Benefit of the Doubt - Chapter 1

I continue my review of Benefit of the Doubt by Greg Boyd. The first chapter of the book is about embracing the pain. Bod starts with an overview and then weaves in his own personal story of his early conversion to faith and issues that he had when it was first challenged, the pain he felt, and how he eventually decided to embrace the pain.

Boyd starts this chapter by looking again at the thought that more certainty leads to a stronger faith and the potential problems this can lead to for believers. The gist of this was covered in my review of the Introduction, found here:

http://stevenuessle.blogspot.com/2014/06/benefit-of-doubt-introduction.html

Boyd uses an illustration from his first church of an example of someone with impeccable faith, and how everyone was compared to this giant of faith. He then proceeded to ask the question of how much faith is enough? The answer I would always think is “more” but this can be dangerous. There are always struggles that come throughout life and there is questions that come when it seems that God is not responding.

Boyd lists several questions that he receives from congregants including:

-Do my doubts disqualify me from “salvation”?

-If I’m fairly sure that Jesus is the Son of God – but not 100 percent sure – am I still “saved”?

-Are me doubts about God’s willingness to heal my child the reason she is not healed?

-I struggle with the idea that God really cares about my family and me. Do you think this is why I can’t find a job?

Questions like these are hard and hit close to home for me (and I’m sure for many of you as well). There are also scripture verses that would suggest that more faith should equal results – verses such as Mt. 9:29, Mk. 9:24, Mt. 8:10, Mt. 14:51, Mt. 21:22. These are all verses cited by Boyd that would seem to go against his basic points here, but he suggests that he will address them specifically later in the book.

The struggle that comes from these verses lead to the questions that were mentioned above. People develop a hierarchy of faith that certain levels of faith lead to certain outcomes. When people do not see outcomes they question their own faith and the reality of God. It is a terrible cycle that perpetuates itself if the only standard is more faith, and that is the only answer people have.

I would say on a personal level I struggle with this, and as a pastor or minister it is a difficult issue to address as well. Is God not honoring me because my faith is so weak? What do you do with this? Is this not a reasonable question to ask?

As mentioned in my post yesterday, one of the primary reasons that people are leaving Christianity is this very situation, “They met a God who didn’t met their expectations”. If you expect a God to honor your requests based on your faith, and you try as hard as you can and as long as you can and you don’t see the conclusion that you expect, this can be a problem. This is the danger that Boyd speaks of when he pushes back against a certainty-seeking faith.

I don’t have a perfect answer to this issue/question. I suspect that an emphasis on a quid pro quo relationship with God is probably an issue (that is, I promise to have faith if you bless me with a certain outcome), and I also suspect that expecting certain things based upon faith treads dangerously upon a prosperity Gospel (that is, God is not an ATM machine, where you insert faith and withdraw blessing). I believe God has a will for our lives and we are to seek that, not necessarily the results that we desire in our hearts.

I suspect Boyd will touch more upon this later in the book. He concludes this chapter with a personal story. He was riding high on his faith late in his high school years and then entered college at the University of Minnesota. His first class was on Evolution and his plan was to study up on all the writings to disprove Evolution and convert his class. However, he found that all objections he raised up with proven to be a problem and he ended up having his own depression and crisis of faith. He knew that he had to move beyond the certainty-seeking faith and took a new look at what is the true foundation of his faith if it was to survive. His faith had been about avoiding pain and challenge, but he soon learned that this needed to change as well. To grow in his faith, he needed to embrace the pain. He will build on this going forward.