{"id":27583,"date":"2026-09-09T08:07:47","date_gmt":"2026-09-09T12:07:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/?p=27583"},"modified":"2026-09-09T09:18:58","modified_gmt":"2026-09-09T13:18:58","slug":"27583","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/?p=27583","title":{"rendered":""},"content":{"rendered":"\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"If I Stand Rich Mullins with Lyrics (4K)\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/TwVrBFuyI04?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">The Cost of Doubt<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>Wednesday, September 9, 2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Brian McLaren normalizes painful experiences of doubt:&nbsp;<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The origin of the word doubt helps name the pain.&nbsp;<em>Doubt&nbsp;<\/em>derives from the same roots as&nbsp;<em>duo&nbsp;<\/em>and&nbsp;<em>double<\/em>, suggesting that to doubt is to be in two minds, one that believes and one that doesn\u2019t. The two minds wrestle and writhe in tension, pulling you in two directions, leaving you in&nbsp;<em>di-stress<\/em>. You can see with eyes of faith and you can see with eyes of skepticism, leaving you with double vision or internal&nbsp;<em>di-vision<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Before doubt, you simply believed. You were in one innocent and undivided mind, seeing with one vision, feeling a comfortable confidence rather than distress. But that innocence, that simplicity, that peaceful unity of mind and clarity of vision now slip away, the first casualties of doubt\u2026.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>For many of us, faith is our map of reality, our map of the universe. It tells us where we are, where we\u2019ve been, where we\u2019re going, where to turn. But as soon as our trusted map stops matching reality, we feel disoriented. We have no idea where to turn, what to do, how to survive\u2026.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>People experience the failure of a mental map, paradigm, or worldview as personally traumatizing. Even scientists, when their conceptual maps fail them and they must challenge some of their fundamental scientific assumptions, use emotionally charged language to describe the experience&#8230;.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Albert Einstein<\/strong> \u2026 described the experience of coping with data that took him off the edges of his scientific map: \u201cIt was <strong>as if the ground had been pulled out from under one, with no firm foundation to be seen anywhere, upon which one could have built.<\/strong>\u201d [1]<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>If the loss of a scientific map or model creates anxiety, how much more does the loss of a religious worldview? This loss threatens us with another even greater loss: the very loss of God or of God\u2019s favor, love, and protection. What could be more terrifying for a sincere believer?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This terror is especially real for people &#8230; who were taught that God is an almighty supreme being who demands absolute perfection and submission, a strict and demanding father, and a tough and exacting judge. Yes, we were also taught God is loving, gracious, and forgiving, but <strong>the one requirement God demands above all others is precisely the thing that doubters struggle with most: God demands&nbsp;<em>firm<\/em>,&nbsp;<em>unwavering faith<\/em>, which we understood to mean correct beliefs. <\/strong>To question those beliefs throws open the terrifying possibility that God might at any moment turn against us, punish us, reject us, maybe even send us to hell if we don\u2019t get our beliefs straight and hold them tight, without doubt\u2026.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Doubt can breach the psychological fortress in which we\u2019ve felt safe, tear up the internal map by which we\u2019ve navigated the world, and threaten to separate us from God\u2019s favor and love.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>============<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h1 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><a href=\"https:\/\/substack.com\/app-link\/post?publication_id=11079&amp;post_id=214857410&amp;utm_source=post-email-title&amp;utm_campaign=email-post-title&amp;isFreemail=true&amp;r=2dkj2&amp;token=eyJ1c2VyX2lkIjozOTkyMzY2LCJwb3N0X2lkIjoyMTQ4NTc0MTAsImlhdCI6MTc4ODk1MzE2MSwiZXhwIjoxNzkxNTQ1MTYxLCJpc3MiOiJwdWItMTEwNzkiLCJzdWIiOiJwb3N0LXJlYWN0aW9uIn0.CfAMgNVTm9JI4DQVQAolokIfLEgKMXGwRKLmJrSSNm4\">If the apocalypse comes for us all<\/a><\/h1>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Life in the face of death<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-table\"><table><tbody><tr><td><a href=\"https:\/\/substack.com\/@slowfaith\">DREW BROWN<\/a>     SEP 9<\/td><td><a href=\"https:\/\/substack.com\/@slowfaith\"><\/a><\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><a href=\"https:\/\/substack.com\/redirect\/383f0b09-fc19-4835-9380-c132ac25955b?j=eyJ1IjoiMmRrajIifQ.ND0qR5RKsmVnltuWgIlyr3BY7uwq2Kt9ZzX29UJK4cg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/substackcdn.com\/image\/fetch\/$s_!Msi9!,w_1100,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep\/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F6577836d-7a28-4f2e-a4b6-c17861e97ca5_3840x3049.jpeg\" alt=\"\"\/><\/a><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">Vincent Van Gogh, \u201cWheat Field with Reaper and Sun,\u201d 1889.&nbsp;<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>I woke up this morning to news that an AI researcher quit yesterday over ethical concerns. He said that if we don\u2019t take the threat of AI seriously, we are headed in a bad bad bad direction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u2014<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I just finished reading a double feature of&nbsp;<em><a href=\"https:\/\/substack.com\/redirect\/d9b2c81a-9559-4b24-80c0-b70e93c4621e?j=eyJ1IjoiMmRrajIifQ.ND0qR5RKsmVnltuWgIlyr3BY7uwq2Kt9ZzX29UJK4cg\">Wild Dark Shore<\/a>&nbsp;<\/em>and&nbsp;<em><a href=\"https:\/\/substack.com\/redirect\/9a6969d1-bd5a-41cc-8a1f-36ebe522fdef?j=eyJ1IjoiMmRrajIifQ.ND0qR5RKsmVnltuWgIlyr3BY7uwq2Kt9ZzX29UJK4cg\">The Dog Stars<\/a><\/em>.\u00b9&nbsp;These are books existing inches away from a near future apocalypse.&nbsp;<em>Wild Dark Shore<\/em>&nbsp;focuses on the threat of global warming.&nbsp;<em>The Dog Stars<\/em>&nbsp;is set after a global pandemic wipes out most of the earth\u2019s population.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Grim stuff.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u2014<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Last night, we hosted our welcome picnic for the Western Theological Seminary community. Faculty, staff, students, and families all came to the seminary for food trucks (tacos! bbq! ice cream!), mini golf, and a bounce house.\u00b2<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It was supposed to end by 7, and Lex and I told ourselves before we went that we wouldn\u2019t stay the entire time, that we would be responsible adults with busy weeks, that we would go home early to clean and watch&nbsp;<em>New Girl<\/em>&nbsp;and be in by by 8:30.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Reader, we did the opposite: we stayed until after 8.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u2014 <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Let\u2019s face it: I would not be well suited for a post-apocalyptic world. I\u2019m doing my doctoral work in creative writing, for crying out loud.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>What am I supposed to do to prove my worth? When food rationing causes us to build our own societies of hunters and gatherers, how am I going to convince some small survivalist collective to feed me and let me live? Write them a play? Write them a fun poem that rhymes \u201cdysentery\u201d with \u201cJoseph and Mary\u201d? Write them marketing copy for the three artisans still living?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u2014<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The researcher who quit posted a note on the-site-formerly-known-as-Twitter explaining his rationale and the threat. It\u2014just like&nbsp;<em>Wild Dark Shore&nbsp;<\/em>and&nbsp;<em>The Dog Stars\u2014<\/em>was grim.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Curious, I read a few comments underneath the researcher\u2019s tweet. One of the commenters said she wasn\u2019t afraid; she said God was in control.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It\u2019s true, God is in control, but I don\u2019t see anything in the Bible that guarantees that all of this this\u2014waves hands at all of America\u2014is going to end well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Ta-Nehisi Coates concludes his book&nbsp;<em>We Were Eight Years in Power&nbsp;<\/em>on this note: \u201cI don&#8217;t ever want to forget, even with whatever personal victories I achieve, even in the victories we achieve as a people or a nation, that the larger story of America and the world probably does not end well. Our story is a tragedy.\u201d\u00b3<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I too believe God is in control, but I also think Coates is onto something. This is\u2014by and large\u2014a country and world of death. Those of us living in extreme levels of comparative wealth and comfort\u2014cloistered, as Switchfoot once sang, inside our \u201cconvenient Lexus cages\u201d\u2014are the ones blinded to the realities of destruction, malnourishment, war, abuse, etc, etc. that have always existed around us.\u2074<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>God has given no guarantee America will make it to the New Jerusalem intact.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>We are living in a land of death.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u2014<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I sponsored a junior high church camp outside Joplin, MO the summer after my freshman year. I was almost twenty and felt very sophisticated with my one year of theology classes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>On the fourth night of camp, I stood in the back and watched the junior highers standing and swaying and holding their hands in the air. I looked out at a sea of fourteen-year-olds and felt\u2014as a nineteen-year-old\u2014so superior to them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>What did they truly know about life? Had they experienced any suffering? Had they truly understood the depths of sin or sadness?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>What had they done to deserve God\u2019s presence or attention?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u2014<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>That whole living-in-a-land-of-death thing isn\u2019t actually an original thought. It comes from\u2014if you\u2019ve read my stuff long enough you can probably guess it blind folded\u2014Eugene Peterson. He wrote in&nbsp;<em>Practice Resurrection<\/em>,<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote\">\n<p>\u201cThe Holy Spirit formed [the Church] to be a colony of heaven in the country of death.\u201d\u2075<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>America, try as it might to listen to its better angels, is a country of death. This started way before AI, way before global warming, way before the first pandemic, way before the current president, way before war, way before systemic privilege and systemic prejudice, way before America itself. This is true for every country and every government built with human hands. All of them Towers of Babel; all of them lands of death; no one is immune; no, not one.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And that\u2019s kind of depressing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u2014<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I looked out at the seminary community last night, saw the laughter and the conversations. Saw faculty sitting with students and staff meeting each others\u2019 families. Kids in the bounce house. New students playing mini golf, making the first tentative steps towards friendship and community. My friend Kate\u2014who helped plan the whole night\u2014told me it was the most RSVPs we\u2019ve ever had. Something seems to be really clicking at Western right now, and I\u2019m just grateful to be a part of it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>As we left, I told Lex how good it felt to see the community all come together. As the Director of Admissions, I spend so much time tilling the ground and hoping for a crop. To see it come to fruition last night meant a lot to me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So much laughter. So much life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u2014<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Eugene didn\u2019t only say we lived in a country of death. No, he said we\u2014all of us who make up the Church\u2014are a \u201ccolony of heaven.\u201d He continues this thought, telling us that we are participating in the \u201cresurrection life, life out of death, life that trumps death, life that is the last word, Jesus life.\u201d\u2076<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The Bible tells us that this world\u2014this aching world of AI, this aching world of global warming, this aching world of pandemics\u2014will be redeemed and made new someday. Theologians call it the eschaton. Guns will become plowshares, we will run and not grow weary, and we will eternally journey\u2014as C.S. Lewis famously said\u2014further up and further into God\u2019s goodness.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Amen and amen and amen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But until then, the Bible also says, God and Christ and the Holy Spirit are with us. In the midst of all this death, God is collecting our tears in bottles, intimate with us in our suffering. And God is asking us to be this colony of heaven, this post-apocalyptic colony of life and beauty, standing in stark contrast to the bleak fatalism of a world focused on its own entropy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Life and life and life quietly living amidst death and death and death.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u2014<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>As I watched\u2014smug and embittered\u2014that sea of fourteen-year-olds holding their hands in the air, I was swiftly convicted by a song. A few months earlier, Gungor\u2019s&nbsp;<em>Ghosts Upon the Earth<\/em>&nbsp;had been released. I bought it for $10 on iTunes, and it felt like the greatest worship album I had ever heard.\u2077&nbsp;As I stood in the back of that chapel looking out at all that presumed ignorance, one song from that album\u2014\u201cChurch Bells\u201d\u2014came into my head:\u2078<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote\">\n<p>Let church bells ring<br>Let children sing<br>Even if they don\u2019t know why let them sing<br>Why drown their joy<br>Stifle their voice<br>Just because you\u2019ve lost yours\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>May our jaded hearts be healed<br>Amen<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Let old men dance<br>Lift up their hands<br>Even if they are na\u00efve, let them dance<br>You\u2019ve seen it all<br>You watch them fall<br>Wash off your face and dance<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>May our weary hearts be filled with hope<br>Amen<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>Those fourteen-year-olds in that chapel outside Joplin were doing the exact right thing. God was pleased with those hands in the air, and I was the one who was wrong.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Who was I to look down at them\u2014na\u00efve though they might be\u2014and tell them not to dance, to tell them not to sing?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u2014<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/substack.com\/redirect\/431e36f7-3ea8-4897-b076-c5b43138ecfa?j=eyJ1IjoiMmRrajIifQ.ND0qR5RKsmVnltuWgIlyr3BY7uwq2Kt9ZzX29UJK4cg\" target=\"_blank\"><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I am not an an AI ethicist; I am not a global warming scientist; I am not an epidemiologist. To be honest, it is often too much for me. I do not read the books published or the articles written by the prognosticators and experts. If I did, I think I\u2019d be too wrapped in fear.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In this way, I am just like those fourteen-year-olds in that chapel: I am ignorant to what lies ahead, oblivious to the pain that could be around the corner, whether at the hands of AI, global warming, pandemics, or a combination of all three.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But does that mean I should lower my hands? Is God that nineteen-year-old in the back, smugly looking at me and not counting my praise because of my ignorance?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Obviously not! God wants that praise, na\u00efve as that may be.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u2014<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I think of that time when a woman poured the perfume on Jesus\u2019s feet, when some of those with him rebuked her, telling her she shouldn\u2019t be doing that. She should give it to the poor or do something better with it. It was so wasteful, so na\u00efve. What was Jesus\u2019s response?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote\">\n<p>\u201cLet her alone; why do you trouble her? She has performed a good service for me.<strong><sup>&nbsp;<\/sup><\/strong>For you always have the poor with you, and you can show kindness to them whenever you wish, but you will not always have me. She has done what she could; she has anointed my body beforehand for its burial. Truly I tell you, wherever the good news<sup>&nbsp;<\/sup>is proclaimed in the whole world, what she has done will be told in remembrance of her.\u201d\u2079<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>What she did for him was worship. Ignorant and na\u00efve, perhaps. But Jesus honored it, promising her that this beautiful act would be an example for the rest of the world, for the rest of all time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote\">\n<p>A colony of heaven\u2026<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>Do you know what happened immediately after Jesus praised this woman with her wasteful and na\u00efve worship?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Judas left and went to the chief priests in order to betray Jesus.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote\">\n<p>\u2026in a land of death.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>This death-dealing and life-giving have existed way longer than everything threatening us now.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u2014<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>All those students last night are preparing to go into a world of death to share God\u2019s life. They are na\u00efve just like I am. None of us know how this whole thing will play out. We believe God is in control, but that doesn\u2019t mean there won\u2019t be suffering, that doesn\u2019t mean there won\u2019t be AI disasters, global warming catastrophes, or pandemic casualties. We are\u2014all of us\u2014venturing through a land of death.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>BUT.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>BUT.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>BUT.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Each of those students is about to do what they do best: worship God by creating life. They will preach sermons and baptize parishioners and sit in hospital rooms. They will walk with counseling patients and fund non-profits and serve immigrants and the marginalized.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>They will na\u00efvely raise their hands like children and dance like old men and pour their perfume on the feet of Jesus, believing that small acts of extravagant love\u2014of faithful living\u2014make a difference.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u2014<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Someday Jesus will come back and turn all this death into life. Until then, I want to innocently and boldly lift my hands and dance, doing things that model this future world redeemed. I will kiss Lex and recruit future pastors and therapists and receive communion and clap as people are baptized. I will call my mom and hug my friends and go a little too hard at game night.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Maybe it is all a waste in the obliterating gaze of the apocalypse, but I believe it is worth it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cTruly I tell you, wherever the good news<sup>&nbsp;<\/sup>is proclaimed in the whole world, what she has done will be told in remembrance of her.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>==============<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Two questions<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>1.<\/strong>\u00a0<em>If faith no longer means having all the answers, what does it mean for you to \u201cstand\u201d in faith when you are uncertain?<\/em> <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>2.<\/strong>&nbsp;<em>In the \u201cland of death\u201d we live in, where are you being invited to create or participate in life\u2014even if part of you wonders whether it will make any difference?<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Cost of Doubt Wednesday, September 9, 2026 Brian McLaren normalizes painful experiences of doubt:&nbsp; The origin of the word doubt helps name the pain.&nbsp;Doubt&nbsp;derives from the same roots as&nbsp;duo&nbsp;and&nbsp;double, suggesting that to doubt is to be in two minds, one that believes and one that doesn\u2019t. The two minds wrestle and writhe in tension, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27583"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=27583"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27583\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":27593,"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27583\/revisions\/27593"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=27583"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=27583"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=27583"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}