The No of Belief

“I believe; help my unbelief!” Mark 9:24b

The speaker of this verse is basically saying no to his unbelief. He’s reaching out for help, of course, and he wants to uproot, reject, and replace his unbelief.

We can also say no to our belief. What does that look like?

“I don’t believe; help my belief!”

Sounds odd, doesn’t it? Obviously, no one would actually ask Jesus to help their belief when they’re trying to choose unbelief. In the verse that leads this post, the speaker is claiming belief yet acknowledging and asking Jesus to help remedy the remnants of unbelief in his life. Perhaps that’s difficult for you to grasp, because to you, people either believe or they don’t. Please at least entertain the idea there are always uncertainties, seeds of doubts, perhaps only in the small things. But a few grains of sand can erode a lot under the right circumstances.

Moving on to the flip version, someone is claiming unbelief yet acknowledging some belief in the context of wanting to get rid of it. Consider these as a few grain of sand in a shoe after spending the morning on the beach. Positioned in the wrong place and walking for miles will create pain. People who vehemently or passively choose unbelief might not attribute the pain to anything substantial and certainly nothing faith-related. But the discomfort is there.

Sometimes it’s equally as important to know what we’re saying no to, not just what we’re saying yes to—what we’re choosing to both (and often simultaneously) believe and not believe.