In this one incident of Jesus healing a young man (told in three Gospels), we hear three conversations about faith and doubt: Jesus' comments to religious leaders who had no faith, a brief but revealing dialogue between Jesus and the boy's father about faith and doubt, and Jesus' de-briefing instructions to his disciples about their need for more faith in prayer. Who will you relate to most?
This Sunday we consider faith and doubt from Peter’s success and failure at water-walking. Peter’s faith was fickle -- lots of “successful failures” in which Peter successfully and courageously stepped out, and then failed miserably. Sound familiar? But toward the end of his life his faith expression is strong and solid. Our purpose Sunday is to study how we can nurture a faith that will endure and become increasingly vital, sustaining us throughout our lives.
This Sunday we begin a 4-week sermon series on the topic of doubt. We begin with perhaps the most famous story of doubt in the entire Bible, the story of Thomas (whose name is so synonymous with doubt, that anyone who demonstrates skepticism is described as a "doubting Thomas"!).
As we look deeper into this story, questions will arise... Does Jesus want us to have "blind faith"? If we ask for evidence, are we showing a lack of faith? Is there a difference between doubt and unbelief? What exactly are we believing in, anyway?
