Luke 7:18 ff. Doubt and Assurance (Part 1)

Doubt, Faith, and Assurance in Luke 7

My question this morning to your congregation is simple but probing. Do you ever struggle with doubt? Do you ever struggle with doubt? Now, if you're honest, you would say, yes, in fact, I do. People struggle with doubt even as Christians.

I mean, I could ask it this way. Are you absolutely positive that Jesus is the Messiah? Do you know for certain that when you die, you'll be in heaven? What happens is sometimes we have intellectual doubts and we wonder, could this really be true?

Is the resurrection really true? And then other times, we are in difficult circumstances with health or other kind of trials. And then we wonder, is God still good? Does God still care? Does God answer prayer?

And doubt creeps in. This morning, we're going to talk about doubt and reassurance. If you have your Bible, turn to Luke chapter 7. Doubt and reassurance. Luke chapter 7. I'm super excited about today and the passage.

It's one of those things that when you read initially, you'll think, all right, what's in there? It's nice info. It's nice data. But is there anything for my soul in there? And all of a sudden, before you know it, you think, this is amazing.

I've been waiting for five, six days to preach this sermon because, not of the sermon, but the passage itself, Luke chapter 7, helps us deal with doubt and wavering. And more importantly, what does Jesus think about you, dear Christian, when you doubt?

What do you, dear Christian, think about other Christians when they struggle and doubt? Very, very encouraging today.

Very, very apropos.

Dealing with doubt and assurance, or doubt and reassurance. How does Jesus think about those that doubt? Now, we're in the gospel of Jesus according to Luke. And remember, everything drives through the first four verses of Luke chapter 1.

That is to say, the purpose of Luke is to make sure you're certain that Jesus is the Messiah, that you're trusting in Jesus. Because only in Christ can you have forgiveness of sins. I heard somebody say the other day, when I'm talking to unbelievers, I don't talk about sin.

I try to show them all the goodness of God to allure them. And certainly, we want to talk about the goodness of God. But sin is real. And sin causes death and eternal death. And so we need to be saved from our sins.

And so Jesus is the Savior of sinners. And He's proven that by the resurrection. And God, in His great kindness, has given us the word so we can see. And Luke wants to make sure that every person who reads it, and every person that's here listening, trusts by faith alone that Jesus is the Messiah, and that they have forgiveness of sins in Him.

And so we come to Luke chapter 7, verses 18 and following. We still have that in our mind. Who is Jesus? What has He done? Is He the Old Testament Messiah? All questions that Luke is continuing to try to answer, so that you see proof, after proof, after proof, after evidence, He has to be the Messiah.

No one teaches like Jesus. No one did what Jesus did. Every Old Testament prophecy has been fulfilled. He has to be the Messiah. And I'll trust Him for my living and for my death. Now, this section is starting in verse 18.

And it goes all the way through the end of the chapter, verse, excuse me, all the way to verse 35. And so we probably aren't going to get too far today. It'll probably take us a couple weeks to get through verse 35.

But for our outline, it's just kind of components to help you see the passage unfold. And so we're gonna look at the doubt today and the reassurance, probably next time, the blessing, the vindication, and the warning.

John the Baptist’s Doubt in Prison

But first, I want you to see the doubt. What about doubt? Is doubting normal? Now, when I would say to you something like this, in the Bible, there are some people who are famous for their doubting. And actually, a disciple, and his name was doubting what?

Thomas.

But did other people in the Bible doubt? And if they did, what's the reaction of God to doubters? Very, very fascinating. Today, we're going to look at doubting John. John the Baptist, the doubter. Now, what's gonna happen is, you're gonna see John doubt.

Now, I don't want John to be doubting, but he is a human, and he's frail, and he's sinful, and he doubted. And what's gonna happen is, you're gonna say, wow, I doubt, and at least someone else has doubted, too, with the stature of John the Baptist.

The greatest person that's ever been born, short of Jesus, struggled with doubt. And if that condition is true, and if that condition is real, then I don't feel so bad about my doubts. I don't wanna doubt, but is there hope for doubters?

Is there hope for John the Baptist? Is there hope for you? I think the answer is yes, yes, and yes. So let's take a look at the doubt, as I just try to work through this passage with you, verses 18 through 20.

This is the doubt. The disciples of John, Luke 7, 18, reported all these things to him. John, calling two of his disciples to him, sent them to the Lord, saying, are you the one who is to come, or shall we look for another?

And when the men had come to him, they said, John the Baptist has sent us to you, saying, are you the one who is to come, or shall we look for another? So if you go back to verse 18, John reports all these things to him.

What do you mean, all these things? All the things that Jesus was doing. And even if you look at chapter seven, what was Jesus doing? Remember, the centurion had a servant, and Jesus healed that servant.

Remember, the widow at Nain, who lost her son, and Jesus raised the son from the dead. These things are being talked about, and they make their way, these things, to John. Now, where was John? As you know, John was in prison.

John had the gall, as it were, to stand up against sexual sin, and it landed him in a gloomy, dark prison by the Dead Sea. And the disciples of John saw a lot of these things that were going on, and tells them to John.

If you look back at Luke chapter three, you can see what I just referred to. You can just either listen to me, or I'll go back there, Luke 3 .19. But Herod the Tetrarch, who had been reproved by him for Herodias, his brother's wife, and for all the evil things that Herod had done, added this to them all, and he locked up John in prison.

So John's in prison, and he wants to know, is Jesus the expected one? Now, John, of course, had knew early on that this Jesus is the Messiah. He had said, behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world, and now he's in jail.

Now, for us, it's easy to see, why would John be thinking that way? I don't think that way, because I have all the data. But if you're John the Baptist, and you know anything about the Messiah who's going to come, the Messiah who's going to come is going to do things like this.

Besides heal, besides raise people from the dead, he's going to take over. He's going to enforce justice. He's going to enforce authority. Roman oppressors, they're going to be gone. Listen to Luke chapter three.

I think you should turn there. Go back to Luke chapter three, just for a moment. What will the Messiah do when he comes back? Luke 3 .16, John answered them all, saying, I baptize you with water. But he who is mightier than I is coming, the strap of whose sandals I'm not worthy to untie.

He will baptize you with Holy Spirit and fire. His winnowing fork is in his hand to clear his threshing floor and to gather the wheat into his barn. But the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire. And now John is in jail.

This isn't happening right now. I'm stuck in a jail. This is the John of the Baptist who knew that Jesus was going to come back with power. And therefore he would say to the Pharisees, who you brood of vipers, who warned you from the wrath to come.

I mean, isn't Jesus going to overcome the Roman system? What am I doing here in jail? This doesn't seem to be going to plan. God, do you hear me? God, do you care? John's doubting, so he sends his men to Jesus.

Are you the one, back to Luke chapter seven, are you the expected one? Are you the one who is to come? Technical language for the Messiah. Certainly the Messiah who comes back with tenderness and kindness, but the Messiah that comes back with authority, justice, righteousness.

Is this the Messiah? I thought the Messiah, the expected one, was going to be the prophet that Moses talked about in Deuteronomy chapter 18, the strong prophet, this prophet that was going to be even better than Moses.

I thought the expected one in Daniel chapter seven was going to come with glory and authority. And he was going to be given dominion and glory. And he was going to be given all peoples. I thought the expected one, he'd be someone like Psalm one says that he doesn't walk in the way of the wicked.

Psalm two, he's the king. Psalm 16, a resurrected, wonderful king. Psalm 23, a shepherd-like king. Psalm 24, an ascended king. Where is this king? And so John doubts. Sometimes you doubt intellectually because you think could these promises of God.

Be really true?

And sometimes doubt creeps in because circumstances just put you in the vice grip of life and you wonder, is God still good? Does God still care? John the Baptist was doubting. Now, some people say he wasn't doubting but his disciples were.

I guess some good scholars can think that way. But remember the centurion? He's got some questions for Jesus and a request from Jesus. So he sends his servants earlier in the chapter. It's the same thing here.

The servants are being sent to ask the question, are you really the one? I mean, Herod, do you know how wicked Herod is? If the Messiah comes back, wouldn't Herod be destroyed? Do you know how oppressive the Roman system is and walking a mile and carrying the things?

Get us out of here. Now, I think we wanna be careful. I don't wanna be too hard on John the Baptist's doubts. Jesus said in Matthew 8, why are you afraid, O you of little faith? And he rose and rebuked the winds and the sea and there was great calm.

Matthew 14, Jesus immediately reached out his hand and took hold of him saying, O you of little faith, why did you doubt? Matthew 16, Jesus said, O you of little faith, why are you discussing among yourselves the fact that you have no bread?

People in the Bible, believers doubt.

How about Elijah?

He's such a great man on Mount Carmel. He's running from Jezebel and he says, just kill me. I can't believe this is all happening to me. These circumstances are hard. I just wanna die. And by the way, he never did.

Elijah never died. Did you know after the resurrection, some disciples doubted? Listen to Matthew 28, now the 11 disciples went to Galilee to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them. And when they saw him, they worshiped him, but some doubted.

He's the risen savior and some of his disciples are doubting. I mean, if you were in a dungeon, would you wonder? If you're in some big trial, would some of those thoughts go through your mind? They're not good thoughts, they're not right thoughts, but they're real thoughts.

One man called this John the Baptist double checking in the dungeon. I think you're the one, but I'm not so sure. Doubt is real. Christians struggle with doubt. What does God think about those that struggle with doubt?

Let me help you a little bit as I was working through this in my own life. I can think back in 2015, prostate cancer diagnosis sitting there and the doubt slid your mind. I wonder what's going on. I haven't abandoned the faith, but I'm just doubting.

How do you deal with doubt? Number one, don't fixate on your doubts. Number one, don't fixate on your doubts. It's been said that doubt is like an attention seeking child and the more attention you pay to it, the worse it gets.

Number two, I think you should confess your doubts. Doesn't God already know that you're doubting? It's not a surprise to him. Lord, I'm struggling with doubt and you know that.

And please forgive me.

I don't wanna be doubting. I wanna walk with a strong faith. If you ever wanna preach a sermon and you think, I'd like to have a good illustration of something, just think about Luther's life long enough and it'll come out.

Luther was going through discouragement. Health discouragement, but more discouragement than that, the Pope is trying to kill him. He thinks he's going to die. His friends turned their back on him, many of them.

And one morning, his wife came downstairs dressed in all black like she was going to a funeral. Woman, where are you going? To a funeral, husband.

Who died? God did.

He got so mad. I mean, it's one thing to friends to shun you and the Pope trying to kill you and now his wife blaspheming. Woman, who told you such a thing? You did, Martin. The way you've been acting the past few weeks, I was sure you had somehow found out that God was dead.

And so we go to the Lord and we say, I'm doubting. I know you're alive. I know you're true. Please forgive me. Three, if you'd like to deal with doubts, I want you to start preaching to yourself. I want you to start preaching to yourself.

Here's an illustration of that, Psalm 42. Why are you cast down, O my soul? And why are you in turmoil within me? Hope in God, for I shall again praise him, my salvation and my God. Because you don't want your feelings to run.

You don't want your thoughts to run. You want to be conformed to God's word. I met with Corey the other day and he said he was teaching the home group, Psalm 77. So I'd like you to turn there. Here's a great illustration of trying to preach to yourself.

When you're struggling with doubt, we go to the word and we let it inform our minds. And so instead of fixating on doubt, it's never gonna help. What can we do? Well, certainly we can confess and we can preach and that's what we want to do here.

Psalm 77, it says in the ESV, in the day of trouble, I seek the Lord. When you're struggling with doubts, here's a good Psalm to go to. I cry aloud to God, Psalm 77, aloud to God and he will hear me. In the day of my trouble, I will seek the Lord.

In the night, my hand is stretched out without wearing. My soul refuses to be comforted. Isn't that interesting? When I remember God, I moan. When I meditate, my spirit faints. You hold my eyelids open.

It's hard to sleep.

I'm so troubled that I cannot speak. I consider the days of old, the years long ago. Oh, those were the good days. I said, now here comes the preaching. Here's what you preach to yourself. You don't preach your own feelings, you preach the word of God to yourself.

You struggle with doubt, here's your sermon that you preach to yourself. I said, let me, he's preaching to himself, let me remember my song in the night. Let me meditate in my heart. Then my spirit made a diligent search.

Good preachers ask questions. Here's some questions you preach to yourself. Will the Lord spurn forever and never again be favorable? Has his steadfast love forever ceased? How can his forever love forever cease?

Are his promises at an end for all time? Has God forgotten to be gracious? Has he shut in his anger, has he in his anger shut up his compassion? Verse 10, then I said, I will appeal to this, to the ears of the right hand of the most high.

I will remember the deeds of the Lord. He starts remembering the promises of God and how faithful God was in the past, not only in the Bible, but in your own life. I'll remember your wonders of old. I'll ponder all your work.

I'll meditate on your deeds instead of my doubts. Your way, O God, is holy, unlike mine. What God is a great God like you who works wonders? The next thing, if you struggle with doubt, is, of course, you'll think this is a simplistic answer, but it's not.

I want you to pray. If you thought about, in the Bible, where someone struggled with doubt and that person prayed, what would be the greatest example of that? The person said, I'm doubting, but I need help.

The one that I think of that I'd like you to turn to that is wonderful, the best illustration in the Bible, is Mark chapter nine. Mark chapter nine. We're going to get back to Luke here real soon, but I've struggled with doubt.

I know people today in this congregation sitting here right now who struggle with doubt, and you'll probably meet other people that struggle with doubt. So what do you do when you struggle with doubt?

The best thing you can do is pray, and here's the prayer, and it comes to us in Mark chapter nine, verse 17. How does Jesus deal with this person? Someone from the crowd answered him, Mark chapter nine, verse 17.

Teacher, I brought you my son, for he has a spirit that makes him mute, and whenever it seizes him, it throws him down, he foams and grinds his teeth and becomes rigid. So I ask your disciples to cast it out.

They were not able. Luke says this is his only son, and his only son is getting tortured and tormented and seized and dashed down and foaming at the mouth. I mean, it's one thing when you go through that, but when you have a child that's sick and suffering, what's going on?

Verse 19, and he answered them, O faithless generation, how long am I to be with you? How long am I to bear with you? Bring him to me. And they brought the boy to Jesus, and when the spirit saw him, it immediately convulsed the boy.

He fell on the ground and rolled about foaming at the mouth. Jesus asked his father, how long has this been happening to him? He said, from childhood. Obviously, Jesus, the God man, knows how long. He wants everybody else to know how long because he's going to do something about it.

The compassion of Jesus, he's going to help. We learned last week in Ephesians 2 .4, but God, those two words would work well here too. Verse 22, it's often cast him into fire, can you imagine? And into water to destroy him.

But if you can do anything, have compassion on us, and help us. And Jesus said to him, the words that he said to Jesus, if you can, all things are possible for the one who believes. Immediately, the father of the child cried out and said, I believe, here's my request to Jesus, the prayer request, as it were.

I believe, and the most wonderful response in prayer to those who doubt, I believe, help my, what?

Unbelief.

Doubt presumes belief. To doubt something, you have to believe something. This is not an unbelief that's repulsive to God. This is a, I'm believing, I know something about you. I went to you to get my son healed.

Therefore, I know you have compassion and mercy and power. Doubt presumes belief. We'll get back to that. Verse 25. And when Jesus saw that a crowd came running together, that's interesting, he rebuked the unclean spirit, saying to it, I mean, can you imagine foaming, all this stuff, crazy stuff going on, and it attracts a crowd.

I mean, this person's causing a commotion. He rebuked the unclean spirit and said to it, you mute and deaf spirit, I command you, come out of him and never enter him again. And after crying out and convulsing him terribly, it came out, and the boy was like a corpse so that most of them said, he's dead.

Nice job, Jesus.

I read one person said, the good news, the operation was a success. The bad news, the patient's dead. Verse 27. But Jesus, but God took him by the hand and lifted him up and he arose. Jesus, you're the right person.

You've got power and kindness and mercy. But in the middle of my trial, I'm just wondering, I'm just doubting, I just need help. Dear Christian, when you doubt, what's the best thing you can do? God, I believe you, I'm trusting in you, but I'm doubting, would you help me?

And we know that Jesus gives help to his people. Lord, I believe, help my unbelief. What do you do when you doubt? One of the best things you can do, you preach the scriptures to yourself and you pray, Lord, help me.

If your child's sick and says, please help me, I think you try to help. You know what else you should do when you're doubting? It's a negative thing. I don't want you to feed your doubts. I don't want you to feed your doubts with questions that can't be answered.

We need to be focused on what can be answered. There are many things in this life that can't be answered. There are theological questions that can't be answered. How can God be one in three and three in one?

Where you think, how do I get my mind wrapped around that? How can Jesus be truly God and truly man? How can God be sovereign and man be responsible? There are things like that. How can this be happening to me?

There are questions that can't be answered, but what one man says you need to say. I don't know the answer to my question, but God does. That's a good way to fight doubt. I don't know what's going on, but God does.

And then lastly, I normally stick in one passage, but I want to go here because it's very, very important. I'm going to go to a verse that you've read many, many times but you probably haven't thought about if you're like me, because I really didn't think about it.

The book of Jude, please. Second to the last book of the Bible. John the Baptist is doubting. We're thankful that we're not the weird ones doubting by ourselves. Other people have doubted. Doubt assumes that you believe something to be true.

It's not atheism. It's doubting in something that is true. And what does the book of Jude say about doubters? Let's find out. Jude, verse 17. But you must remember, beloved, for the predictions of the apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ.

They said to you, in the last time, there will be scoffers following their own godly passions, ungodly passions, excuse me. It is these who cause divisions, worldly people devoid of the spirit. But you, beloved, building yourselves up in your most holy faith and praying in the Holy Spirit, keep yourselves in the love of God, waiting for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ that leads to eternal life.

Here it is, a short verse, but very, very important. And have mercy on those who doubt. Have mercy on those who doubt. Save others by snatching them out of the fire. To others, show mercy with fear, hating even the garment stained by the flesh.

Have mercy on those who doubt. Remember what we've been saying about mercy? Mercy sees someone that's in a state of need and does something about it. Mercy is something that looks at a person that's in a state of pity.

They need to be pitied. It's difficult. Seems to be no way out. And you say, you know what? I want to help them. Here, the passage in Jude 22, have mercy on those who doubt. I think sometimes churches become, if you're not walking in line and you're perfectly lockstep with confidence and assurance and everything else, then this is not the place for you.

They somehow think, they don't say it out loud, but they think the church is for people that have everything all together. And I want you to know from the top down to the bottom, in terms of leadership structure even, we don't have it all together, right?

And so if you're doubting, what do you need from other people?

Scolding?

I think you need mercy. I think you need mercy. One writer said, and have mercy, that is, of such who have gone astray, being drawn aside, who are simple and ignorant and out of the way, who sin through infirmity and the force of temptation.

We want to have mercy on those who doubt because doubt is something that Christians have.

I want to say it again.

I've said it twice, I think, and I want to say it one more time. Doubt presupposes faith. You can't doubt something you don't believe. Doubt presupposes faith. The doubting Christian says, there is a God.

He is good. He is kind. He has been raised from the dead. He's coming back. But I've got questions now because I'm in a circumstance and I'm in a trial, and so I'm wondering about that because through my eyes, I don't see his goodness and kindness.

Unbelief is sinful and awful and is a recalcitrant refusal to believe.

I will not believe.

Jesus didn't die on the cross. I'm not a sinner. I'm not gonna believe any of that. Get out of my way. But doubt questioning assumes belief. You question what you believe. There's a tragedy in the family and you think, well, I'm a Christian and I've been seeing God's faithfulness in my life and these things go through your mind.

It's almost like I could say the difference between doubt and unbelief. This might be a good example where Job loses everything, including his children, all of his children, and the doubt that he has expresses itself with some faith where he said, blessed be the name of the Lord.

The Lord gives, the Lord takes away. Blessed be the name of the Lord. And a real kind of hardened unbelief seems to be what his wife is doing, curse God and die. Did you know it's rare to meet someone who doesn't struggle with doubt?

Sometimes those doubts are fleeting. Sometimes they just zoom through your mind and you're off to the next thing.

Thomas Brooks said,.

Our knowledge of God, of Christ and ourselves and of scripture is imperfect in this life. How then can our assurance be perfect? How could we perfectly never doubt to put it in a wrong grammar way? Spurgeon doubted.

Does that make you feel good? I don't feel good that Spurgeon doubted, but I feel good that somebody like a Spurgeon doubted. Doubt presupposes faith. So now here's the question. What do you think Jesus is going to do knowing that John the Baptist doubts?

How does Jesus deal with a doubting believer? How does Jesus deal with doubting John? Let's find out, Luke chapter seven. Back to the book of Luke. John the Baptist is doubting, he's in prison. He doesn't know what's going on necessarily.

Are you the expected one? Are you the Messiah? The Messiah, of course, is going to come and heal and raise people from the dead, but he's also going to take over. And of course, we know as Christians, that's at the second coming, but he's seeing scriptures and he's thinking, John the Baptist is going to experience liberation.

From the prison.

Hasn't he been doing the Lord's work this whole time? And so he doubts. And how does Jesus respond to John's doubts? Luke seven, 21 and 22, we move from the doubt to the reassurance. 21 and 22, the reassurance.

Jesus’ Merciful Reassurance to Doubting John

In that hour, Jesus rebuked John and said, how could you, you loser? Oh, sorry. That's the revised standard perversion, I'm sorry. Well, I'm just going to wait a little bit. I think he's going to have to suffer some.

There's going to be a time,.

We're going to do kind of 20 questions,.

Some suspense, maybe some guessing games.

Jude 22 says, we're to have mercy on those who doubt. Do you think the perfect man, the only true man, the God-man Jesus, is going to rebuke, disown, condemn, or have mercy on John the Baptist? What do you think?

And I think you know the answer. And I hope you're glad for it because when you doubt, what kind of response do you want God to have toward you? In that hour, verse 21, he healed many people of diseases and plagues and evil spirits, and on many who are blind, he literally graced sight.

He gave them a gift, sight. And he answered them, go and tell John what you have seen and heard, actions and words. The blind receive their sight, the lame walk, lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear, and the dead are raised up.

The poor have good news preached to them. True or false? God loves to give assurance to his children. Well, you know what? Maybe if we don't give assurance, people might work harder to make sure they're saved.

Is that how the Lord works? Is that how the Lord worked with John the Baptist? Is that how he works with you? Doesn't God want you to know that you're his child? 1 John 5, these things I've written to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, that you may what?

Know that you have eternal life and that you may continue to believe in the name of the Son of God. What would you think of me as a father of four who would say finally when they turned 18, I know you didn't know that you were my child until now, but you've been my child all along.

Or what would you say if I said to one of my children, you know what? I don't know if you're really my child or not with my last name until you start obeying a little bit more. You'd think what in the world?

God wants you to reach heaven, dear Christian, and he wants you to know that you are. God loves to assure his people. How does the Lord Jesus deal with John? Let me give you confirmation that I'm the one.

Let me authenticate that I'm the one and I'll show you by my miracles and I'll show you by my fulfilling prophecy of Isaiah 35 and Isaiah 61, what I do and what I say. It seems to me that Jesus, instead of rebuking John the Baptist, he thinks of John the Baptist as a bruised reed that he's certainly not going to break.

He thinks of John the Baptist as a smoldering wick that he's not going to quench. Doesn't that look like it to you? Of course it does, it's right there. I'm not making any of this up, it's right there in the text.