The Great Cloud of Doubters

The Great Cloud of Doubters

Are you the only one faking it? In this episode, Pedro tackles the "Imposter Phenomenon" within faith. If you’ve ever looked around a worship service and felt like the only person with questions, you aren’t losing your faith—you’re likely a victim of pluralistic ignorance.

In this episode, we explore:

• The Science of Doubt: Why isolation triggers a "threat response" in your brain, and how finding a fellow doubter creates "social buffering" to lower your cortisol.
• The Cost of the Mask: Why "spiritual performance" leads to burnout and why honesty is the only path to relief.
• Biblical Wrestlers: From Jacob (whose name literally means "he who wrestles with God") to Thomas, we see that God doesn't scold doubters—He meets them exactly where they are.

Doubt isn't the opposite of faith; it’s the historical norm. Stop carrying the 50lb backpack of certainty and join the long lineage of those who limped across the finish line.

Connect with me:

Email me: isitbecauseofjesus@gmail.com

Buy the book.

Website: isitbecauseofjesus.com

Support the show on Patreon.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:17

Hey my friend, it's nice to be with you again. This is Pedro, and we're going to keep exploring some of the reasons why Christians doubt their faith. We're gonna put words to those feelings, emotions, and spiritual battles so that we can refresh our faith and go back to Jesus, always keeping in mind the question Is it because of Jesus when it comes to doubting? Today I've called this episode the Great Cloud of Doubters. And the summary of today's episode is that you are not the first person to wrestle with God. You know what happens, like for example, um the feeling of looking around during a worship song or a sermon, let's say, and everyone else is you know, hands raised, maybe eyes closed or nodding along. But meanwhile your internal monologue is saying something like Am I the only one who thinks this doesn't make any sense? Or something like Am I the only one who is faking this? Why am I here even? So the great cloud of witnesses, this is a passage uh from Hebrews twelve. We sometimes think about those as a group of perfect people judging our poor performance. But in reality, it's a group of people who, let's say, limped across the finish line after wrestling with God. So what we're going to do is to dismantle the illusion that everyone else has it together to prove that doubt is not an anomaly but the historical norm. Okay, so here's the concept. Um it's called pluralistic ignorance and I'll give you a definition of this, okay? This is more the psychological part of it pluralistic ignorance. It's a psychological phenomenon where a majority of group members privately reject a norm but incorrectly assume that most others accept it and therefore they go along with it in public. That's the definition, okay? So let's apply this. In a church of five hundred people, let's say, four hundred of them might be actively wrestling with a specific doctrine or the problem of evil or burnout. But because no one voices it, all four hundred people believe they are the only one. So you are not losing your faith, but you are a victim of pluralistic ignorance. Careful with that word, because ignorant in English has a very strong you know connotation. And well as as you can hear, my first language is Spanish, but I think ignorance in in English carries a really strong connotation. So pluralistic ignorance. Then this what causes is what's called or it can cause this. It's called the spotlight effect and or imposter phenomenon. The definition of this is the following the cognitive bias where people believe they're being noticed and evaluated much more than the they actually are. So for example, when you doubt, you feel like a fraud. You feel like everyone can look at you. Even though they don't know what's going on with you, they can look at you and you believe that they can tell that you are an imposter. So this anxiety is what forces us into hiding, preventing you from seeking the very conversations that would heal you. This is a very important concept. This happens so much, it really does happen a lot. Now when you feel isolated in your doubt, you know what your brain does. Your brain treats it as a threat, activating the sympathetic nervous system anxiety, raising heart, panic. And then when you discover someone else shares your doubts, your brain experiences what's called social buffering. It triggers the parasympathetic nervous system. Finding a fellow doubter literally lowers your cortisol levels and heart rate. And this is why many doubt. When we doubt, we tend to isolate ourselves, we don't talk to anyone, and then when we find someone that doubts, we don't treat it as oh you're doubting too, let's talk about it. We treat it as oh you're doubting too, let's doubt together and doubt till the end, because all of this is probably not true. So we you're trying to uh to reach is a feeling, a sensation of belonging first, instead of just going at it thinking, oh, I'm doubting, and I'm gonna I'm going to have conversations to heal the doubt. So psychology explains how our brains isolate us, but emotion is where we feel the weight of it. We tend to think that all of this is just conceptual intelligence. Truly, emotion is a huge part of it. The sheer exhaustion of spiritual performance is like, you know, it's like wearing a mask of certainty requires massive amounts of emotional energy. And of course that's going to lead to spiritual burnout. It is truly very, very tiresome to pretend to be or to pretend that you're not feeling what you are feeling. So honesty is crucial. Honesty is necessary even when honesty is going to you know lead us to the valley of shadows. And then of course there's the me too moment, right? Like for example, there's a specific visceral relief when you hear someone that you respect saying, you know what? I don't know either, or I I I'm doubting too. I'm not sure about this. It truly feels like setting down a fifty pound backpack you forgot so you were wearing. That's the way it feels, and that is the feeling that is exactly the feeling that makes people abandon Christianity many times. But since the self is the one that is doubting, then it's be it becomes cyclical and it starts to hurt. That's why it's very important to not isolate yourself if you're doubting Christianity. Because doubting Christianity can be the most beautiful thing because it's it's going to lead you to Jesus even more. The other thing I wanted to share with you today is like uh I don't know how to say this well, but we tend to um sanitize our faith heroes, both biblical and personal. So for example, we look at grandparents, pastors or historical figures, and we assume their faith was a straight upward line, it was perfect from the very beginning. So we have to mourn the loss of the perfect Christian myth. So then we can embrace the reality of a lived messy follower of Jesus. Okay, so what is Jesus' perspective on all of this? So if isolation is a psychological trap, how does the God of the Bible respond to people who push back? So for example, you have Genesis 32. Jacob literally gets into a physical grappling match with God in the dirt, refusing to let go until he gets a blessing. And God doesn't smite him for his insolence, God renames him. Israel literally translates to he who wrestles with God. So what is the point? The point is that the entire Judeo Christian faith is named after a guy who fought with God. So wrestling isn't the opposite of faith. It is the definition of it. For example, we have Jesus and Thomas. Thomas wasn't there when Jesus first appeared. He explicitly says, Hey, unless I see the nail marks, I will not believe. Which is truly it's a deeply relatable, rational boundary, right? So what happens then? Jesus doesn't send a messenger to scold Thomas. A week later, Jesus shows up specifically for Thomas. He offers his scars. He meets Thomas exactly where his psychological and physical demands require. Do you think that this is a coincidence? Do you think that the the the Bible is a shame of people who doubt? The word of God is giving time for the doubter to express him and herself. Okay, so let's conclude here. You're not broken for doubting. You are experiencing pluralistic ignorance and you belong to a long ancient lineage of wrestlers. Remember what I said about ignorance in English, it carries a very, very uh strong weight with it, but pluralistic ignorance is a concept, you're not ignorant. Try to hear me well, okay. So I think what you should do if you're doubting Christianity, but you've still a Christian, follower of Jesus, find one safe person this week and break this pluralistic ignorance. Say, hey, just wanted to be honest with you, I'm struggling with X, Y, or Z or Z. You will likely give them the permission they desperately needed to share their own doubts. And then if you feel entirely alone in your questions, that isolation is a psychological trick. And you know where trick comes from. It's the enemy. It's not a spiritual truth. Because if you look closely at Jesus, he's usually standing right there in the room with the doubters. Is it because of Jesus you feel alone? No. Jesus invites you to touch this car. It's been a pleasure to spend time with you. As I always say, you know, in the description of the podcast, you have information, my website, email. You can contact contact me and share your story with me. And just know that I love spending time with you and that you're not alone and Jesus waits. Thank you and have a wonderful day.