LUKE 7:18-23 WHEN BELIEVERS DOUBT2012 Teaching by Jerry B Simmons

Teaching Transcript: Luke 7:18-23 When Believers Doubt

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You are listening to FerventWord, an online Bible study ministry with teachings and tools to help you grow deeper in your relationship with God. The following message was taught by Jerry Simmons in 2012.

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This morning as we look at this portion here in Luke chapter 7, if you want to dig in a little bit more and see the parallel passage, you can find that in Matthew chapter 11, verses 1 through 6, where Matthew records these same events and gives his extra insights as well. And you can dig in a little bit later on and see what God has for you.

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But here we're looking at a situation with John the Baptist and we're really talking about a situation where John the Baptist began to have some doubts and so he asks Jesus a question and Jesus responds to him to encourage him to continue on in the faith. But as we look at this portion, I want to deal with the subject the Lord put upon our hearts to deal with the subject of doubt.

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When believers doubt. Do you ever doubt? Do you ever have doubts in your Christian walk, in the Christian faith?

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I think it's important for us to consider these things because, well, we do have doubts. All of us have these wrestlings that happen within our minds, these struggles that we go through. And we'll see that as we go through our portion this morning, that it's something that happens. It's something that we all deal with. And so it's something we should address because many times,

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those doubts are not really addressed. And well, we kind of feel condemned or ashamed because we have the thoughts, the questions, the struggles and the wrestlings that we have. And yet there's a reality to those things and a reality that we can come to the Lord with those doubts and he will minister to us and meet our needs.

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I like what Warren Wiersbe has to say regarding the subject of doubt. He makes a distinction between doubt and unbelief. Here's what he says about doubt. He says, doubt is a matter of the mind. We cannot understand what God is doing or why he is doing it. So he says, doubt has to do with our minds. It has to do with our thinking. That we're looking at a situation, we're looking at circumstances around us,

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And we cannot understand what God is doing. We cannot figure out

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why are you allowing this God? Why is this happening in my life or in their life? And there's these doubts that we have, these wrestlings that we have because we do not understand what God is doing. I think that's something that you and I can relate to. We understand what that's like because, well, as the scripture says in Isaiah 55, God's ways are not our ways. And as high as the heavens are above the earth, his ways are higher than our ways. And

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And so as God is working, He certainly is working, but we don't always understand it or recognize it or know why He's doing it. And so there will be times in your life, if you haven't experienced it yet, it will happen. Or maybe you're experiencing it today. There will be times where there will be those doubts, where you cannot understand what God is doing.

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Unbelief, on the other hand, is a completely different thing. He says, unbelief is a matter of the will. We refuse to believe God's word and obey what he tells us to do. So doubt is a matter of the mind. It's us trying to figure out and understand, and we can't understand, what God is doing or why he's doing it. Unbelief, on the other hand, has to do with our will. It has to do with us choosing God.

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to disobey God, refusing to believe God, refusing to follow his instruction. And so there's a big difference between doubt and unbelief. Doubt is something that you and I will experience, but we need to be careful.

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That we do not allow those doubts to turn into unbelief. That we don't allow those doubts to cause us to then say, I'm not going to follow God. I'm not going to walk in His ways. I can't believe in a God who does that or allows that or lets those things happen.

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And so in order to make sure that those doubts do not turn into unbelief, we have the example here of John the Baptist to help us understand how to deal with those doubts that come into our lives and our minds. Well, John the Baptist, you might remember him from earlier in our study of the Gospel of Luke. He had an incredible ministry because he is the one who got to introduce Jesus into

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to the nation of Israel. He was the one sent before him, the herald of the king. He was the one who announced that the Messiah was coming, Jesus Christ. He was the one who prepared the way for the Lord. That was his ministry and he fulfilled it well. He announced, he prepared the way for Jesus to appear to the nation of Israel. But now, at this time, John the Baptist is in prison.

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And that happened back in Luke chapter 3 verse 19 and 20. You can check that out and see how Herod locked him away because he was preaching against the immoral relationship that Herod had with his brother Philip's wife. But also other evils that Herod had done. John the Baptist was speaking out against them and so Herod locked him up in prison.

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And so he's been in prison since chapter 3. Here we are in chapter 7. We don't know exactly how much time has gone by, but he's been there in prison for some amount of time. And as he's been there in prison, he has these doubts. He's wrestling. He's trying to figure out what God is doing and why God would be allowing these things in his life. And so we have...

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Four points that I'd like to share with you this morning from the example of John the Baptist in relation to this subject of doubts. The first thing is,

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is that believers hold on to God's promises. We see that in verse 18 and 19. Look at it again with me. It says, Then the disciples of John reported to him concerning all these things. And John, calling two of his disciples to him, sent them to Jesus, saying, Are you the coming one, or do we look for another? So here's John the Baptist. He's in prison now.

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And Jesus has been doing these great works, these great miracles. We've seen in the previous weeks, Jesus raise people from the dead. We've seen him heal the blind. We've seen him make the lame walk. We've seen him just do incredible things.

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And so verse 18 tells us that the disciples of John the Baptist, they come back to John who's in prison and they report to him. So they go visit him in jail, in prison, and they say, man, Jesus did this and then he was over here and he did that and Jesus was working over here and this and this incredible miracle took place. And so they're telling him, they're keeping him up to date with all the things that Jesus is doing in the region of Israel.

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And as they're telling him all these things, John the Baptist begins to have a question. He begins to wonder. Again, he begins to doubt. And he asks the question, is Jesus the coming one? Believers hold on to God's promises. Here's what John the Baptist is doing. He's holding on to God's promise that one would come.

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As he's asking Jesus the question in just a few moments, are you the coming one? Although he's asking a question, he's also holding on to God's promise. God's promise that he would send a savior, that he would send the Messiah, that he would send a deliverer. And John believed God. He was holding on to God's promise that there was a savior that would come.

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And so although he has these doubts, although he's wrestling with what is going on, he's still holding on to God's promise. The promise of a Savior is something that God had been giving from the very beginning. As soon as man fell in the garden, God began to promise and prophesy of the Savior who would come. If you were reading along with us in the Bible in three years, then you saw that this week in Genesis chapter 3.

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There, as soon as man fell, as God's dealing with the sin right there in the Garden of Eden, in Genesis chapter 3 verse 15, he also gives some prophetic references to the Savior who would come as he refers to the woman and her seed. And then the serpent. And how the serpent would wound the woman's seed's heel.

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but that the woman's seed would crush the head of the serpent. It's a reference to Jesus, the Messiah, the Savior. And then all throughout the rest of the Old Testament, over and over again, through the different prophets, through the different writers, God announced there is a Savior who's going to come. There's a Savior who's going to come. The Messiah is coming. The Savior is coming. He's going to come over and over again.

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And so John is holding on to God's promise. There is a Savior. There is a coming one. There is one who will redeem us and deliver us. He believes God's promise. Believers hold on to God's promises. What has God promised you? What promises has He given to you?

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Now there's some general promises that we have, like the return of Jesus. In a similar way, as John the Baptist was looking for the coming of the Savior, you and I, we've seen that Jesus came, the Savior came, but you and I are holding on to the promise of His second coming. We're holding on to the promise that He is coming again to establish His kingdom here upon the earth.

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We're also looking forward to the promise of the rapture of the church that will take place first, where we will be caught up to meet the Lord in the air. And these are things that God has promised. He's declared them. They're going to happen. And so these are promises that you and I have, that you and I can hold on to, that you and I need to grasp hold of. But there will be times...

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When we look around and the circumstances don't seem like they're really going to come together the way that God has said.

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And again, we can look at the promise of Romans chapter 8 verse 28, where God declares all things work together for good to those who love God and are the called according to his purpose. That's a promise that God has given to you if you are in love with him and are the called according to his purpose. As you're walking with him, it's a promise that you can hold on to. There's many times as we look around, we think, how can anything good come out of this?

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How could God work in the midst of this situation? How could this be a good thing? We cannot figure it out. We cannot understand it. But we can hold on to God's promises even though we don't fully understand what's happening or why God is allowing it. Essentially, John the Baptist is saying this. We know that the Messiah is coming. That's for sure. I'm holding on to God's promise. There is a coming one. Here's the question.

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Are you that one? Are you the Messiah? Are you the Savior that has been promised? And so that brings us to verse 20. The second point this morning is believers waver in faith sometimes. Believers waver in faith sometimes. Look at verse 20. It's the same question. It says, When the men had come to him, they said, John the Baptist has sent us to you, saying, Are you the coming one, or do we look for another?

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Sometimes you and I as believers, we carry around extra burdens that we don't need. We carry around extra stigmas that really don't belong to us. And you may not be comfortable with this point, with this idea that sometimes believers waver in faith. But this is a reality. This is something that takes place.

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In your life, but also in other people's lives. As John asks the question, are you the coming one or do we look for another? We can see there's some doubt that has crept into his heart, into his mind. As he's wondering, he can't make sense of it. He's trying to figure it out.

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Again, Wiersbe states, doubt is a matter of the mind. We cannot understand what God is doing or why he's doing it. I think that's a perfect description of where John the Baptist is at right here. He cannot understand because if you look back at John the Baptist's ministry, his previous testimony of Jesus, well, you probably remember. He says, behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.

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John also said, look, I didn't know who the Messiah was, but the one who sent me told me when I see the Spirit descend upon him and remain, that's the Messiah, that's the Savior. And he testified, that's Jesus. I saw the Spirit descend upon him and remain. He's the Messiah. John testified of that to the nation of Israel. He announced to Israel that Jesus was the Messiah. He made some bold declarations that Jesus is that Savior that God had promised.

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But now he's asking the question. He says, wait a minute. Are you the Messiah? I announced you as the Messiah. Are you the Messiah? He has some doubts, some struggles in his mind. He's trying to understand what God is doing. And he can't quite figure it out. Now again, John is in prison at this time. And he's probably trying to figure out God's plan because, well, I'm in prison. I've been in prison for some time now. And what's going on?

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I imagine John was expecting the prison doors to bust open anytime, you know. And Jesus marching as the conquering king. Because the Jewish people in that day, well, they were expecting something very specific from the Messiah. They were all looking forward to the Messiah. They all believed that the Messiah was coming. But their expectation of the Messiah was different than what Jesus came to accomplish.

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The Jews were expecting the Messiah to come and to establish a kingdom right then and there. See, during this time, the Jewish people were under Roman rule and they really hated it. It was very uncomfortable for them. They didn't like having their own authority. Some of their liberties had been taken away. They didn't like to pay the taxes and on and on and on. And so they wanted to be free from Roman rule.

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And they were looking for the Messiah. They were expecting when the Messiah comes, He's going to knock out the Roman Empire. He's going to set up His own kingdom. And we're going to be free from the Romans finally.

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Now it's very likely this was John's expectation because, well, we also see that the disciples had this same expectation. And we'll see it as we go through the Gospel of Luke. Jesus has to correct them. They keep wondering, okay, is it right now you're going to establish your kingdom? Is it now it's going to happen? Are we going to, you know, do it right now? They were expecting Jesus or the Messiah to establish a kingdom. And so here's John in prison thinking, where's the kingdom?

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Why hasn't he overthrown Rome yet? Why am I still here in prison? And so he sends the question, are you the coming one? Are you the promised Messiah? I'm wondering now because you're not doing what I thought you would do. You're not doing what I expected that you would do. He begins to have some doubts. In another place, Wiersbe says, it is not unusual for great spiritual leaders to have their days of doubt and uncertainty.

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That may not be something you get real excited about. But it's not unusual. For great spiritual leaders, we like to think, right? Great spiritual leaders, they don't have doubts. They don't ever waver. They don't ever struggle. They're solid. But here's the reality. It's not unusual. Great spiritual leaders, people we look up to, they doubt. They have times of wavering. They have times of struggle.

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Again, doubt is a matter of the mind where we can't understand what God's doing or why he's doing it. We see this example throughout the scriptures. I think David is a good example. In many of the Psalms, you get to see how he's expressing his heart to the Lord and there's these questions, there's these struggles as he, again, basically expresses, I don't understand. I don't understand.

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In Psalm chapter 10 verse 1, the psalmist said, why do you stand afar off, O Lord? Why do you hide in times of trouble? The psalmist begins there, Lord, I'm in the midst of this great difficulty, this great affliction, and it feels like you're just far away, and you're just standing there watching me struggle, and you're not doing anything. Why do you hide in times of trouble?

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And it's like God sees, oh man, Richard's going through some trouble. Okay, I'll make sure he doesn't look at me. I don't know what I could do with that situation, right? That's what it feels like. He's like, why do you hide from me when I'm in trouble? Because that's how he feels. He's wrestling. He's struggling. I don't understand why I'm going through this, why you're allowing this. Now then the psalmist comes back around to faith in God, trusting in God. But he has these doubts. He goes through these things. Another psalm, Psalm 73.

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Again, the psalmist has some doubts. As he begins to look around, he's like, I believe in God. I'm walking with God. And my life is hard and difficult and there's struggles. But then I look at unbelievers. They don't even care about God. And they're successful in their workplace. They've got great families. They don't have pain when they die. They live a long time. I mean, it seems like they have it made. And they don't have pain when they die.

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And they don't believe in God. And here I am walking with God, wanting to be righteous, seeking to honor Him. And it's just these constant battles that are going on. And so the psalmist expresses there in Psalm 73, these emotions that he's going through, these difficulties that he's facing, these doubts that he has. But again, he goes into the house of the Lord at the end of Psalm 73. And he says, and then I understood.

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Once he put God back in the picture and remembered what God said and the end result of walking with God and walking away from God, he then came back to his senses. He came back to that firm foundation. But it was this process that he went through, these doubts that came in, these thoughts he had to struggle with. And so you and I, much like many who've gone before us, will have times of doubt.

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Times where we waver in faith. Times where we have to work out and struggle through things that are going on in our life. I like what Oswald Chambers says about doubt. He says, Doubt is not always a sign that a man is wrong. It may be a sign that he is thinking. Doubt's not always a sign that you're wrong. That your heart is wrong. That you are in the wrong place or that God's upset with you. Doubt doesn't necessarily mean that.

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It just is an indication that you're thinking, that you're wrestling, that you're working through the things that are going on. So we will have doubts. And here's where doubts come from. Doubts come when God does not meet our expectations. Think about that. Doubts come when God does not meet our expectations. When God does not do what we thought He was supposed to do, that's when we begin to wrestle.

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Here's John the Baptist in prison. I thought I was going to be delivered by now. I thought the Messiah was going to establish the kingdom. I thought things would be set straight. God's not meeting my expectations. Things aren't happening the way that I expected them to happen.

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When we do pre-marriage counseling with couples, one of my favorite sessions to work through with the couple is the session on expectations. It's a fun one because what we do is we have each person go through this list of expectations and to write out, to express, what do you expect from

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from your spouse? What do you expect your life to be like? What do you expect your marriage to be like? How many kids do you expect to have? What kind of, you know, life do you expect to have? Where do you expect to live? All these expectations. And it's such a fun one because it's where dreams are shattered and reality becomes apparent. It's like they stop living in the dream world and go, oh, you know, those rose-colored glasses, they just shatter, they fall apart because...

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Well, we often have expectations without really thinking about it. And then we have these expectations and once, you know, the bride and groom-to-be, when they come together and they share and they go like, you expect what of me? I don't think so. And then they got to decide, well, do we still want to get married? Because I can't meet these expectations.

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We often have those expectations and we need to be challenged in them. In the same way, we have expectations of God, even though we may not have thought it through all the way, we have these expectations and when God doesn't meet them, well, here come the doubts. And we look at a situation and we think, God, I thought you were going to heal me. That was my expectation, but God, how come you haven't healed me? I don't get it. I don't understand what you're doing. Why are you allowing this sickness?

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Or you're looking on at someone else and God, you were supposed to heal them. How could you let them die? They loved you. They served you. We look on and we realize God did not meet our expectations. Or you're in the situation and you're losing the house. And you're looking at God saying, God, I expected you to provide. I expected you to meet the need. I expected that you were going to save us. We were going to be able to stay here.

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I don't understand what you're doing. I don't understand why we're going through this. Or whatever's happening. You know, bad things happen in our lives. And we don't get it. People die. And it doesn't make sense to us. And those doubts come when God doesn't meet our expectations. But again, understand and remember, Jesus does not do things according to our ways, but His ways.

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And His ways are higher than our ways. As high as the heavens are above the earth. And so there is going to be many times in our life where we do not understand. Where what we expect is not what takes place. We can hold on to God's promises knowing that God is working. He is faithful to His word. But at the same time we wrestle with how does it all work together? I don't see how this could work out. I don't see what God is doing.

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And so we will have those doubts when our expectations are not met. But we can learn a good lesson here from John the Baptist. Because now when John the Baptist has these doubts, he does the right thing. What does he do? He asks Jesus. He sends him a message and says, Jesus, I don't understand. I announced you as the coming one.

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But you're not doing what I expected, so was I wrong? Are you the coming one? Are you the Savior? Are you the Messiah? Listen, whenever you waver, whenever you have these times of doubt, these struggles, the right thing to do is to ask Jesus. Ask Jesus. Look to Him and say, I don't understand. Now sometimes again, when we carry around these burdens like

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Well, if you doubt, you know, you're a terrible person and God's upset with you. If you have struggles, well, God's going to look at you and say, why are you struggling, stupid? But that's not the way that the Lord is. He knows our frame, the psalmist tells us in Psalm 103. He knows who we are. He knows what we're like. He knows that we are going to have doubts, that we're not going to understand His ways. As John sends these messengers to Jesus, Jesus doesn't rebuke John.

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He doesn't rebuke the messengers. He gives an answer. And so when you have doubts, when you wrestle, when you struggle, when it doesn't make sense and you're like, I believe in you God. I'm wanting to hold on to your promises but I just can't see how this is working. I don't understand what you're doing. Take it to the Lord. Ask Jesus.

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And allow Him to help you address those doubts and the situations that are going on within your mind. Because again, doubt is a matter of the mind. Now what you don't want to do is allow those doubts to then become unbelief. Where it causes you to say, I can't believe in a God who would allow this. And you walk away from Him. We'll talk about that more in a minute. But let's move on to verse 21 and 22. Here we have the third point from John's example. And that is that believers have good reason to believe.

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Look again at verse 21 and 22. It says, So here come John's messengers.

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And they meet up with Jesus. They say, Jesus, we come from John the Baptist. He has a question. Are you the coming one? Or is there another one that we're supposed to be waiting for? And so Jesus invites them to watch. We would have loved a simple yes or no, right? Just check the box. Yes or no. Just tell me straight. Are you the Messiah? Are you not the Messiah? We got to know. But very often God doesn't answer our questions in that way. Instead, he says, take a look at what's going on. Watch what's happening.

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And so that very hour, he cures infirmities. He heals those with affliction. He casts out evil spirits. And he gives sight to the blind. Jesus, are you the Messiah? Take a look at this. Boom, boom, boom, boom. He works these miracles, does these healings. And then he sends them back to John. He says, okay, now go tell John what you've seen and heard.

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You've seen these people be healed. You've seen the blind receive their sight. You've seen them be set free and the gospel is preached to the poor. Go tell John what you've seen and heard. Again, it's not a simple yes or no like we would like, but he gives him good reason to believe. You see, in the scriptures, as I said over and over again, God prophesied and promised that the Messiah, the Savior would come.

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And along with those promises, he gave some indication about the works that the Messiah would do. Isaiah chapter 35 verse 5 and 6 is a good example of this. There in Isaiah, the prophet says, The eyes of the blind shall be opened. The ears of the deaf shall be unstopped. Then the lame shall leap like a deer and the tongue of the dumb sing.

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The prophet Isaiah says, when the Messiah comes, the blind are going to be made well. They're going to see. The lame are going to leap around and be able to walk. This is the work that the Messiah is going to do. And so Jesus answers the question, not with a simple yes or no, but with the evidence that was given in the prophecies about the Messiah. This is the way that God works. He gives enough for us to believe.

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but he leaves out just enough so that it's still by faith. He gives us what we need in order to believe, but he leaves out just enough so that it's still by faith that we come to him and walk in relationship with him. You and I as believers, we have good reason to believe. He sends back message to John the Baptist and he says, here's a good reason to believe that I'm the Messiah. I'm fulfilling the prophecies that were given of the one who was to come.

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He doesn't say yes. He doesn't say no. He gives them the reasons to believe. You and I as Christians, we are not asked to have blind faith. God doesn't say, okay, believe in me. I'm not going to give you any reason to believe. I'm not going to tell you why you should believe. Just believe. Don't think about it. There's no requirement. You know, check your brain at the door. We don't want no logic, no reasoning here. You know, you can't use your mind. You have to

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No, no, that's not the way that God works. The way God works is he gives us evidence. He gives us reason to believe. And then he asks us to believe. He could appear to you, right? He could just materialize right there in front of you and say, ta-da, here I am. I'm God. Believe in me. But he chooses not to. Why? Well, that's speculation. We can guess this or that

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Wonder why God doesn't work the way that we expect him to. But again, his ways are not our ways. But he doesn't say you have to believe and just not think about it. He gives us good reason. You and I as believers, we need to know our relationship with the Lord is reasonable. It's reasonable. It's not ridiculous. It's not ridiculous.

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I know the world will tell you it's ridiculous. That's stupid. But listen, our belief in Jesus Christ is not just based on warm fuzzy feelings that we have. It's not based on emotions. It's not based on just, you know, I woke up one day and thought, well, maybe I'll try this. Our Christian faith is based on solid evidence. He gives us what we need in order to believe. Let me give you some quick examples of that.

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First of all, the prophecies that Jesus fulfilled. He quoted one there, or referred to one in Isaiah chapter 35, but many others. It's about 300 prophecies that Jesus fulfilled when he came and walked the earth. Now here's the thing. Those prophecies that he fulfilled were all compiled together, translated into other languages, 300 years before Jesus was born. So here you have a piece of

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of literature that was compiled, put together, translated. It's documented. We know it took place 300 years before Jesus was born. In this piece of literature are over 300 prophecies about the Messiah and Jesus came and fulfilled those prophecies. Now I'm not a mathematician but mathematicians have

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done the work, they've worked out the probabilities and statistics and determined it is essentially mathematically impossible for any one person to fulfill all of those prophecies. Being born in Bethlehem, riding into Jerusalem on a donkey, being born of a virgin, on and on and on we go. It's impossible mathematically for one person to

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fulfill all those prophecies, but it was fulfilled in Jesus. There's some solid evidence there. There's some good reason to believe that Jesus indeed is the Savior of the world. I think that Lee Strobel is a great example of this. You probably have heard of him. He's written many books, The Case for Christ, The Case for Faith, those kinds of books. But he started out as an unbeliever. His wife was a Christian. He did not believe. He hated the fact that she believed and he wanted to once and for all prove her wrong.

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And so as an investigative reporter, he thought, well, I can put my skills to use. I can investigate this as I would any other story. I can prove that it's not true. So finally she'll be quiet and stop telling me about Jesus. And so he sets out to disprove Christianity, the fact that Jesus is God and the Messiah, the Savior. But as he goes through the evidence, it comes to a point where he sees that

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The evidence points to the fact that Jesus Christ is who he said he is. That the Bible is the word of God. That it is true. And then he had to make a decision. This is where doubts differ from unbelief. He had doubts, so he investigated. He dug up the details. As he looked at the evidence, he realized it points to the fact that Jesus is God. Now he had the decision to make, to believe or not to believe. Now he chose to believe. But unbelief, again, it's a matter of the will.

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He could have, seeing the evidence, said, okay, I see the evidence. I see that it points to the Lord, but I'm not going to follow that. I don't want to walk with God. I don't want to believe in Jesus. That's what the scribes and the Pharisees did. They saw the miracles of Lazarus raised from the dead. They saw the evidence right in front of them, but they said, no, I'm not going to believe. It was a matter of the will. You see, it's not an intellectual thing.

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stumbling block that keeps people from walking with God, from believing in Jesus. It's not intellectual. It's not in the mind. It's a matter of the will. It's a matter of the heart refusing to believe, refusing to obey. And so you and I, we have good reason to believe. We have a solid foundation to stand on. Again, God gives us enough that we can believe, but He leaves out just enough so that it's still by faith that we approach God

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That we have relationship with God by faith. What's interesting to me is that John heard the report from his disciples. He heard all the things that Jesus was doing. And it caused him to ask the question, is Jesus the Messiah? And so he sends the messengers, Jesus, are you the Messiah? And how does Jesus respond? With the same things that John had already heard. Listen, you are going to have doubts. There are going to be those wrestlings in your mind, the strugglings in your mind.

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And again, learn from John's example and take those to Jesus. But many times, God's response to you will be the things that He's already spoken to you. He'll be reminding you, this is my word. You can believe it. Hold on to it. Don't let this become a stumbling block for you. And that brings us to verse 23. And the fourth point, which is, believers are not offended by Jesus.

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Believers are not offended by Jesus. Verse 23 says, And blessed is he who is not offended because of me. You see, Jesus sends the message back to John the Baptist. Tell him what you've seen. Tell him the miracles I've worked. And he adds on to that, And blessed is he who is not offended because of me. I said before, doubts come when God does not meet our expectations. We are offended when we cannot believe

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Get over that and trust in God. We get doubts when God doesn't meet our expectations. But when Jesus says, blessed is he who is not offended because of me, that word offended, it means to be tripped up or stumbled. And so when you have those doubts and you can't trust God in the midst of it, it's where you begin to be offended or you are caused to stumble. When we cannot trust God in the midst of the doubts,

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It becomes a matter now of unbelief. Where it's not that I'm wrestling in my mind, but now I'm choosing to disregard God and His Word. And so he tells John basically this. John, you're wrestling, you're struggling. Here's some evidence. Here, I encourage you again. You need to believe. And don't be offended. Don't let this be a stumbling block that causes you to say, I can't believe in a God who would allow me to stay in prison.

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Don't let it be a stumbling block where it causes you to say, I won't follow a God who will let this happen or who will allow this or who will do these things. Don't be offended because of me, John. Trust in me. Believe in me. I am the one who is promised, the Savior. And you and I in the same way, we need to trust God and not be offended by His message, by His timing, by His ways.

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And so yes, we are going to have doubts. Yes, there will be struggles. There's going to be wrestlings in our mind. And that's okay. It's normal. When you have those, you need to go to Jesus and let Him encourage you. Let Him remind you and confirm His word to you once again. But don't let those doubts turn into unbelief where you are offended and you say, I can't follow a God like that anymore. I won't.

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obey. I won't believe. It's one thing to doubt. Unbelief is something else entirely. How can we be offended by Jesus? Well, there's a couple examples we find in the scriptures. We can be offended by Jesus as we go through trials. In Mark chapter 4 verse 17, Jesus is giving the parable of the sower and he talks about the seed that grows up but then there's trials, there's affliction and

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He says when that persecution arises, immediately they are offended. They're stumbled. God didn't meet their expectations. Oh, I thought the Christian life was going to be easy. I thought there was going to be no problems. And now here's all these difficulties. And like the psalmist said, looking around, and these people don't have problems. But now I'm a Christian, I have all these problems. And some people are offended. They're stumbled. And they say, forget it. I can't walk with God like this. I wanted an easy life.

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Sometimes people are stumbled at Jesus' teachings. We see an example of this in John chapter 6. As Jesus is teaching some hard truths to the people, the people are murmuring, they're complaining, they're trying to figure out what's going on. We don't like this teaching. In John 6.61 it says, When Jesus knew it, he said unto them, Does this offend you? And at that time many people walked away from Jesus. They said, This is too hard.

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You know, Jesus teaches some hard things. He teaches some hard truth. He said, look, if you're not willing to forsake everything that you have, you cannot be my disciple. I'm sorry if I'm the first one to ever tell you this, but the Christian life is not easy, a bed of roses, always, you know, just rainbows and flowers and beautiful things. The Christian life is filled with trials and difficulty and attacks and battles. If you're looking for comfort in this life,

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You won't find it in Christ. Internally, he'll give you peace that passes all understanding. But externally, there's going to be some battles. And you've got to be willing to forsake all. And some people are offended by Jesus' teaching. And it causes them to say, that's too hard. I can't walk with it. No. It's one thing to have doubts. But don't be offended. Don't let it become unbelief. Another occasion where we see people offended at Jesus is in Mark chapter 6.

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I would label this as familiarity. As Jesus is teaching and working, the people are looking on and they're saying, hey, we know this guy. We grew up with him. He's the carpenter. And we have his brothers here and his sisters here. And it says that they were offended at him. They decided, look, we can't receive from this guy. We know him. We grew up with him. We have his brothers and sisters here. There's a danger for us as believers today.

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Because, well, on the one hand, we have a great intimacy with our Savior. And He invites us to come in. Oh, it's beautiful. But we need to be careful that it doesn't become too casual. Because Jesus still is King of Kings and Lord of Lords. And there are times in believers' life today where they have this familiarity with Jesus. They know about Him. Yeah, I've heard the stories. But there's not that commitment to Him.

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And then when he requires, when he says, look, this is what I say. This is what I want you to do. This is the hard thing, a difficult thing. You've got to go forward. They're familiar with Jesus, but they're not committed to him. And it causes them to be offended, to stumble, to turn away and say, I can't follow Jesus down that path. I can't believe that. I can't walk with him in that way. And then, of course, there's the issue of salvation.

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The Bible teaches very clearly that salvation is only found in Jesus. The Apostle Paul in Romans chapter 9 explains that the Jewish people did not receive Jesus, they didn't receive salvation at that time because they did not seek it by faith, but by works. And because they sought it by works, they wanted to get right with God by their own good deeds. Paul explains in Romans 9, 32 and 33 that Jesus became a stumbling stone, an offense to them.

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Because Jesus said, I'm the way, the truth, and the life, and no one comes to the Father except through me. Salvation is only found in Jesus Christ. And so Jesus says, blessed are you if you're not offended by me, if I don't cause you to stumble. Because salvation is only found through me. I am the Savior, Jesus says. I am the Messiah. You must look to me. I'm the only way to have forgiveness, to have eternal life. I am the way, the truth, and the life.

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And so you and I as believers today, like John the Baptist, we will have times and seasons of doubt. And we need to hold on to God's promises. There will be times where you waver in faith, where you have those doubts, where you have those struggles in your mind. And that's okay, but don't let them turn into unbelief. Instead, take them to Jesus. Let Him reconfirm His Word to you. Let Him reconfirm in your heart the things He has declared.

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Let Him encourage you and equip you that you would continue to believe so that you are not offended by Him, by His ways. So that you're not offended as you look and you say, I can't believe in a God who would allow this, who would do that. But that you would hold on to His promises and realize His ways are higher than my ways. And I don't understand it, but I believe God is good.

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And he works all things together for good to those who love him and are the called according to his purpose. One last thought. You know, it's often been said that we as Christians, you know, we need to have a sign on us that says, under construction. Right? That we're not perfect. You know, we still got some growing to do. God's still working on us. And it's a good sign. It's a good example. But I think we don't think it through all the way sometimes. Because under construction, when a building is under construction, well,

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Sometimes it's a mess and sometimes there's some serious work that has to be done. Sometimes walls have to be stripped back to the structure. The drywall has to come off, the paint has to come off, the structure itself has to be addressed and taken care of.

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And for you and I as believers, sometimes that's the reality. We are under construction and sometimes God's got to strip off the walls and tear down the rooms. He's got to uncover the foundation and dig down deep and re-pour some more foundation. And he does that in our lives, but that's some serious work that's going on. There's some serious trials that we go through that he accomplishes that work through. There's some serious things he teaches us. We have to undergo some heavy things.

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And it's often in those times. Although we profess, I'm under construction. When the construction's happening, we're like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Put away the jackhammer. I mean, that's too loud. That's too crazy. Things are being broken up. I don't get it. And those doubts come in. God, this is not what I expected. But understand, you're under construction. God's at work. You can hold on to his promises. He will be faithful to complete the building project in you. But hold on to him. Let's pray.

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Heavenly Father, I pray for each and every one of us, God. Lord, as we face doubts, as we wrestle with and struggle with things where things are not happening the way that we expected, I pray, God, that you would help us. Lord, to take those doubts, to take those wrestlings to you. Lord, that you might confirm your word to us and encourage us and strengthen us. Lord, that we would not allow those doubts to turn into unbelief, that we would not be offended, that it would not become a stumbling block for us.

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But Lord, that we would believe You at Your Word. That we would draw near to You and trust in You. Even when we cannot understand and figure out what's happening and why You're allowing the things that are going on. God, help us to remember to know that Your ways are higher than our ways. That You are on the throne. That You are good. And that we can trust in You and rely upon You. For Your ways are good. And You love us more than we can even understand.

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And so, Lord, we invite you to work. Strengthen us. For those who are doubting right now, God, I pray that you would, even right now as we pray, confirm your word in their hearts. Strengthen them, God. Fill them with your spirit. Give them boldness to trust in you. Lord, that they would hold on to your promises even though they cannot see and understand what you're doing. And God, I pray for any who are not right with you this morning.

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Maybe they've never received you as Savior and Lord. Maybe they have, but they've gone astray because, well, they were offended. They stumbled. The world was enticing or they didn't like what you had to say. They didn't want to follow you any longer. God, I pray that each and every one would know how much you love them right now, Lord, that you would reveal yourself and speak to their hearts by the power of your Holy Spirit. And God, I pray that you would draw them to you. Lord, that they would know and understand

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It's not a matter of the mind and overcoming intellectual hurdles, but it's a matter of the heart and choosing to follow You, to believe in You. God, I pray that You would help them to make that choice today and to receive Your Savior and Lord, to receive the forgiveness that You offer, the hope and the promise of eternal life. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.

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We pray you have been blessed by this Bible teaching. The power of God to change a life is found in the daily reading of His Word. Visit ferventword.com to find more teachings and Bible study resources.