TEACHING

Daryl Wood

(Daryl is a fivefold teacher from Ohio)

“UNBELIEVING BELIEVERS?”

I dare you to construct a better oxymoron!  Sometimes people who define themselves as “believers” freely admit their failure to trust God in their present circumstances.  Family or friends may label folks “believers,” in spite of the fact that their behavior consistently belies any confidence in Christ.   And the double-irony is that this catch phrase seems to be, in some instances, so . . . well, accurate.  James addressed the contradiction this way:

Does a spring send forth fresh water and bitter from the same opening?  Can a fig tree, my brethren, bear olives, or a grapevine bear figs?  Thus no spring can yield both salt water and fresh (Jas. 3:11, 12, NKJV).”

“Believers” do what their label implies—they believe God!  It is a most natural thing for the fruit that comes forth to reflect its parent.  In the case of genetic defects, deformities may result in offspring bearing no resemblance to their progenitors, but this is most unusual.  God’s way—both in the natural and in the spiritual—is for “like to beget like.”   So when it comes to some who call themselves God’s children, what gives?  Why are so many of His kids slow to trust Him?  Worse, why do many live in an almost perpetual state of unbelief?   Like a drowning victim spasmodically breaking the surface to gasp for air, some seem to grab a “faith breath” merely on occasion—just before going back down.  Though they may be technically alive, they transit through the greater part of their lives suspended within the throes of the death process.  They often seem to have more in common with those in a mortuary than those who are alive in God.  Yet, beneath all of this there appears to be a flicker of genuine love for the Lord.

Some might dismiss the last observation, concluding that all these “walking contradictions” are not genuinely converted.  In some cases this is probably correct; counterfeit faith is prolific, and imitations can seem rather convincing.  Yet while paradoxical, there is strong evidence that the “unbelieving believer” actually does exist.  Credibility for their sightings far outweighs the sum of all that has been reported for Big Foot and the Loch Ness monster combined.  I have no less than Jesus as my source:

Now the disciples had forgotten to take bread, and they did not have more than one loaf with them in the boat.  Then He charged them, saying, “Take heed, and beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and the leaven of Herod.”  So they reasoned among themselves, saying, “It is because we have no bread.”  And Jesus, being aware of it, said to them, “Why do you reason because you have no bread?  Do you not yet perceive nor understand?  Is your heart still hardened?  Having eyes, do you not see?  And having ears, do you not hear?  And do you not remember?  When I broke the five loaves for the five thousand, how many baskets full of fragments did you take up?”  They said to Him, “Twelve.”  And when I broke the seven for the four thousand, how many large baskets full of fragments did you take up?”  And they said, “Seven.”  So He said to them, “How is it you do not understand (Mark 8:14-18, NKJV)?”

Following His resurrection, He encountered widespread unbelief among His own:

Now when He rose early on the first day of the week, He appeared first to Mary Magdalene, out of whom He had cast seven demons.  She went and told those who had been with Him, as they mourned and wept.  And when they heard that He was alive and had been seen by her, they did not believe.  After that, He appeared in another form to two of them as they walked and went into the country.  And they went and told it to the rest, but they did not believe them either.  Afterward He appeared to the eleven as they sat at the table; and He rebuked their unbelief and hardness of heart, because they did not believe those who had seen Him after He had risen (Mark 16:9-14, NKJV).”

Then He said to them, “O foolish ones, and slow of heart to believe in all that the prophets have spoken (Luke 24:25, NKJV)!”

Notably, this state was often attributable to Jesus’ friends, not just those who hated and opposed Him!  It would not be too strong to say that He experienced and expressed anger, frustration, and irritation when He encountered hardness of heart--particularly within those with whom He had lived in intimate, covenantal relationship.  He had given them no reason not to trust Him and a plethora of reasons to take Him at His word.  Clearly, His expectation was that His own would believe Him.  A high percentage of the time they did not.

Unbelief was even more pervasive in society as a whole.  Jesus’ effectiveness to minister in Nazareth was sorely limited by its stronghold there in His home town, causing Him to marvel (Mark 6:4-6).  His disciples fared far worse when they bumped into it in Caesarea Philippi, in the case of the man with the epileptic son who was demon possessed.  This time, where they failed, He prevailed:

He answered him and said, “O faithless generation, how long shall I be with you?  How long shall I bear with you?  Bring him to Me.”  Then they brought him to Him.  And when he saw Him, immediately the spirit convulsed him, and he fell on the ground and wallowed, foaming at the mouth.  So He asked his father, “How long has this been happening to him?  And he said, “From childhood.  And often he has thrown him both into fire and into the water to destroy him.  But if You can do anything, have compassion on us and help us.”   Jesus said to him, “If you can believe, all things are possible to him who believes.”  Immediately the father of the child cried out and said with tears, “Lord, I do believe; help my unbelief!”  When Jesus saw that the people came running together, He rebuked the unclean spirit, saying to him, “You deaf and dumb spirit, I command you, come out of him, and enter him no more!”  Then the spirit cried out, convulsed him greatly, and came out of him (Mark 9:19-26a, NKJV).

While this father’s self-assessment may be questionable from the standpoint of its theological precision, it does capture the conflictive aspect of one professing both belief and unbelief simultaneously.  While offering no excuse for unbelief, it provides insight into the internal workings of those in this condition.  Confusion and a lack of clear vision and understanding are apparent in this man’s response.  Still, driven by personal desperation due to his son’s state, He pressed Jesus for help and saw the deliverance that he coveted.  Some, such as the woman with the issue of blood, literally pulled a miracle out of Jesus through their faith.  In contrast with her active cooperation through faith, the father (not to mention the crowd of curious onlookers who accompanied) was packing a truckload of dead weight that had to be moved before his blessing could be released.  That is why the disciples hit a wall in their attempts to minister in that situation.  It is also why Jesus remarked:

“This kind can come out by nothing but prayer and fasting (v. 29b, NKJV).”

He was not saying that a deaf and dumb spirit is such a powerful order of demon that one cannot cast it out without first fasting and praying.  His disciples had successfully participated in plenty of deliverances prior to this instance.  Rather, it was the spirit of unbelief—in both the father and in the crowd—that initially served as the greatest obstacle.  However, unbelief, being infectious, spread to the deliverance ministers as well.  Matthew’s account records this fact:

Then the disciples came to Jesus privately and said, “Why could we not cast him out?”  So Jesus said to them, “Because of your unbelief; for assuredly, I say to you, if you have faith as a mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move; and nothing will be impossible for you.  However, this kind does not go out except by prayer and fasting (Matt. 17:19-21, NKJV).”

Unbelief is not an inability to believe God; it is an unwillingness to do so. 

If God required something of us and didn’t provide the grace or ability for us to perform it, then He would be cruelly at fault.  Yet, this is precisely the charge that the unbelieving level against God—that He is somehow at fault.  Rather than taking responsibility for their refusal to believe, the unbelieving adopt the role of the victim.  Instead of recognizing their affront against God, they project their blame onto Him.  While few would ever come out and actually admit this, it is, nevertheless, the internalized judgment of all who are hard of heart.

Beware, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief in departing from the living God; but exhort one another daily, while it is called “Today,” lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin.  For we have become partakers of Christ if we hold the beginning of our confidence steadfast to the end, while it is said:  “Today, if you hear His voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion.”  For who, having heard, rebelled?  Indeed, was it not all who came out of Egypt, led by Moses?  Now with whom was He angry for forty years?  Was it not with those who sinned, whose corpses fell in the wilderness?  And to whom did He swear that they would not enter His rest, but to those who did not obey?  So we see that they could not enter in because of unbelief (Heb. 3:12-19, NKJV).

Unbelief is not a mysterious fog that capriciously settles over a poor, helpless soul.  It is a choice, and hence, it is synonymous with sin.

Whenever one hears God’s voice on any matter, he has a clear choice to both believe and obey Him, or to resist Him.  The latter is rebellion, and it incurs His righteous wrath.  When rebellion is practiced, the heart further hardens.  Where one might have exhibited a readiness to hear and respond to God in the past, this responsiveness fades and atrophies.  He is left with a sensation that he is utterly without the strength and ability to make the right choices any longer.  Feeling swept along by a torrent of fleshly impulses, he concludes that he cannot believe God, and that obeying the Lord is a hard thing.  Hence, within his heart he raises his fist against his creator.

But indeed, O man, who are you to reply against God?  Will the thing formed say to him who formed it, “Why have you made me like this (Rom. 9:20, NKJV)?”

Unbelief dulls the heart to spiritual realities.

Immediately after seeing the Red Sea part, after traversing it on dry land, and after seeing the Egyptian army swallowed up as the waters returned, the children of Israel returned to grumbling and complaining (Ex. 15-17).  Immediately after participating in the miraculous feeding of five thousand, the disciples failed to grasp the significance of this extraordinary event.  In both these instances, there was no spiritual acumen in the observers due to their hardness of heart.

For they had not understood about the loaves, because their heart was hardened (Mark 6:52).

“And in them the prophecy of Isaiah is fulfilled, which says:

‘Hearing you will hear and shall not understand,

And seeing you will see and not perceive;

For the heart of this people has grown dull,

Their ears are hard of hearing,

And their eyes they have closed,

Lest they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears,

Lest they should understand with their heart and turn,

So that I should heal them (Matt. 13:15, NKJV).’”

“Unbelieving believers” are cowards in full battle dress.

When Joshua was commissioned by the Lord to lead the children of Israel after the death of Moses, he was given this key word of instruction:

“No man shall be able to stand before you all the days of your life; as I was with Moses, so I will be with you.  I will not leave you, nor forsake you.  Be strong and of good courage, for to this people you shall divide as an inheritance the land which I swore to their fathers to give them.  Only be strong and very courageous that you may observe to do according to all the law which Moses My servant commanded you; do not turn from it to the right hand or to the left, that you may prosper wherever you go.  This Book of the Law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate in it day and night, that you may observe to do according to all that is written in it.  For then you will make your way prosperous, and then you will have good success.  Have I not commanded you?  Be strong and of good courage; do not be afraid, nor be dismayed, for the LORD your God is with you wherever you go (Josh. 1:5-9, NKJV).”

There is a strong link between faith and courage.  The hard of heart possess neither.  They may don all the trappings of those who have been trained and battle- hardened, but they lack one thing—the heart to follow the Christ.  Like the lion in the Wizard of Oz, they tremble and cower before the voice of the evil one.  On the other hand, those who are strong in the Lord and the strength of His might put His word always before them.  They are quick to hearken to His voice, and enjoy the blessings and benefits that come from abiding in His presence.

It is no coincidence that the cowardly and the unbelieving are juxtaposed beside one another in the descriptive list of those of those who will have their part in the lake that burns with fire and brimstone (Rev. 21:8).  These two qualities go hand in hand.

Conclusion

None of us has room for complacency, since all have been hard-hearted at times, even if that is not descriptive of our present condition.  Sin is deceitful, and each of us has to constantly contend with an enemy who would seek to allure us from our only place of safety.  This fact alone should inspire all who are currently enjoying freedom in Christ to demonstrate meekness and compassion toward fellow soldiers who are self-imprisoned at this very moment.  Those whom God may use to jail break others during one season may need the favor returned sometime later on down the road.

The terms “hard of heart,” “unbelieving,” “slow of heart to believe,” and so forth, may carry nuances that reflect some subtle differences in meaning.  The essence of each, however, is basically the same. All of these phrases refer to those who, at present, are not actively and fully engaged with Christ and His word.  In some cases the condition may be more chronic than in others.  In each, though, the remedy for the problem is identical—to completely and unconditionally turn back to one’s First Love, who is Christ.  For those who have been away for a long time, they may find it necessary to press relentlessly into His heart, wrestling with the endurance and determination of Jacob, until He once again establishes their footsteps upon the Rock.  Through repentance and faith His nearness will once again be a vital reality.

Therefore, as the Holy Spirit says:

“Today, if you will hear His voice,

Do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion (Heb. 3:7,8a, NKV).”

The LORD is near to all who call upon Him, to all who call upon Him in truth (Ps. 145:18, NKJV).