Humility In the Wrong Place

In Orthodoxy, G.K. Chesterton writes,

What we suffer from today is humility in the wrong place. Modesty has moved from the organ of ambition. Modesty has settled upon the organ of conviction; where it was never meant to be. A man was meant to be doubtful about himself, but undoubting about the truth; this has been exactly reversed. Nowadays the part of a man that a man does assert is exactly the part he ought not to assert – himself. The part he doubts is exactly the part he ought not to doubt – the Divine Reason…
We are on the road to producing a race of man too mentally modest to believe in the multiplication table.

Is not this one of the defining spirits of our age?

Secular culture delights in relativistic thinking and revels in questioning fundamental truths. Really, such a trend shouldn’t be all that shocking. Can anything else possibly be expected of fallen man?

What’s truly unsettling is the way many Christians are following suite. Knowingly or unknowingly, they are abandoning conviction in favor of this false humility, this predilection to doubt and question anything and everything, even the most basic doctrines of their faith.

But truth – specifically God’s truth – is not negotiable. If it was, it wouldn’t be truth.

Apparently, some people didn’t get the memo.

I know we’re all pretty much sick and tired of hearing about Rob Bell, but is he not a perfect illustration of this? He wrote a 230 page book questioning the biblical doctrine of Hell. Funny thing is, his questions had already been answered. Definitively. By God Himself. In the Bible.

“Has God indeed said?” Many Christians today would rather ponder that question instead of firmly avowing that, yes, God has indeed said. Why? Because to them, a thousand shallow questions are preferrable to a single, substantial answer.

However (and as I said in an earlier post), here’s the thing: questions are not the answer. Answers are the answer. And not just any answers – the right answers. God’s answers. Because His are the only ones that matter.

Whether people like it or not, that’s how it is.