On the Journey Towards Living With Doubt

Absalom unexpectedly came up against David's servants
(2 Samuel 18:9)

Absalom was riding his donkey after losing a battle against his father, David, when his head got stuck in an oak tree. When David's men saw him hanging there, they killed him thinking that this was a positive action. But when David heard the "good news," he wept over his son's death.
Life ... what will happen next? I can be optimistic that my life's obstacles will, like Absalom, hang helplessly in oak trees. I can be doubtful when I wonder if my good work will be appreciated, or what losses and failures my future holds. Optimism is fun; it's more difficult to live with doubt. In reality, I live with plenty of both.
How can I live with doubt? While the path between doubt and despair is well travelled, as people of faith, we believe that doubt is not the end of the story but rather an opening through which the saving presence of God breaks into our lives. Jesus also hung from a tree. He doubted as he cried to his father in anguish. The heavens darkened as a father grieved a son's death. Jesus' tomb, however, was not the end of the story but a womb that birthed this world's greatest hope.
Our doubt sometimes feels tomb-like. Rather than see doubt as an invitation to despair, however, we can claim doubt's darkness as a womb that will birth a deeper experience of God's love in our lives.

by Doug Weibe