How I Worked Through My Doubts

In my last post I shared how I became a Christian, but the story is not really complete without adding what happened when I was 18, as I went through a sudden onset of doubts. I hope that many of my questioning friends will read this!

A few months later I started experiencing a massive amount of doubts about Christianity. This was probably partly due to the fact that I had suddenly committed my life to Christ far more radically and so the need for me to be sure that it was all true was more than ever before. But also I expect the devil didn’t want me to be that committed and tried to dislodge me. For about three months I went through constant doubts.

Every time I went to a public place I would look around and think, ‘I’m sure all these people don’t believe in God, so how can it be true?’. Interestingly, the next year I went on a mission trip to London with an outreach team, and walked up to a lot of complete strangers to talk to them about God. And I was surprised to find that probably 95% actually did believe there was a God! They just don’t have a sign on them saying that they do 😉

I decided to sit down and work out why it would be true. Here are the things that finally convinced me:

• There were so many people I knew that were very practical and intelligent and believed it. Men and women – my dad being the main person in my mind. I’m not sure if I know anyone more practical and realistic than him, apart from my husband!
• There is clearly evil in the world, seen in the occult, so there must be supernatural stuff going on, and it follows that there must be good if there is evil.
• Creation is so amazing – little did I know then of the wonders of pregnancy, birth and breastfeeding which has made it even more amazing to me! And I couldn’t see how anyone in their right mind could believe it had evolved!
• I have had so many miraculous answers to prayer. As a child and teenager the kind of things I prayed about were not earth shaking – but enough for me to see that God cared about me and heard my prayers and answered them miraculously. I distinctly remember one day in secondary school when I could not find my French textbook anywhere! I needed it for school that day, and if I couldn’t find it I would get a detention. I had NEVER got a detention so I was super-scared of that. I had searched my room for ages and had to leave for school. I was so stressed, then I threw up a quick prayer, ‘Father please help me find my textbook’. I looked up from closing my eyes in prayer, and it was right there IN FRONT OF ME!! It was in the middle of a pile of books on top of my piano, and I hadn’t seen it. That was just too obviously God (and his sense of humour). I have also had lots more amazing answers to prayer beside that one.

There are many other reasons to believe in God – but these are the ones that helped me to be sure of my faith. So God brought me through these doubts and out on the other side, which resulted in my faith being much stronger! And I have had a wonderful experience of life with God beside me, helping me, guiding me, encouraging me, and just being there for me. If you would like to know more, please e-mail me – rhodajane at gmail.com – or visit this website which explains how to know God, and answers frequently asked questions about God.

If you are a Christian and were convinced about the truth of Christianity by other ways, it would be great if you could comment and share – maybe it will help someone who is still uncertain!