and i still ask for forgivness. i just hope that im not like bugging god! well its just hard to get over my guilt trip so i wonder that sice i cant get over that one thing and ive asked for gods help in getting over it, then maybe god cant forgive
or even worse he just cant forgive ME?
so yeah… deep thoughts!
(:0)
andylicious
So encouraging to see people realizing that this is a safe place to ask questions and wrestle with truth. great words, stephen. we miss you too, bro.
i will preface my response with the fact that i love the whole idea behind this form of going public. i love getting on and reading how my brothers and sisters are doing on a daily basis. keep this up, you guys; lets grow together as a family.
i love that we, as a family, dont have to fake who we are. it is a rare thing to find a community that is willing to publish all of their doubts. I really think that one reason that families grow cold and stagnant in their faith is that they refuse to let other people see who they really are; i feel like people in church families are eager to publicize their religiosity while they quickly sweep their doubts and weaknesses under the rug before anybody can see. one doubt that resonated with me was “doubting the people in the church.” in my struggle with this doubt i can come up with: we don’t put our faith in the church; we put our faith in Jesus, and he is faithful even when pastors, methodists, councilors, baptists, interns, or volunteers are not. sometimes people in the church seem superficial, hypocritical, or just plain wrong, but God uses screw-ups to do great things. exhibit “a” is Jesus’ choice in apostles; what a ragtag group of followers, but they were the hands and feet of Jesus. Have faith that God will use the people in the church (as messed up as they may be) to spread the message of Jesus and His love, death, and resurrection.
one of the doubts i kept noticing was ‘i doubt that the bible is true.’
one thing i have learned and that i feel like today a lot of people dont realize is that there is more than one kind of truth. there is scientific truth: which is factual scientific knowledge. and then there is deeper truth: that can only be expressed poetry, narratives, and other higher forms of language. only this kind of language can reveal the deeper forms of truth that are important for Christians. this is the truth that the Bible contains.
in this way, it doesnt matter whether or not the stories in the bible are what we today would consider to be historically accurate, because they are true in the sense that the tell us something about human life that could be expressed in no simpler way.
Wow… i really wanted to go to church that day but my parents were to tired. But wow…! I think those same things. Does god really love me after everything i have done or said? How could he… he loves the people that i dispise… after everything they have done? i just makes me think… he must REALLY love us! Wow…
Katelyn M!!!!! : )