Quotes & Sayings About Doubt In The Bible

Isn't it an odd thing that doubting doctrines and dogmas not fully articulated until the Middle Ages can make you a heretic? Admitting to your pastor or priest that you doubt God, the Church, or the Bible can get you excommunicated. Yet treating your fellow human beings as though they were worthless scum will get you elected to the parish council (or to the U.S. Congress). Being open and honest about your faith - or lack thereof - will gain you ridicule and contempt. But take heart, fellow Christians. If you pretend everything is good, and that you are a faithful believer in all things, you most certainly will gain the respect of everyone in your community. Well, except the most important person of all - the guy who railed against hypocrisy: Jesus of Nazareth. — Charles Shingledecker

I remember walking into the Bible study. I had a knot in my stomach. In my mind, only weirdoes and zealots went to Bible studies. I don't remember what was said that day. All I know is that when I left, everything had changed. I'll never forget standing outside that apartment on the Upper East Side and saying to myself, "It's true. It's completely true." The world looked entirely different, like a veil had been lifted off it. I had not an iota of doubt. I was filled with indescribable joy. — Kirsten Powers

Sometimes I feel that in religious content, religious drama, it's almost told like a tale, like an account of facts, and in 'A.D. The Bible Continues,' it's drama, it's real drama that we like to see on TV today, seeing the characters struggle and doubt and be completely in conflict with each other, kind of like 'House of Cards.' — Juan Pablo Di Pace

Many in the church have turned their back on serious study, and have embraced an anti-intellectualism which refuses to learn anything from scholarship at all lest it corrupt their pure faith. It is time to end this standoff, and to reestablish a hermeneutic of trust (itself a sign of the gospel!) in place of the hermeneutic of suspicion which the church has so disastrously borrowed from the postmodern world. — N. T. Wright

People in general know not what wickedness there is in this pretended word of God. Brought up in habits of superstition, they take it for granted that the Bible is true, and that it is good; they permit themselves not to doubt of it, and they carry the ideas they form of the benevolence of the Almighty to the book which they have been taught to believe was written by his authority. Good heavens! it is quite another thing, it is a book of lies, wickedness, and blasphemy. — Thomas Paine

Your words and deeds are seeds, scattered in the wind ... the seeds are light or darkness ... they'll break apart or mend ... Sow light instead of gloom. Sow faith instead of doubt. Sow truth and love, and hope, and peace. Sow light and darkness rout. — Colleen Luntzel

The serpent's objective is clear. He seeks to drive a wedge of doubt into Adam and Eve's confidence in what God has told them. Satan knows the power of undermining a human being's confidence in what God has revealed. Sadly, the serpent's temptation was successful. Adam and Eve second-guessed God's trustworthiness and then rejected his command. They sinned and ate the forbidden fruit. This was the beginning of the fallen world we all experience. All generations following would have a natural bent for rebelling against God and being skeptical or indifferent to what he has said. To this day, Satan's objective has not changed. Though his questions look a little different at times, they all contain the same idea — Jon Morrison

The existence of the devil is so clearly taught in the Bible that to doubt it is to doubt the Bible itself. — Chip Ingram

We see through a glass, darkly." The verse surprised him. He hadn't picked up a Bible in a year, yet he knew the phrase came from the New Testament. He knew it went on to say that one day everything would be clear. One day believers would know without a shadow of a doubt, and one day they would be in the presence of God. — Janice Cantore

Is my faith so terribly pathetic that I have diminished God to the point that I doubt His ability to survive in the very world that He came to save? Indeed, I have done exactly that. And all I need to do to beat that mentality is to remember that a baby born in a manger with every disadvantage imaginable stills lives today. — Craig D. Lounsbrough

We are raising a generation on the spiritual junk food of religious videos, movies, youth entertainment, and comic book paraphrases of the Bible. The Word of God is being rewritten, watered down, illustrated, and dramatized in order to cater to the taste of the carnal mind. That only leads further into the wilderness of doubt and confusion. — Dave Hunt

It is also worth noting that one can obtain a Ph.D. in any branch of science for no other purpose than to make cynical use of scientific language in an effort to rationalize the glaring inadequacies of tbe Bible. A handful of Christians appear to have done this; some have even obtained their degrees from reputable universities. No doubt, others will follow in their footsteps. While such people are technically "scientists," they are not behaving like scientists. They simply are not engaged in an honest inquiry into the nature of the universe. And their proclamations about God and the failures of Darwinism do not in the least signify that there is a legitimate scientific controversy about evolution. — Sam Harris

But isn't that what love is, Clarissa? Ownership? 'I am my beloved's and my beloved is mine,' as the Song of Songs goes."
"No. And don't quote the Bible at me. I don't think you get it ... It's not just that someone belongs to you, it's that you give yourself to them. I doubt you've ever given anything to anyone. Except maybe nightmares."
"To give yourself to someone?" The thin smile didn't waver. "As you've given yourself to Jonathan?"
"What?"
"You think I haven't seen the way you two look at each other? The way he says your name? You may not think I can feel, but that doesn't mean I can't see feelings in others. — Cassandra Clare

The inspiration and authority of the Bible is the bedrock upon which our faith is built. Without it, we are doomed to uncertainty, doubt, and a hopeless groping in the darkness of human speculation. — Sam Storms

The Bible has no doubt had much influence in its time, but it provides very few laughs. None, in fact. — Arthur Smith

One bold message in the Book of Job is that you can say anything to God. Throw at him your grief, your anger, your doubt, your bitterness, your betrayal, your disappointment - he can absorb them all. As often as not, spiritual giants of the Bible are shown contending with God. They prefer to go away limping, like Jacob, rather than to shut God out. In this respect, the Bible prefigures a tenet of modern psychology: you can't really deny your feelings or make them disappear, so you might as well express them. God can deal with every human response save one. He cannot abide the response I fall back on instinctively: an attempt to ignore him or treat him as though he does not exist. That response never once occurred to Job. — Philip Yancey

As commonly understood, creationism involves belief in an earth formed only about ten thousand years ago, an interpretation of the Bible that is still very popular. For the record, I have no reason to doubt that the universe is the billions of years old that physicists say it is. Further, I find the idea of common descent (that all organisms share a common ancestor) fairly convincing, and have no particular reason to doubt it. — Michael Behe

If you have ever belonged to such a community, however, you may have discovered that the trouble starts when darkness falls on your life, which can happen in any number of unsurprising ways: you lose your job, your marriage falls apart, your child acts out in some attention getting way, you pray hard for something that does not happen, you begin to doubt some of the things you have been taught about what the Bible says. The first time you speak of these things in a full solar church, you can usually get a hearing. Continue to speak of them and you may be reminded that God will not let you be tested beyond your strength. All that is required of you is to have faith. If you still do not get the message, sooner or later it will be made explicit for you: the darkness is your own fault, because you do not have enough faith. — Barbara Brown Taylor

Even though prayers are not offered only to get a desired result, there is little doubt that most miracles are the result of prayer. God wants us to pray to him and ask him for things, just as any loving father and mother want their children to come to them with whatever is on their minds. But if our focus is solely on getting the outcome we want, the prayer will fail, precisely because our belief is placed in the wrong place. It's a great irony. If all we care about is the result, then we are effectively making that result our God, rather than God himself. So if we are praying to our "God" - the God of results - rather than to God himself, then we are praying to a "God" who is not God, and who is therefore powerless to help us. — Eric Metaxas

The year showed me beyond a doubt that everyone practices cafeteria religion ... But the important lesson was this: there's nothing wrong with choosing. Cafeterias aren't bad per se ... the key is in choosing the right dishes. You need to pick the nurturing ones (compassion), the healthy ones (love thy neighbor), not the bitter ones. — A. J. Jacobs

Bible debunkers and Bible defenders are kindred spirits. They agree that the Bible is on trial. They agree on the terms of the debate, and what's at stake, namely its credibility as God's infallible book. They agree that Christianity stands or falls, triumphs or fails, depending on whether the Bible is found to be inconsistent, to contradict itself. The question for both sides is whether it fails to answer questions, from the most trivial to the ultimate, consistently and reliably. But you can't fail at something you're not trying to do. To ask whether the Bible fails to give consistent answers or be of one voice with itself presumes that it was built to do so. That's a false presumption, rooted no doubt in thinking of it as the book that God wrote. As we have seen, biblical literature is constantly interpreting, interrogating, and disagreeing with itself. Virtually nothing is asserted someplace that is not called into question or undermined elsewhere. — Timothy Beal

I liked the thought of being a country clergyman. Accordingly I read with care Pearson on the Creed and a few other books on divinity; and as I did not then in the least doubt the strict and literal truth of every word in the Bible, I soon persuaded myself that our Creed must be fully accepted. — Charles Darwin

Among other reasons which will readily suggest themselves, one alone will suffice. Every Christian knows, experimentally, that the Bible is the Word of God. When a sinner becomes seriously concerned about his character, state, and prospects, if he reads the Bible, he finds at first that it is all against him. By the holy law of God he is convicted and condemned; and he is conscious of a power and dignity in the Word of condemnation that makes him feel that it is the Word of God. There is a power in the Word that proves it Divine; and he who has once experienced its influence will never doubt its truth. — Charles Haddon Spurgeon

Well, Espen, you're no drug addict, so why do you beg?"
"Because it's my mission to be mirror for mankind so that they can see which actions are great and which are small."
"And which are great?"
Espen sighed in despair, as though weary of repeating the obvious. "Charity. Sharing and helping your neighbor. The Bible deals with nothing else. In fact, you have to search extremely hard to find anything about sex before marriage, abortion, homosexuality, or a woman's right to speak in public. But, of course, it is easier for Pharisees to talk aloud about subordinate clauses than to describe and perform the great actions the Bible leaves us in no doubt about: You have to give half of what you own to someone who has nothing. Thousands of people are dying every day without hearing the words of God because these Christians will not let go of their earthly goods. I'm giving them a chance to reflect. — Jo Nesbo

John felt grounded again. He remembered his favorite Bible story, the one about Peter getting out of the boat and walking on water. The big fisherman was walking along quite nicely until he looked at the waves and began to sink. As much as possible, John tried to live his life without looking at the waves. But when he did, when the lives of his grown children caused his faith to waver even a little, God always sent someone to illustrate the words of Christ: "You of little faith . . . why did you doubt?" John felt certain that in this, his most trying season yet, the Lord had sent Pastor Mark to fill that role. It was a certainty that kept his eyes where they belonged - off the waves and straight ahead to the outstretched arms of Jesus. — Karen Kingsbury

Chase, we don't believe that homosexuality is a sin. The Bible was inspired by God, but it was written, translated, and interpreted by imperfect people just like us. This means that the passing of this sacred scripture from generation to generation and from culture to culture has been a bit like the "telephone game" you play at school. After thousands of years, it's impossible to judge the original spirit of some scripture. We believe that when in doubt, mercy triumphs judgment. So your parents are Christians who study and pray and then carefully choose what we follow in the Bible, based on whether or not it matches our understanding of Jesus's overall message. — Glennon Doyle Melton

On the other hand, inspiration - a criterion for canonization we might expect to play a great role - is not a factor. The Shepherd of Hermas and many writings either claimed inspiration or had it claimed for them, yet were neither universally nor ultimately accepted as canonical. In contrast, no NT writing claims inspiration for itself. The statement in 2 Tim. 3:16 that all Scripture is inspired by God (theopneustos) refers to Torah. Second Peter 3:16 refers to Paul's letters as though they were Scripture but does not say they were 'inspired.' In Revelation, 'inspiration' is certainly implied but not explicitly claimed. No doubt there was an increasingly widespread conviction that the NT writings were divinely inspired, but that notion did not appear to factor in as a criterion for canonization. — Luke Timothy Johnson

Morals do exist outside of organized religion, and the 'morality' taught by many of these archaic systems is often outdated, sexist, racist, and teaches intolerance and inequality. When a parent forces a child into a religion, the parent is effectively handicapping his or her own offspring by limiting the abilities of the child to question the world around him or her and make informed decisions. Children raised under these conditions will mature believing that their religion is the only correct one, and, in the case of Christianity, they will believe that all who doubt their religion's validity will suffer eternal damnation. This environment is one that often breeds hate, ignorance, and 'justified' violence. — David G. McAfee

I believe that the Bible is to be understood and received in the plain and obvious meaning of its passages; for I cannot persuade myself that a book intended for the instruction and conversion of the whole world should cover its true meaning in any such mystery and doubt that none but critics and philosophers can discover it. — Daniel Webster

It wasn't love at first sight. They ran into each other one morning in a sunny clearing in the forest. A few moments of stunned silence. 'Glockenspiel,' Adam pronounced, thinking (but with terrible doubt) he'd found another animal in search of a name. When Eve approached him, proffering a handful of elderberries, he threw a stick at her and ran away. — Glen Duncan

If I were the devil I should broadcast doubts about the truths and relevance and good sense and straightforwardness of the Bible ... At all costs I should want to keep them from using their minds in a disciplined way to get the measure of its message. — J.I. Packer

But about then I began to get into different trouble and more serious. You might call it doctrinal trouble.
The trouble started because I began to doubt the main rock of the faith, which was that the Bible was true in every word ... They had staked their immortal souls on the infallible truth of every pen scratch from "In the beginning" to "Amen." But I had read all of it by then, and I could see that it changed. And if it changed, how could all of it be true?
For instance, there is a big difference between the old tribespeople's coldhearted ferocity against their enemies and Jesus' preaching of forgiveness and of love for your enemies. — Wendell Berry

The wondrous theme of the Bible that frightens so many people is that the only visible sign of God in the world is the cross. Christ is not carried away from earth to heaven in glory, but He must go to the cross. And precisely there, where the cross stands, the resurrection is near; even there, where everyone begins to doubt God, where everyone despairs of God's power, there God is whole, there Christ is active and near. Where the power of darkness does violence to the light of God, there God triumphs and judges the darkness. Then — Michael Van Dyke