Showing compassion towards others is a wonderful gift to them, but how can we support others with compassion and understanding if we are struggling with painful issues ourselves? What if we have our own doubts and don’t want to be hypocritical by telling others to have faith when our own is weak?
I have struggled with doubts and unbelief in the past, and tried to make myself have a stronger faith. I tried to prove to myself what to believe. But actually, that’s like trying to gain salvation by works, and like trying to save myself. We can’t be good enough to get into heaven on our own, or to please God on our own. So why do we think we can have a strong enough faith on our own? We acknowledge we can't save ourselves, but then are proud of ourselves for having a strong faith, and for our faith saving us.
No, Jesus is the only One who saves us. Instead of struggling to increase our faith, just…believe. Say, just as in the old classic hymn, “I have decided.” I have decided to believe, I have decided to follow Jesus, I have decided to have faith and to accept that faith which comes from God. “I have decided!”, not “I have figured it out logically on my own.”
Sometimes we need a moment by ourselves before we can be ready to help others. Being alone, without close human companionship, is not always negative. It allows us to not trust in human knowledge or human guidance, but only in the Voice of God. It allows us to drink in that faith that God will pour out on us, and then, after a while, turn around and provide that faith and comfort for others.
Many times when we help others, we end up helping ourselves. They say that you never really understand something deeply until you try to teach it to someone else. That can be true of musical skills, academic subjects, and faith in God.
So that there should be no division in the body, but that its parts should have equal concern for each other. If one part suffers, every part suffers with it; if one part is honored, every part rejoices with it.
1 Corinthians 12:25-26