Too full of fear and prophecy to see
The revelation right in front of me
So sick and tired of trying to make the pieces fit
Cause it’s not what bearing witness is
(David Bazan)
But you, You’ve gone too far this time
You have neither reason nor rhyme
With which to take this soul that is so rightfully mine
(Mumford & Sons)
Let’s face it. It’s hip to doubt.
Just take a look at the current indie music landscape.
Lately there’s been a swell of connection and intrigue over artists who have grown up Christian, become disenfranchised with their faith, and are now transcribing their complex conversations with God on vinyl and mp3s for a new generation to hear. Artists like David Bazan and Mumford & Sonsare among the list of well-received musicians using their influence to fight through their inability to reconcile their questions with the God of the Bible. The result? Some haunting, deeply poetic, thought-provoking, and beautiful songwriting. Props to these artists for capturing the dialogue between man and the Creator in such personal and relatable ways.
The tragedy is that they stay there…in the tension, in the unresolved, stuck in their doubt. It alerts me because I believe their state of being doesn’t simply reflect a musical trend but embodies an entire generation of culture.
Let me say that doubt is an absolute necessity. Historically, the church might have been better off had they embraced it a bit more. Instead, the bride has gotten hung up on theological details and debates making them non-negotiables for a successful marriage. I’m convinced our culture of grown-up church kids wouldn’t be as unsure as they are now had they been given the freedom to ask difficult questions in Sunday School.
Consider this, however: Doubt for the sake of more doubt is meaningless.
Doubt should inevitably lead to faith. That is its purpose. If there were nothing to doubt there would be nothing to find faith in. One simply cannot exist without the other.
So, why are we so stuck as a culture? Why are our lyrics so entitled when they speak to the Creator? Why do we insist He explain himself (read Job 38-40)?
Some of this artistic expression is not only extremely healthy but incredibly biblical. Read the Psalms and you won’t get far before running into one of David’s tantrums with Dad. But if we remain in the tantrum, if we don’t move forward with faith and hope, if we don’t exhale our questions with radical expressions of bravery and trust, we have nothing to say for ourselves, nothing to point to. We’ve depleted the hope our world has in this generation and diminished ourselves down to a collective of insecure, cynical pessimists.
I’m not sure how it is for girls (you’ll have to fill me in with your comments) but I see this attitude in guys a lot. We can’t figure out the world and why it’s so broken, why all the commandments we were told to follow when we were kids don’t seem to fit with how we’re wired to live as adults so we use our doubt and disappointment to get out of any responsibility and courage we should carry. We cement ourselves in this ongoing argument with God blaming him for the very prisons He came to rescue us from. I know guys well into their thirties still living like 16 year olds, convinced they’ve been dealt a bad deal in life and God owes them. They’ve wasted years of courage, freedom, influence, and strength. And that to me is incredibly, incredibly sad.
I desperately want to see our culture converse freely about the aspects of God they don’t understand. And I desperately want our culture to stand confident in the truth that they’ll never fully understand Him, embrace his mystery, and risk trusting his “other-ness.”
What would it look like for us to carry unexpected faith in a culture full of broken expectations?
I think all have made a good point and I agree mostly. However I think the problem is also sometimes the opposite. In situations where people are told only of God as a King and Judge, then sometimes they lose the ability to relate to him.
Maybe one of the best things that we as Christians could do for our faiths and our Message is to view God less as unattached independent character traits which pertain to a character, and rather as the rounded Father King Creator that he is. Which means that sometimes we will need to answer for our mistakes, but we always know where we can go to say “Daddy… I messed up!”
Maybe we need to ask more questions as well. We can only give in to doubt when we stop bringing things to God. It’s stated loads of times in the Bible that as long as we’re bringing our problems to Him, then He will lift the weight of our troubles. Which doesn’t mean we won’t have them, mind you. Just means we need to trust in Him more.
Sometimes it could be that we’ve grown too comfortable in a world where we feel that can pop down the shops for everything we need and stop trusting in God to provide…
Great points said by all. The paradox of God being both a friend and a holy king is one of the many things that are so beautiful about the gospel. I think there’s a lot of grace for us when we hold one view higher than the other and hopefully that grace births reverence. A God who is both friend and king empowers us to be a generation marked by both confidence and humility.
I agree with this observation and think it’s important to point out. I think part of the reason we are so entitled as a culture, besides our sinful nature, is that a lot of us who are college-age right now grew up in “seeker friendly” services that taught us how super great life in christ is but forgot to teach us about the struggles that were ahead, and once we hit those struggles, we were ill equipped to understand them as part of our sanctification, and instead turned to doubt, without a solid foundation of hope and trust. not that we can blame anyone, because scripture makes this situation clear, but that mentality took a lot of getting over, at least for me.
Message (500 Character Limit)David wrote in Psalm 27: I would have dispared if I had not seen the hand of the Lord in the land of the living. Recognize the touch of God in His word, in song, in creation, in others and even in the church and each day will be more full than the last. Even when I mess up the “hand” of God can make things better!
“Why are our lyrics so entitled when they speak to the Creator”–I find this question interesting, because it brings out a truth in our culture today–we approach God from the stance of entitled children rather than unworthy sinners. I feel like we are encouraged to doubt, and to come back, and really see God as a friend– but do we see God enough as a disciplinary figure? As someone we are not worthy to untie the sandals of (metaphorically speaking). I feel like we need to re-think God in our minds–he’s a friend, he’s a buddy, but he’s also a king, Lord, parent, and Creator, and though we sing it, I feel that it doesn’t sink into our hearts or our minds. Carrying unexpected faith creates resentment–like someone is “too good” to doubt.