The Balloon Of Doubt
I have the great fortune to know an actual honest-to-goodness Desert Monk. One of those guys who takes a vow and lives in a Monastery in the Sahara Desert near the Red Sea. God recently maneuvered this friend-monk back into my life after nearly 10 years. Back when we were just dopey college kids kicking a soccer ball across a tennis court (a great sport we invented and coined “Toccer”) life was simple and light-hearted. But life moves forward and I got married to a woman and he got married to God and left for a remote Monastery in the desert of Egypt. In that time, life dealt me a few bad hands like it dealt many others, and I found myself hitting a bottom. I can’t say “rock bottom” because I feel there is still so much blessing in my life and there is definitely a lot further down to go before I even see a real pit of despair. However, that didn’t stop me from feeling quite down and wallowing in self-pity and sadness. I found myself escaping to be alone at a nearby lake, and looked up at the giant clouds moving slowly above me. I mentally shouted at God, challenged Him, doubted Him, double-dared Him, and went away depressed.
It may have been weeks, or simply days later, but that Monk-friend of mine got a hold of a cell phone and managed to give me a call to check up on me. Now, he did call me at least once a year to say hello around my birthday, but this call was off-schedule. A lot had happened in 2020 with COVID and his call was out of concern. But he found me in much worse emotional and spiritual state then he expected. He is a great listener and a comfort, so I talked to him at length about my heavy heart. Then, he apologized and told me was going to sound like a Monk now, but he wanted to know about my spiritual life and practices. He told me he was convinced that my current situation was being used by God to let fall real low and feel really alone so that I have nobody left in my life to turn to except God Himself. I wasn’t ready to hear this cookie cutter stuff, but the mysterious timing of this call from a man living an ascetic life in the desert, within days of me shouting at God for an answer, had me pretty suspicious that an underlying Force might actually be coordinating things.
Monk-friend started me on a prayer and meditation regime. He spoke of consistency and establishing a rule of prayer that would last with me. Counterintuitively, he advised the consistent quantity over a fleeting flare of quality. His routine really wasn’t much different than I had heard preached before, but there is a love for this Monk, as a brother I never had, which kept me following his prescribed routine out of respect for him. The routine was like that of a diet prescribed by a doctor or dietician, working towards consistent behavior-changing patterns rather than a cleanse or fad-diet. Part of the routine included daily Bible readings, just 10 minutes a day. Despite this effort to “get closer to God,” I found that the daily Bible reading was opening many questions in my head. The questions started to get more bold and foundational. My faith got weaker and my doubt got stronger, bolstered by Pride at my new academic knowledge. These questions were self-inflicted stumbling blocks. Thankfully though, I had established the routine solidly as a new habit and I did not falter, despite the doubts.
On my next opportunity to speak with Monk-friend, I brought up these questions. I even pointed out that I heard heresies are good and important because they help us question our faith, and thereby come out stronger. My friend did not have a solid answer for me at this time, but told me that it was okay to question God, so long as I do it with faith that the answer was still that “God is true”. I was not a fan of his answer and it seemed like a cop-out. Basically I can question God, so long as I am not really questioning God. Like asking God easy questions at some conference that I know He will be able to answer easily. Like it was rigged. I wasn’t a fan of this answer at all. We were stuck at a chicken-or-the-egg situation. I had to have faith when I asked questions, but the questions were ruining my faith.
I think my Monk-friend was well aware that the answer was not settling well with me, so on our next opportunity to talk, he came prepared with a much better answer. One that really hit home with and I felt was profound enough for me that I should write it down and share it with others in case it resonates with them as well. It is this:
When we learn about Gravity in science class, we grow an understanding and a faith in a mysterious force of nature. We don’t fully understand it, but we learn the equations, we see it in operation with our own eyes daily, we feel the pull of it with our own bodies. Gravity begins to become undeniable, and now we can even calculate its force and understand its interactions. Then one day we see a kid let go of a balloon and see that balloon float into the air, violating that very law of nature that we just learn. That balloon just defied gravity. Perhaps an immediate thought might be that “gravity does not exist, I was wrong”. However that would pass quickly as you observed all the same things you observed before that led you to believe in Gravity is still in effect. This balloon defies Gravity, but Gravity is true and undeniable. There is an interaction here I don’t understand. A new mystery. The new question does not negate the old faith. When I now seek out the answer to the actions of the balloon, it is within the context of a Gravity-based world, understanding the uniqueness of Helium.
At once I understood his point and my failing. I will never fully understand Gravity, nor will I fully understand density and helium. I believe in both, I ca pursue knowledge in both. And if I find myself faltering, I remind myself that there is more evidence of Gravity’s pull than there is of a world where objects of any shape or size can just float up into the sky. My questioning God, even if it gets so far as to doubt the Divine Inspiration of the Bible, or God’s very existence entirely, would be tempered by the simple truth that I have more proof on a daily basis of God’s actual existence and working my life.
