In the Garden, before sin darkened a perfect world and made it the twisted fallen one we recognize today, there was no doubt. Adam and Eve saw God–or at least had relationship with him–in a way that left no room for the shadow. They walked and talked with God in the cool of the evening. Their faith (trust and confidence) in God was perfect. The world was young and fresh and so was mankind. They reasoned and asked God anything and without hesitation had access to his limitless wisdom and knowledge. They trusted him entirely.
“And they heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden. 9 But the Lord God called to the man and said to him, “Where are you?” (Gen. 3:8-9)
The fall happened. The world fell under the shadow of a curse. Humanity was cut off from free unhindered communication with God. Many questions came after banishment and silence yawned into minutes and hours and years. All of humanity has had questions that Adam never had to face pre-fall. Why is there pain? Why is there death? What is my purpose? Is there anything worth living for?
Experiences were held through the tinted lens of separation from God’s eternal wisdom. Through sin was born fear, doubt, rejection and pain. Our world revolved around the counterfeits of what God created it to be. Separate from the creator’s word and guidance our own conclusions were drawn. I am unloved. There is no God. If there is he is not good. etc.
Adam saw with his eyes but when his eyes no longer saw and he might ask God, “Are you listening?” In the silence of the night doubt crept close. His faith and trust in God was tested. He could not see God as he saw the stars. He could not hear God as he heard the crickets or feel him like the breeze through the grass at his feet. He wiped the sweat off his forehead and drank cool water from the stream allowing water to pour over his blistered hands and chose to believe God was there, somewhere.
In the gap between a question and an answer, doubt rises up to challenge faith. Doubt tests the strength of faith as a wrestling match reveals strength and weakness.
In another light I like the way Bill Johnson approaches these ideas in ‘Dreaming with God’:
To embrace what [God] has shown us and to obey what He has commanded us, often in the midst of unanswerable questions, is an honor beyond measure.
To have questions is healthy; to hold God hostage to those questions is not…Not understanding is OK. Restricting our spiritual life to what we understand is not…Such a controlling spirit is destructive to the development of a Christ-like nature.
We all have questions and if answers don’t appear doubts may grow. Personally, I believe what we choose to do with them is most important. Doubt will die when we do but faith came before life and will continue after death.
11 When I was a child, I spoke and thought and reasoned as a child. But when I grew up, I put away childish things. 12 Now we see things imperfectly, like puzzling reflections in a mirror, but then we will see everything with perfect clarity.[c] All that I know now is partial and incomplete, but then I will know everything completely, just as God now knows me completely.
13 Three things will last forever—faith, hope, and love—and the greatest of these is love. (1 Cor. 13:11-13)
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