Wednesday, November 12, 2014

Why Every Christian Needs Doubt - Timothy King in Emergent Voices

Without truly doubting and opening yourself to the possibility that even many of your most deeply held tenets of faith could be wrong or inadequate, questioning will remain a mental exercise that does not reach its potential for personal transformation. 

Not only is questioning important to a well-reasoned faith, but it is core to the development of Christian intellect and character.

Doubt is the fertilizer in the garden of faith. Manure and other biodegrading organic matter can at times be unpleasant as they break down. But it is that process of decomposition that makes fertilizer valuable to the garden; part of the healthy balance.

A growing faith quite likely means that what we think it means to "weigh Christianity in the balance" at one point in life, will not mean the same thing later. And that's a good thing.

Without truly doubting and opening yourself to the possibility that even many of your most deeply held tenets of faith could be wrong or inadequate, questioning will remain a mental exercise that does not reach its potential for personal transformation.

Doubt, I would argue, is that state of change that allows for the questions to continue and faith to grow. And as the husks of beliefs that were wrong, too small, or in other ways insignificant fall aside, they join in the process of fertilizing a more perfect faith through their own decomposition.

Faith is not grown by the removal of doubt but by acting in its presence.

The full article is available here