Just because someone is a believer, it doesn’t mean they don’t experience seasons of doubt from time to time. Chip Ingram says the reason for this is we don’t always know why we believe what we believe.
“I’ve met people that have been a Christian for 20-25 years, things have gotten kind of stale, and then one of their kids says, ‘I don’t know if I believe all this anymore.’ Then they go into a crisis saying, ‘Gosh, I don’t know if I do either.’ It’s because they don’t know why they believe.”
Do you know why you believe the gospel? If you are feeling skeptical about your beliefs today, Chip says it’s important to work through those questions to receive clarity and come to an understanding. He shares from his personal experience,
“One of the toughest ones for me was, wow, this is an old book! Then I got it: If God can raise someone from the dead, He certainly can preserve a book and keep it exactly the way He wants it; I can get that logic. But then how did He do it? And can you prove that?”
“I think it’s great to be a skeptic, if as a skeptic you’re saying, ‘I’m going to be committed to finding out what’s true wherever the truth leads me.’ Then saying, ‘I’m going to stand on it; I’m going to have convictions.’ I think that’s a good kind of skepticism.”
Chip gives us a summary for why he personally believes in God, the Bible and Christianity, and why we can confidently believe in it too.
“The first one for me is so fundamental, it’s archaeology. Every religion has their holy book, but you go and try to find the historical places, times and events for most of them, they don’t exist. Some person had a dream, he had scrolls came down from heaven, or an angel spoke to him and whole religions are based on that.”
“Unlike that, ours is very historical. We can go to the places, we have documentation as early as 1207 B.C. of an Egyptian King talking about this nation called Israel. It’s not myth, it’s not fairy tales it’s not legend.”
He says the second reason he believes is because the Bible claims infallibility.
“This is God’s actual words; this is truth. When you look at the Old and New Testament and then you look at the origin, how is it that over 1500 years, 40 independent authors with 20 different occupations, living in 10 different countries, could write something with perfect alignment as Christ as the focus, and with prophecy – hundreds of years apart – but come true down to the letter?”
We have good reasons to believe that Christianity is true. But it’s important for us to know what those reasons are in order to navigate seasons of doubt and remain firm in our faith.
Chip Ingram’s passion is to help Christians really live like Christians. As a pastor, author, coach, and teacher for twenty-five years, Chip has helped people around the world break out of spiritual ruts to live out God’s purpose for their lives. Today, he serves as Senior Pastor of Venture Christian Church in Silicon Valley, California, and CEO and Founder of Living on the Edge – an international teaching and discipleship ministry. He is author of several books including .
Why do you believe?
