Freedom From Doubt
When I was 27 years old, I went to Pakistan to plant churches among Muslim people in southwest Punjab. No one told me it was the most difficult posting our mission offered. Long on enthusiasm and short on Biblical wisdom, I sauntered into a spiritual minefield that would upend my life.
I plunged into learning the Urdu language, which included a new alphabet written from right to left and sounds that felt like oral gymnastics. My Canadian people skills like eye contact, overt laughter, and trusting everyone became instant deficits. Soon, my personality, joy, and spontaneity felt compressed, like a jack-in-the-box in its tin container.
I had brought personal supplies to last four years in my trunks but neglected to bring one essential item—a rock-solid assurance of salvation.
A desperate person makes an outstanding student. In Pakistan, sequestered inside the four walls of our compound, fighting for spiritual equilibrium, I became an excellent student.
Are you desperate? Desperate to be free from doubt? Good. Let’s begin.
CAREY
The church lobby overflowed with church-goers after the Sunday morning service. Carey straightened the collar on her blouse, scratched the back of her neck, and folded and unfolded her arms. Avoiding eye contact with people, she scanned the lobby for the quickest path to the parking lot.
Carey was spiraling in a vortex of introspection.
The pastor had preached from James 2, emphasizing the need to feed and clothe the poor. He said it was evidence that one had true faith, not a dead faith. Evidence that one had eternal life.
She stumbled into the parking lot trying to remember where she had parked her car. Am I compassionate toward the poor? I turned down an opportunity to work at the food bank. Homeless people don’t make me feel sad. Is my faith dead? Does that mean I’m not saved? Her stomach sank, and an icy fear crept into her body.
She found her car and slid into the driver’s seat. Her palms were sweaty on the steering wheel, and her heart was racing.
On the drive home from church, Carey rehearsed acts of kindness and generosity. I give my tithe to the church. Helping at kids’ camp was fun and even a little sacrificial. The immigrant family loved the used furniture I arranged for them. My used clothing always goes to the Mission Thrift Store. I’m doing more than other Christians in our church. As she justified herself, her muscles relaxed. She took a deep breath. Surely, I have a living faith and not a dead one. I must be saved.
Can you relate to Carey? I can. Combing through your life for evidence seems like a reasonable way to gain assurance of salvation. Comparing yourself to other Christians who are less obedient should seal the deal, right? The trouble is that these methods are subjective. They arise from your calculations. Not God’s. What if God’s ground of assurance is not based on what I do, but on what He has promised?
LISTENING TO JESUS
“How Did Jesus Share the Gospel?” The sermon title at our church’s Bible conference one year captivated me. I want to share the gospel like Jesus did. Am I? It turns out I was not.
The preacher directed us to the Gospel of John to discover the answer to the question.
In the Gospel of John, Jesus tells his hearers how to have eternal life. Read each verse below and answer this question: “What condition does Jesus give to receive eternal life?”
John 3:15 (NASB) “so that whoever believes will in Him have eternal life.”
John 3:16 (NASB) “For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life.”
John 3:36 (NASB) “He who believes in the Son has eternal life; but he who does not obey the Son will not see life, but the wrath of God abides on him.”
John 4:13-14 (NASB) Jesus answered and said to her, “Everyone who drinks of this water will thirst again; but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him shall never thirst; but the water that I will give him will become in him a well of water springing up to eternal life.”
John 5:24 (NASB) “Truly, truly, I say to you, he who hears My word, and believes Him who sent Me, has eternal life, and does not come into judgment, but has passed out of death into life.”
John 6:40 (NASB) “For this is the will of My Father, that everyone who beholds the Son and believes in Him will have eternal life, and I Myself will raise him up on the last day.”
John 6:47 (NASB) “Truly, truly, I say to you, he who believes has eternal life.”
When Jesus told people how to have eternal life, He gave only one condition—faith in Him for it.
Sitting in my seat at the conference, I thought of all the ways I had shared the gospel. None of them reflected Jesus’ words in the Gospel of John.
Why didn’t Jesus require people to know about His coming death, burial, and resurrection? Why didn’t He tell them to repent of their sins and promise to clean up their lives? Why didn’t He make them confess with their mouths that He is Lord? Couldn’t He have at least made people pray the sinner’s prayer? He did not.
Either Jesus forgot to share all the conditions, withheld information, or He shared the gospel exactly as meant to. I’m going with the last option.
FAITH—THE ONLY CONDITION FOR RECEIVING ETERNAL LIFE
After graduating from high school, I learned to skydive. My knowledge of planes and parachutes was zero. Before my first jump, I had never even flown in a plane!
The jumpmaster took responsibility for me. Someone else packed my parachute. And a licensed pilot flew the plane. Had I insisted on supervising myself, packing my parachute, and flying the plane, I would probably have died or at least been arrested. Instead, I took myself out of the equation, trusted in the professionals, and lived.
Three hundred and fifty jumps later, I not only lived but had learned the art of free falling like a bird.
Freedom from doubt involves a fundamental change in my thinking. Instead of looking to myself, my works, and my feelings, I fix my eyes on the written, objective promises of Jesus to give eternal life to whomever believes in Him for it. This is the only possible ground of assurance of salvation. The only way to be free from doubt.
“Jesus said to her, ‘I am the resurrection and the life; he who believes in me will live even if he dies. And everyone who lives and believes in Me will never die. Do you believe this?’”
John 11:25-26 (NASB)
