Answering doubt

This morning’s scripture reading comes from Matthew chapter eleven verses one through six.

When Jesus had finished instructing his twelve disciples, he went on from there to teach and preach in their cities. Now when John heard in prison about the deeds of the Christ, he sent word by his disciples and said to him, “Are you the one who is to come, or shall we look for another?” And Jesus answered them, “Go and tell John what you hear and see: the blind receive their sight and the lame walk, lepers are cleansed and the deaf hear, and the dead are raised up, and the poor have good news preached to them. And blessed is the one who is not offended by me.”

For the last several weeks we’ve been looking at the theme of being sent. Jesus is essentially preaching a sermon to them as he commissions them to go out. One of the things he talks about is how they will face opposition. Some will receive the message and some will reject it.

Jesus then goes to preach—probably in the places he sends them—and we encounter an example of someone who is trying to determine what to make of Jesus. It’s not outright resistance, but perhaps some level of confusion about Jesus. And that is John the Baptist. John of all people, the one who pointed to Jesus as the Messiah and said, “Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.” John of all people has doubts.

John of all people has doubts and questions, so much so that he sends his disciples to maybe double-check and inquire once again. Why does John doubt? What's going on in John's life? Well, one of the things about John's ministry is that even outside of the Bible, we have historical records of it. John's ministry was huge. We do know that from Scripture, but John was greatly revered at the time, and in time periods beyond that, by the Jewish people. His ministry drew massive crowds and drove people to come out into the wilderness, similar to Jesus, just to hear what he had to say and to be baptized. People of all different walks of life came—Pharisees came, all kinds of people came, similar to Jesus's ministry.

But John spoke out against Herod, and Herod imprisoned John. Now, after some period of time, John was sitting in prison, waiting. Waiting for that Messiah. Waiting for that Jesus to bring his kingdom in its fullness, its greatness, and its power—and it hasn't been happening yet.

And so the questions, the puzzling, and the doubt begin to fester because John's current reality doesn't match his expectations. And that's so much of the way it can happen in life: we can look at our lives, we can have expectations for how our life should go, what God should do for us, or what our lives should be like in God. When the reality that we're living out doesn't match our expectations, we begin to doubt too. John here is beginning to experience this in his life.

I want us to look at a couple of passages just to give us insight into some of the Old Testament prophetic passages that John would have been thinking about and expecting to see in the life of Jesus. So one of them is Micah 5:5-6, and it says: "And he shall be our peace. This is talking about the Messiah who will come when the Assyrian comes into our land and treads on our palaces; then we will raise against him seven shepherds and eight princes of men; they shall shepherd the land of Assyria with the sword, and the land of Nimrod at its entrances; and he shall deliver us from the Assyrian when he comes into our land and treads within our border." So we see a military leader. We see one in the line of David who would come, rule, reign, conquer, and defeat the enemies of Israel, just like in Daniel.

Then we look at Daniel 7:14, talking again prophetically about what was given to one like a Son of Man. This is the vision that Daniel was picturing as coming. Jesus used that same title for his own life. And it says: "...and to him was given dominion and glory and a kingdom, that all peoples, nations, and languages should serve him; his dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom one that shall not be destroyed." Where is that? Where's the king? "I have this expectation from Scripture, and I don't see it coming to fruition."

One more for you: Isaiah 11:4: "But with righteousness he shall judge the poor, and decide with equity for the meek of the earth; and he shall strike the earth with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips he shall kill the wicked." So there's a side of judgment here. Judgment is good for dealing with people like Herod, who was evil and had imprisoned John. John expects his enemies and the enemies of God's kingdom to be judged and dealt with. But that reality was not playing out at this point in time. So John is confused because the kingdom and the Messiah's life look different than what he expected.

When our reality doesn't match our expectations, we begin to doubt. You know, before that, we actually sometimes become disappointed. You’ve known that in your own life—those moments where God didn't answer that prayer. Those were moments in life when you expected God to do something based on certain verses of Scripture. You waited, you expected, you had faith, and yet God did not do it that way. Somehow, that began to birth a disappointment.

David even tells us about his disappointment; it's marked all the time in the Psalms. And that disappointment can begin to lead to doubt. Why? Why? One of the voices of the prophets in the Old Testament constantly rings out, "How long, O Lord?" If we are not careful and that festers, this offense and this disillusionment can make us drift away from the Lord.

I want you to know that doubt isn't entirely a bad thing. You can be honest with God about your doubts. You can be honest with God about your disappointments. The Psalms are one of the greatest illustrations of David working out his frustrations, his disappointments, and his doubts right before the Lord. Because when you bring those things before Him, you allow the Lord to work in your own heart and in your own life. If you keep them from Him, if you just try and process it all by yourself, then you never invite the Lord into your heart and into that situation of doubt and frustration. But when you open up, saying, "Lord, this is what I've got, I'm just..." when you're honest about where you're at, God begins to work. He begins to speak. He begins to answer.

In a lot of ways, that's what we see this morning. Jesus is answering a guy who is beginning to express those things to the Messiah: "I've got doubts. I've got questions. I don't know what to make of this."

These are the things that we struggle with oftentimes because we project our expectations onto God. We think, "This is what God should do. He should do it the way we want Him to do it, and in the time that we want Him to do it." But what we have to wind up seeing is that when you do that, you are forcing your external expectations of who God should be, how He should do things, and when He should do them upon Him. You want God to run your life and the world around you in the way that you think is best, and that doesn't allow God to be God. That diminishes God to your timetables and your plans.

But God works on a deeper level. And that's what's happening here. Even here, God is bringing His kingdom through Jesus—a greater kingdom, one that will not end, and a reign that is coming one day, but it goes through a cross and a resurrection. It could not be fully seen or understood by John at the time. And that's how it often works. God is not working on some small dominion of geography; He's working on a global and universal scale. Even when we experience suffering, hardship, doubt, and disillusionment, we need to remember what Jesus says. So we're going to be looking at how Jesus answers our doubt.

The first thing that we see here is that Jesus responds to the doubt of John. It says right here in this text—I want you to see this—in verses 2 through 6. Now when John was in prison and heard about the deeds of the Christ, he sent word by his disciples and said to Him, "Are you the one who is to come, or shall we look for another?" And Jesus answered them, "Go and tell John what you hear and see."

So, in some ways, he made John's disciples his own messengers because he's now sending them out, just like he did his other disciples, to go back to John and tell him. This points to something that has always been true: God wants to give us answers to many of our questions. Here, even in Jesus's answer, what he's about to say shows it's not a blind leap of faith.

Francis Schaeffer, a great apologist who lived in the 70s and 80s and was a pastor, used to say that it's not a blind leap of faith; God has given us reasonable evidence to trust Him and to believe. That's one of the things he was always unpacking—that there were reasonable answers to reasonable questions. So here, what Jesus is doing is saying, "Go tell John what you hear and see." This is something that the prophets, as well as ancient Israel, were always called to do: to be messengers who record and testify.

I'm going to show you an example from Isaiah 43. I don't think it's on our screen, but I just want you to hear this little example of what's happening in Isaiah. He says to Israel: "Bring out the people who are blind, yet have eyes, who are deaf, yet have ears." So there are people who are struggling with doubt or unbelief. God wants to meet people in their doubts and their unbelief; He doesn't want to leave us or anyone in those places. So He calls Israel to bring those people out, and then He says to Israel: "You are my witnesses, declares the Lord, and my servant whom I have chosen, that you may know and believe me and understand that I am he. Before me no god was formed, nor shall there be any after me."

What He is saying is that over time, because the eyes and ears of the people of Israel are open, He wants them to testify and be a witness to the people who do not hear and do not see. John might be struggling right now to hear in his prison cell, so God is now sending his disciples back to report to John. Go tell him.

That same instruction is there for us. If you are in Christ and you have experienced His power, if you have seen the life-changing power of the cross in your own life, then we, in that same way, are called to be witnesses—to go and tell what we hear and see, and what we have experienced in our own lives. That's the power of your personal testimony. When you tell people what you have experienced, it's your story, and there is a powerful witness in that.

In the church, as a side note, we are all called to walk in obedience to Christ. Even within the church, there are times when we struggle with doubt and disillusionment. The church ought to be a place where we preach the Word to one another, where we speak, testify, and remind each other of the truth of God. There ought to be safe places in church to bring your doubts and your questions.

So often I've seen places where, growing up and coming to worship, if someone asked a question, they just got shot down. But God is not afraid of our questions. He has given us solid answers for these things. When you create that space, it benefits the community of the church—gathering the saints and finding deep relationships within the people of God where you can just be honest. Honest to God, and honest to the people around you. We ought to know not to condemn one another, but to go and tell these truths.

First, the Word is Fulfilled. Jesus right here says, "Go and tell John what you hear and see" in verse 5: "The blind receive their sight and the lame walk, lepers are cleansed and the deaf hear, and the dead are raised up, and the poor have good news preached to them." Jesus is essentially pointing back to words spoken in Old Testament prophecy. He's alluding to things spoken hundreds of years before his life—things promised by God for His Messiah. Jesus is essentially saying, "It is happening now. I understand the prophecies you are thinking of regarding dominion and judgment. You're right, but I'm working in a process, the way God works in time. That judgment isn't fully coming right now, because first, I am doing the work of deliverance. I'm doing the work of salvation. Today, I am completing this part of the mission."

He alludes to passages like Isaiah 35:4-6, which says: "Say to those who are anxious of heart, 'Be strong; fear not! Behold, your God will come with vengeance, with the recompense of God. He will come and save you.' Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf unstopped; then shall the lame man leap like a deer, and the tongue of the mute sing for joy. For waters break forth in the wilderness, and streams in the desert."

And then once again, Jesus quotes from Isaiah 61:1: "The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because the Lord has anointed me to bring good news to the poor; he has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to those who are bound; to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor."

Jesus is saying the words are being fulfilled. It may not be the exact way you expected all the prophecies to unfold, and it might not come all at one time, but I am working. I am doing the things that my Father foretold, and now they are coming to fruition and pointing to me. Trust, John. Trust the process. Trust that even though I may not be doing it all right now according to your timetable, I've got a plan. I've got a purpose. Lives are being changed. These words are coming true. God tells us in advance, and then He fulfills those promises. Scripture does this wonderful thing time after time where God, in His grace, announces beforehand what He will do, and then He brings it to fruition. Jesus is saying, "I can't manufacture these things; they are evidence that I am who I say I am—the Messiah." Hallelujah!

Scripture and God do this all the time. It's a great thing for us as well, because we can look at how God has fulfilled these prophecies for Jesus, alongside all sorts of other prophecies in Scripture. If you struggle with questions about Christianity, or whether Jesus was the Messiah, or whether the Bible is truly the Word of God, you can look at the historical and prophetic evidence.

For instance, the ancient port city of Tyre was known for its vast riches and wealth, but the prophet Ezekiel said that one day, every single stone of the city would be scraped into the sea. Centuries later, Alexander the Great came along. He had no knowledge of the prophecy, but he threw every single stone of the city into the water to build a causeway out to the island to conquer it. That is the accuracy of the Word of God. Time and time again, God's promises stand. Will you trust them? There are several books out there that are handy for this if you ever have questions, like Josh McDowell's Evidence That Demands a Verdict—that would be a great start. You can trust the Bible. God's intentions are clear throughout Scripture, and archaeology and history constantly verify it. You can trust Him.

Second, the Miracles Validate His Identity. Jesus points to his miracles: the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have the gospel preached to them. These are finished miracles, signs, wonders, and displays of power. Even when Jesus talked to the Pharisees, he pointed to the fact that "even if you don't believe my words, believe the works that I do." Believe the signs and the wonders. These things testify and point to the fact that I am the Messiah. The power alone demonstrates it.

The miracles validate and demonstrate Jesus's claims, but they aren't just magic tricks or nice gestures. Jesus is showing us the breaking in of God's kingdom, where God's rule and reign begin to enter into the world. This is a glimpse of the restoration: healing the blind, making the lame walk, transforming lives. And it's not just physical. Following the physical healing came spiritual transformation. These people were healed, their lives were changed, and they believed and followed Him. The poor, the tax collectors, the outcasts—they saw these things and, unlike the Pharisees, they didn't doubt; they believed.

Jesus is asking, "Do you see what is happening? Do you see the lives being changed? Do you see the kingdom breaking in? Go and tell John these things." In that same way, we keep bearing witness to that. Have you seen God work in a way that transformed your own heart? Have you seen Him heal brokenness? Have you seen Him deliver someone from addiction, from bondage, or from depression? Yes, we have. All of our lives are testimonies of the different ways God performs signs and wonders through the changing of the human heart. When the gospel is preached to you, it changes you into something new. I can tell you, the old Steven is different now; I am a new creation in Christ. If you are in Christ, you are that same miracle.

When you are struggling with doubt, you need memories and milestones. You need to remember the moments when God came through, the moments where He provided, and the moments when He answered your prayers. We forget so easily. In those moments when you begin to doubt, you can pull out those memories and remember when God met you. Remembering those signs, wonders, and moments doesn't answer all our questions, but it illuminates the dark places.

Third, the Message Itself. The final thing here is the message. Jesus says in verse 5, "the poor have the good news preached to them." It's not just power, but it's the message itself. This phrase "good news" is translated as the gospel. What is that message that Jesus has been preaching all along? The kingdom of God is here, your sins are forgiven, and life is found in me. He is inviting people into that message to experience the power, healing, restoration, and grace of God. That's why people who are far from God are coming to Him—because of the power of this message.

It doesn't tell people, "Get your life right, fix yourself, and then God will accept you." No, Jesus comes along and says, "I love you. I accept you." No matter your walk of life, no matter what you have turned to, Jesus comes down and meets us first. He meets people in their stories; He eats with outcasts, He offers living water to a broken woman at the well, He offers salvation to a corrupt tax collector who defrauded people constantly, and He delivers and heals a demon-possessed person. Jesus comes with the good news, transforming the lives of people.

This message changes lives. "Go and tell John: the good news is proclaimed to the poor in spirit, to the broken, to the downcast, to those who do not deserve it." That is the power of the gospel we should proclaim every single week over and over again. It is not about us finding our way to God; God comes down and offers us life and salvation.

The gospel is entirely different from every other religious system. Every other system says: "Fix your life. Follow the rules. Do these things, and then maybe your good will outweigh your bad and you'll gain entrance to heaven." Jesus comes and says, "I've already done it. Receive my life. Your sins are forgiven." This message is fundamentally different because it is scandalous compared to what the world teaches. It disturbed the religious leaders of the day because it was so radically beautiful.

If you find yourself in doubt or disappointment with God, remind yourself of that message. Remind yourself of how, when we were far from God, Jesus came and took on all of our guilt, all of our sin, all of our rebellion, and all of our darkest deeds. He died for us to bear our punishment so that He might offer us life and clothe us in His righteousness. In theology, we call this The Great Exchange. Think about how righteous and holy Jesus is—He credits that to us, and takes our debt, our sin, and our dirt upon Himself. We deserve the opposite.

If you are in doubt, look at the cross and His glory. Let that anchor you. Even if you can't process or figure out what God is doing right now, remember that He loves you, that He suffered for you, and that He changed your life. When you can't make sense of your circumstances, preach the gospel to yourself every day so your mind will not drift away.

Life can often bring deep disappointments. We experience tragedy, we find ourselves in metaphorical prisons like John, we suffer from disease, or we experience chronic pain—and the questions come. Disappointment happens. Someone you love dies, even though you prayed continuously, and we question: "Why, God? Why?" Left alone, those questions can lead to a destructive doubt, and if we are actively letting that fester, we begin to drift. Jesus explicitly says, "Blessed is the one who is not offended by me," meaning the one who doesn't fall away because things didn't go the way they expected. Don't pull back. So often we try to process our pain, our sorrow, and our disappointments completely on our own.

God has given us answers, and He will continue to comfort us. Come to Him. Find comfort like David did, and God will steady your heart. He will speak to you in your pain and even in your doubt. One day, those who trust in Jesus will be swept up into a life where disease, sorrow, and all pain are gone, and every tear will be wiped away by Him.

Do you doubt? Are you stumbling? Sometimes you can't see the big picture. Sometimes we must simply trust Him, but that doesn't mean that God is faithless. We can look to what He has already done. We can see the amazing wonder of changed lives and His power working to heal and restore hearts, marriages, families, lives, and souls. Most of all, He has given us a message—a great legacy of hope. Preach the victory of Jesus to your heart today, and let the Lord heal and restore you once again. Amen.