Why Do We Doubt God?

Why Do We Doubt God?

Matthew 14:22-33

Sermon by Rick Crandall

McClendon Baptist Church - Nov. 30, 2008

*Why do we doubt God? Christians, I am not talking about doubting your salvation, though many believers do at some point in their spiritual life. Tonight I am talking about us doubting God when unexpected problems hit.

*Why do we doubt God? That’s an important question, especially when the question comes from God Himself. Let’s look into the Word of God to find some answers that will help us stop doubting and start trusting God more.

1. Why do we doubt God? One reason is because we tend to expect positive results when we obey.

*The disciples were not looking for trouble in this story. In vs. 22 Jesus made them get into the boat and go before Him to the other side of the sea. Jesus told them to go and they went -- probably expecting smooth sailing. But as Jesus sent the multitudes away and went up on a mountain to pray, the disciples were running into trouble. In vs. 24, “The boat was now in the middle of the sea, tossed by the waves, for the wind was contrary.”

*“Tossed by the waves.” He’s not talking about some gentle rocking back and forth. The idea behind that word “tossed” is “pain, toil, torment, torture.” They were in real trouble, not because of some failure, but because they had obeyed the Lord. Results like that can lead us to doubt God.

*Today many Christians are being influenced by a false prosperity gospel. There is a feel-good lie being taught that you should expect nothing but the best from this world, because you are a child of the King. But in John 16:33 Jesus told His followers, “In the world you will have tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.”

*Job was an Old Testament hero, who “was blameless and upright, and one who feared God and shunned evil” (Job 1:1). But for a while Job lost almost everything that mattered to him in this world.

*The Apostle Paul was a great hero of the New Testament. If anybody should have received only good things in life, it would have been Paul. But listen to his testimony from 2 Corin 11:24-28:

24. From the Jews five times I received forty stripes minus one.

25. Three times I was beaten with rods; once I was stoned; three times I was shipwrecked; a night and a day I have been in the deep;

26. in journeys often, in perils of waters, in perils of robbers, in perils of my own countrymen, in perils of the Gentiles, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils among false brethren;

27. in weariness and toil, in sleeplessness often, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness

28. besides the other things, what comes upon me daily: my deep concern for all the churches.

*Down through the ages there are countless other examples to teach us that we should not expect only the good-life from following the Lord. Don’t make that mistake. You keep trusting Jesus in the good times and the bad. You keep trusting Jesus no matter how bad things may get in your life.

2. Why do we doubt God? Sometimes it’s because we tend to expect positive results when we obey, and because the Lord doesn’t proceed according to our expectations.

*The Lord doesn’t always act according to our expectations. He is God and we are not. So He is going to do things that we don’t expect or understand. This is what happened when the disciples were hammered by the wind. But they were even more shocked when Jesus came to them, walking on the water!

*As we read in vs. 25&26:

25. Now in the fourth watch of the night (probably some time between 3 and 6 o’clock in the morning) Jesus went to them, walking on the sea.

26. And when the disciples saw Him walking on the sea, they were troubled, saying, “It is a ghost!” And they cried out for fear.

*They didn’t expect to be blasted by the wind. And the last thing they expected to see was Jesus walking on the water to them, so they doubted. But God really does move in mysterious ways.

*The Children of Israel were backed up against the Red Sea, with the Egyptian army bearing down on them. Bloody slaughter seemed inevitable. But God did the unexpected. He parted the waters of the Red Sea with less effort than it takes us to let the water out of the kitchen sink.

*Four hundred years later a giant and his army were terrorizing the army of Israel. Everyone in the army was afraid to face the giant, but God did the unexpected. He used a shepherd boy and a slingshot to bring that giant down.