We Are All Unbelievers
A few years ago I had the opportunity to receive an early copy of a book by Jeff Vanderstelt in order to review it. I had read his previous book Saturate: Being Disciples of Jesus in the Everyday Stuff of Life and it had shaped a lot of my thinking on discipleship. The book I was reviewing was called Gospel Fluency: Speaking the Truths of Jesus into the Everyday Stuff of Life and I found it to be just as helpful as the first book.
Vanderstelt opens the book by saying “I am an unbeliever.” He goes on to say that we are all unbelievers. It’s a strange thing to say, but as he unpacks this statement it’s clear that he’s onto something. Here’s part of his rationale:
“When I say we are all unbelievers, I mean we still have places in our lives where we don’t believe God. There are spaces where we don’t trust his word and don’t believe that what he accomplished in Jesus Christ is enough to deal with our past or what we are facing in this moment or the next. We don’t believe his word is true or his work is sufficient.”
I don’t know about you, but I can certainly identify with that! When things don’t go the way I hope they will, too often my first response is to worry or to dwell upon it, rather than to immediately bring it to God and declare my continuing trust in Him. When someone shares a difficult situation with me, my impulse is to suggest something that will help them fix it, rather than just speaking the truth of Jesus into their situation, praying with them and trusting that God can and will come through for them.
During my first year living away from home, God spoke to me through a verse from Galatians 3. Paul says, in the strongest terms, “How foolish can you be? After starting your new lives in the Spirit, why are you now trying to become perfect by your own human effort?” It’s stuck with me since then, probably because all these years later it’s still relevant to me!
What about you? Is your first reflex to try and fix things yourself? Do you actively believe the truths of the Gospel are sufficient for what you’re facing? We all need to honestly examine our hearts and allow Jesus to deal with our unbelief wherever it is found. Let’s be like the father who asked Jesus to cast out his son’s demon, who said, “I do believe, help my unbelief!” (Mark 9:34)
