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"Keep the faith: Shift your Thinking on Doubt" is a book that I was very keen to get my hands on. This has been a year spent fighting for faith in the face of a range of struggles and doubts. Any help in dealing with issues of doubt and battling from a biblical standpoint in this area has been warmly welcomed. So I was full of anticipation as I began reading Keep the Faith and I dearly wanted to 'love' this book.

I liked a lot of it, but I didn't fall in love with it. I'm very encouraged by the approach and direction that shapes this book, but it didn't leave me satisfied that it had achieved all it could.

The central thesis is very sound. In today's world Christian thinking and ways are no longer mainstream. Many intelligent and articulate people dismiss Christian faith as outdated, irrelevant, unsubstantiated myths, and sometimes even downright dangerous. We live in an atmosphere of unbelief and this can wear away at Christian faith.

Faith is helpfully explained as 'trust' or 'reliance'. Faith is more than an intellectual assent or belief that something is true. It is a willingness to act on the basis of this belief. The distinctive of Christian faith, as opposed say to trusting the accuracy of the weather forecast and not taking an umbrella, is that so much rides on it. We're dealing with matters of life and death, meaning and purpose. So both faith and doubt are hugely significant when it comes to Christianity.

Ayers warns the Christian of the importance of taking preventative measures so that we are not easily swayed, and so that we understand where people, including ourselves, are coming from. His key point here is to demolish any claims to neutrality when it comes to considering God. This is true both for those who reject God and those who follow him. We all bring our prejudices and predispositions to bear on our thinking and choices. He argues clearly from Romans 1, that every person has an awareness of God, that's displayed in the creation. And that rather than accepting this revelation and honouring God, people choose to suppress this knowledge and replace God with other things in their lives.

18 The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of people, who suppress the truth by their wickedness, 19 since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. 20 For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities "his eternal power and divine nature" have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse.

21 For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. 22 Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools 23 and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images… (Romans 1:18-23)

The implications of this run deep. He demonstrates that there is a moral component to rejecting God. It's not simply that people are persuaded that the evidence doesn't stack up. It's that people do not want there to be a God who has a right to direct their lives. It's a picture of a creation in rebellion against it's creator. This might seem a rather harsh or insensitive analysis, but we should remember we're not talking about abstract intellectual ideas. We're talking about a relational God who lovingly desires a relationship with those he has made in his image. Ignoring God is to turn our back on this offer of relationship.

Martin Ayers describes atheists, and others who dismiss God, as being guilty of wishful thinking. I found this a somewhat refreshing change, because I'm more used to hearing arguments from the other side that Christians are the wishful thinkers (or non-thinkers!). While acknowledging that Christians are also guilty of wishful thinking, the bulk of the argument focuses on why we do not want there to be a God. He quotes the intellectual atheist, Thomas Nagel, saying:

I want atheism to be true and am made uneasy by the fact that some of the most and well informed people I know are religious believers. It isn't just that I don't believe in God and, naturally, hope that I'm right in my belief. It's that I hope there is no God! I don't want there to be a God; I don't want the universe to be like that. My guess is that this cosmic authority problem is not a rare condition and that it is responsible for much of the scientism and reductionism of our time. (p52; quoting T. Nagel, The Last Word, Oxford University Press, New York, 2001, pp.130-31)

The first part of this book helpfully critiques the claims to neutrality in assessing Christianity. It just can't be do...

[Note] This review was transferred from our old online store which did not give ratings. But this new store requires ratings. So in order to transfer them we have tried to give a rating which reflects the content of the review. So you may prefer to ignore the rating and just read the review.
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Whether or not we'll admit, every Christian wrestles with doubt. We often come across questions that we don't have immediate answers for, and this can cause us to wonder – wait, what if I was wrong about all this? Doubt is one of those things that people often like to keep on the down low, because we feel like strong Christians shouldn't have doubts, and if we have doubts, then we're not being faithful Christians.

This is, of course, completely wrong. Doubts are okay. All Christians have them. And since doubt is a topic that's so often not talked about, we often have no idea how to deal with it. Thankfully, Martin Ayers has written a great book to help Christians think through the issue of doubt: Keep the Faith – Shift your Thinking on Doubt. This short, accessible book helps Christians think through how we approach doubt. It points us to what the Bible has to say about doubt, and has some practical insights on how we should respond to our doubts.

How do you handle your doubts? Brush them under the carpet? Ignore them? Trawl angry youtube comment debates about Christianity? As much as those sound like great options, can I recommend an alternative? Read Keep the Faith. Not because this book will magically fix your doubts, but because it will help set you on a path where you can deal with your doubts in a healthy way.

As I see it, there are two main goals in this book, both of which are ultimately helpful to a Christian in a secular society who is dealing with doubt (so, basically all Christians in Western countries). First, it deconstructs some of the claims and assumptions behind the atheistic worldview. I was surprised at first to see Ayers taking the offensive here – in a book aiming to help Christians deal with doubts about their own faith, why is he attacking atheism?

But it actually makes a lot of sense when you think about it. Western Christians live in a sea of doubt and scepticism, and atheism pervades our culture. Many (not all, but many) of our doubts stem from the anti-Christian arguments of passionate atheists, and it can often seem to us that their position is the more reasonable and intellectual position. Indeed, it is often argued that atheism is simply the neutral, factual, unbiased position of weighing the evidence (while Christianity is illogical blind faith).

Ayers demonstrates that this isn't true, and reveals some of the biases, presuppositions, and leaps of faith that exist within atheism. He exposes the lies that we are constantly (if implicitly) fed about our faith and our doubts, showing clearly that atheism is not as impartial and unbiased as some claim it to be. That's the first main goal, and it's a helpful one.

Second, Keep the Faith gives some great advice for how Christians should deal with the legitimate doubts and questions that they do have. He points out a number of methods that Christians often employ when faced with their doubts which are destructive and will not help, and gives some alternatives. For example, he notes that many Christians who are faced with serious doubts tend to withdraw from other Christians and keep it to themselves (hoping it will resolve), but he explains why this almost never works, and that it is a much better idea to actually engage more with other Christians and serve others.

In addition to this and many other concrete steps (which are great), Ayers highlights three things which we should keep in mind that will help us to think and act rightly in response to our doubts: remember the fall, remember your redeemer, and remember the stakes.

If we remember the Fall, we will remember how it has skewed and darkened the thinking of mankind (both Christians and non-Christians). This will lead us to expect doubts, and to expect opposition from others against the faith. If we remember the Fall, then we'll know that we need not be discouraged by our doubts.

If we remember our Redeemer, and focus on Him in true worship, then our affections for Him will grow. And as we grow in our awe of and affections for God, we will find that many of the doubts that we have become less troubling to us. Will we ever know the answers to all the hard questions? Not this side of heaven. But as we remember our Redeemer and fix our eyes on Him, we start to recognise that some of those doubts and questions aren't quite as important as they seemed.

And finally, we need to remember the stakes. Christianity is not merely an intellectual exercise. It's a matter of life and death. Doubts are nothing to be ashamed of. But if we remember the stakes, then we'll commit ourselves to seeking answers and not settling for anything short of the truth.

Keep the Faith is a great book to ...