Daily Devotional: February 8

Week 3, Day 1, The Gospel According to Matthew, Chapter 11

In today's reading John the Baptist is in prison. Jesus has been healing people and performing miraculous signs and proclaiming a radical new message of hope and love. However, John has been hearing about all of this from behind the walls of what can only be imagined as a dark, damp, filthy cell. This was not the life John had imagined would await him when Messiah came. He was the forerunner of the King of Kings, yet here he was sitting in chains. 

What if I am wrong?

Doubt is a marker of faith. Just because some times you are less sure of your beliefs than others, doesn't make them any less valid or true. It always makes me upset when spiritual leaders make it seem like having doubts somehow invalidated your faith or your "relationship with Jesus." If we aren't struggling with doubt, then we really aren't doing a very good job testing our faith. 

The man whom Jesus described as the greatest man ever born, John, struggled with doubting the entire reason he believed he was on earth. I can identify with John, and I think you can too. He had devoted everything to proclaiming that Jesus was Messiah, and was worried he may have made a huge mistake. He knew he was going to die in prison, so he sent his disciples to ask Jesus if John had been wrong about the whole thing. 

What if I am wrong?

Jesus assured the disciples of John that He was who John claimed. John hadn't made a mistake, he was just confused about what a Messiah would do. Jesus uses this opportunity to attack the people who are trying to fit Him or John into boxes. He references a children's game about flutes and dirges, and compares His generation to kids mad that no one will play along. Just because Jesus isn't the Messiah we want Him to be, doesn't make Him any less the Messiah we need. 

Allow your doubts to stretch the box in which you keep Jesus. Our boxes will never contain the Infinitely Possible One. Pray for the ability to deconstruct your faith on a consistent basis, only holding on to the things Jesus shows you to be essentials. Be brave.