I’ve lived long enough to see plenty of changes in the way people do church. The fact that I even typed the phrase “do church” is a hint at the fact that a lot of those changes haven’t served us so well.
Through the years, people have gathered in traditional churches, contemporary churches, cowboy churches, coffeeshop churches, theater churches, King James only churches, house churches, megachurches, and microchurches.
We’ve seen pastors wear three-piece suits, jumpsuits, collared shirts, tee shirts, skinny jeans, no jeans, expensive shoes, bargain shoes, and no shoes.
Some pastors scream, some strut like chickens. I’ve heard pastors who were master storytellers, and others who cursed while preaching. Full disclosure: I’ve never really understood that last one.
I’m pretty sure that all of those forms of practicing church can bear fruit (except that cussing pastor thing — I mean, sure, God can use anything, but I think we can raise the bar higher than that), so I don’t get hung up on preferences. But for all of those preferences, there’s one thing that I don’t think we’ve ever really done well, and I’m not sure that we’ve ever made much progress with it.
We’ve never made room for the doubters.
We’ve made room for the equipment needed to do a jammin’ livestream and stage show. We’ve made room for lobbies that serve some of the best coffee and frappés this side of Seattle. We’ve made room for every age group to enjoy church in a way that has been curated for and catered to their specific demographic needs.
But we haven’t down a good job making room for the questions that naturally come as people age through those demographics.
Kid: Why did God let my dog die?
Older kid: Why didn’t God stop my parents from divorcing?
Teen: Where was God when my best friend died in a car accident?
Young adult: If God made me this way, then why do I want to be another way?
Parents of young children: Why can’t God make my baby stop crying? Will I ever sleep again? I wonder if we have any chocolate to eat since I’m going to be up all night?
I could go on, but you get the point. Every age and every stage opens the door to doubts and questions, and for the life of me, I can’t figure out why the church, in all her many forms, struggles to let people express them? In what has become one of my favorite passages over the last few years as I’ve wrestled with doubts of all kinds (shout out to the parents who raised children only to find out that the burden of parenting never actually goes away), Jesus showed us exactly what to do with doubters:
Then the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain where Jesus had told them to go. When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted. Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” (Matthew 28:16-20, emphasis mine)
Some worshipped, and some doubted. All were sent, and all went.
Some worshipped, and some doubted. All were sent, and all went. Share on XJesus didn’t pull the doubting ones aside to attend remedial Sunday School classes until they were able to pass the Great Commission acceptance exam. He didn’t do anything. He simply told them to go, along with the others who weren’t doubting, and they did.
Jesus treated doubt like it was, hold on to your theology, normal. Expected. Not a problem to be taught out through information, but worked out through application. It is in the doing that the not knowing gets addressed, or becomes unnecessary. Jesus knew that, and so he modeled the patience of one who isn’t rattled by the seeker, and isn’t rushing to fill in the blank.
Do we always like this approach? I think you know the answer to that. Jesus once told a parable about letting the weeds grow with the wheat so that the wheat wouldn’t be harmed while trying to get rid of the weeds.
That’s not how we deal with doubts, is it?
“Pastor, that person doesn’t look like me, act like me, or believe like me! They ask questions that make my kids ask questions, and that makes me uncomfortable because I don’t have answers to those questions. DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT…NOW!!!”
Pro tip for all the church people: if you ever write an email like that, please be courageous enough to sign it.
We want the doubters removed, and yet Jesus wants the doubters recruited. He actually doesn’t just welcome them to come and sit until they get the doubts resolved; he invites them to be on mission with others even while they aren’t completely sure what the mission is all about.
Even as I type this, I keep thinking about how much I love that about Jesus, and also how much I don’t understand that about Jesus. I guess you could say I have some doubts about the way he handled doubts.
But here’s something I don’t doubt: if this is the way Jesus handled people with doubts and questions, then the church doesn’t need to come up with another way that seems to be cleaner, easier, or just more to our liking.
We simply need to swing wide the heavenly gates, stand at the door, and yell at the top of our lungs:
“All who doubt are welcome here!”
