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I Want In

roller coasterDear friend,

You possess a rock-solid certainty of the truth and accuracy of your faith. This is a gift. Did you know that? Certainty is not a universal thing.

I long for it. But, at least for now, I don’t have it.

Sometimes I think you fail to understand that about those of us who are less certain.

I often wonder if you think doubters want to doubt, that we like this uncertain world and make a conscious choice to stay there.

Is this why you declare your answers to my questions as though pummeling them into me with a sledgehammer? It’s as if you think that saying it hard enough or often enough will transform doubt into certainty.

Sometimes when you speak about doubt, it sounds like you think doubt is contagious. And not only contagious but deadly. Like you think it must be isolated at minimum and ideally, destroyed.

I may not know for certain what God has said on certain issues, but I know this. You have never doubted. If you had, you would know better.

You would know that it doesn’t work that way.

It isn’t that easy.

If only it were that easy.

For those of us who wrestle with doubt, your confident faith is like a lush amusement park in the middle of the Nevada desert. Inside, everyone is smiling, riding, eating, splashing in refreshing water fountains, having fun.

I am stuck on the outside. I want the carefree joy I see on your face. I’m parched, starving, my skin is burned and cracking from the sun and the heat.

But I can’t find the way in.

I stagger along the perimeter, searching for a way in. Hope rises as I spot something… I’ve finally found it!… only to be shattered again … it’s a mirage dissolving into dust. Or a new question sends me on another detour…. waaaaay out into the desert.

Do you get it?

When you scold or rebuke or pound on me for doubting, it’s like you’re yelling “Why aren’t you in here, you stupid person? GET IN HERE.”

But you don’t tell me how.

That doesn’t work, does it?

I  need directions, a map, the secret word, a key, the keypad code, something that will lead me to the gate and, at long last, gain me entry.

I want to get in. I want that confidence and peace that you have.

I just haven’t found it yet.

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