me:I stumbled across your wife’s healing story while trying bolster my own flagging, increasingly skeptical faith in Jesus. Is she still still symptom-free?# Phil:Yes, I can confirm that Vonna has not had any Multiple Sclerosis symptoms since 10pm on June 8, 2003. My wife and I are both skeptical by nature, and we have been diligently watchful for any hint of a return of the familiar symptoms. 11½ years after the healing, my own skepticism persists, but I can confidently say that in addition to this healing from MS being sudden and complete, I am 11½ years closer to declaring it permanent.But there’s a follow-up to the story, and it’s something we’re walking through right now. Although God chose a sudden and miraculous healing to deal with Vonna’s MS, that has not been the case with her genetic kidney condition (polycystic kidney disease), which has been slowly developing before, during, and after her bout with MS. Her kidneys, which normally weigh about 5 oz. each, are now estimated to be in excess of 12 pounds apiece, and her kidney function is down to about 25%. This coming Monday, December 8, she will undergo surgery to have the larger and more painful of the two kidneys removed. This will put her in need of a transplant or dialysis within the next few months.In the case of Vonna’s kidney disease, we are content in knowing that a miraculous healing is not going to occur. We are learning to trust God to provide in other ways, through the wisdom and skill of medical professionals, and through the gracious provision of a willing and compatible live kidney donor. But here, we are seeing a different type of miracle: I just “happen” to share Vonna’s relatively rare blood type, and in spite of not being blood relatives, have already passed the crossmatch test to be a donor. Sometime next year, I expect to have the privilege of giving one of my kidneys to my wife.So my own skepticism continues to be exercised. Why does God sometimes choose not to heal miraculously? Is there even a line between the “miraculous” and what we consider “natural”? Does the nature of God’s interaction with the physical universe imply some sort of incarnational submission to physical laws which render some conditions “unhealable”? These are the kinds of questions that fuel my own skeptical faith. But while some see skepticism as a negative, I value my own skepticism and encourage it in others. Skepticism is a process of taking truth claims, especially those we ourselves hold, and examining them from all angles. Faith sometimes requires accepting things without proof, but it doesn’t mean accepting them without examination. The process of examining, testing, and re-examining our beliefs is a necessary part of discarding beliefs that may be faulty, and strengthening those which stand up to the examination.You didn’t mention where you read my wife’s story, but I’ve shared much of my own perspective on that healing on my blog at faithforthinkers.com. I invite you to check it out, if you haven’t already. The site also contains links to many other items of interest to those with a healthily skeptical Christian faith.Thanks for contacting me, Scott. I’d like to hear more about your own personal journey, and any other questions you might have.# me:I’m gratefully surprised for your quick and thorough reply. Thank you.That is such good news about the MS. And although the kidney disease is potentially confounding and certainly no fun, how beautiful that your kidney will be hers. I wish and pray you both long, happy, loving lives together.I agree with you about skepticism in general. The problem with my skepticism is that it’s not what you or I would consider healthy: The truth claim under examination is not a specific attribute of God or the way He works. It’s the claim that He exists. Here’s how my doubt began:In May, I began a formal evangelistic effort toward some formerly Christian friends. It comprised reading with them The Case for Christ, Atheism & the Case Against Christ, and The Resurrection of Jesus: A New Historiographical Approach. (They have not read the latter.) Serious consideration of the thoughts in the Atheism volume led to further reading on the Internet, which gave room for three theological “why?" questions to burrow into my soul:1. Why, if God is all-good and all-powerful, does the world contain apparently meaningless suffering and evil?2. Why, if God wants a relationship with His creatures, doesn’t He make Himself more obvious?3. Why, if prayer is supposed to work the way I understand the Bible to describe it working, doesn’t it work more often?These questions led to serious religious doubt back in May, which led to anxiety, which led to a sleepless night, despite my anguished cries for rest. Since then, I had mostly been able keep conscious doubt at bay. The only manifestations were anxiety as I contemplated how to talk about death and God with my kids, and anxiety about not seeing God as obvious in nature like I’m “supposed to” according to the Bible (cf. Romans 1:20, Psalm 19:1).But playing too sympathetic to my friends’ doubt at a “family sleepover” with them, I relapsed into doubt pretty heavily starting on about 10/12. Along the way, I have relied heavily on three primary defenses to keep my faith alive:1. The Bible anticipates suffering of all kind, including doubt and anxiety (e.g., Psalm 77), and has prescriptions on what to do about it (e.g., James 1:2-5, Hebrews 3:12-15).2. God has “worked” as a central organizing concept for my life for twenty-five years. It would be foolish to drop Him in favor of easy, atheistic answers to my three theological questions.3. My friends (and many others, like you) have had experiences that are difficult to dismiss with naturalistic explanations.But I feel those defenses weakening. Currently—and this changes week to week, although I’m not sure I can stand the flux forever—philosophical naturalism seems so much tidier an account of reality than theism. In the case of your wife’s wonderful healing, might we not propose that there’s an as-yet poorly understood, partially genetic, powerful psychosomatic potential for people’s bodies to heal themselves at certain, often religious, triggers?I guess the answer to that question doesn’t matter: The trigger for your wife was faith in Jesus, whether He is actually alive or not. So faith in Jesus remains a very good thing in her case.But for me, it’s nevertheless unsettling yet enticing-because-of-Occam’s-razor to contemplate that your wife’s healing may have been the result of a glorified, amazing placebo effect.You see my problem?# Phil:Perhaps the time waiting around hospital rooms in the next few days will give me more time to carry on this conversation. I appreciate your candidness, and want you to know that what I consider to be my “healthy” skepticism absolutely includes speculation about the very existence of God, although in my case, my wife’s healing from MS does give me something to hold onto. The circumstances of that healing have confounded every other explanation I can come up with. Our skepticism about miraculous healings was due in large part to the “placebo” effect we’d seen so often. That’s why we were so cautious about claiming a healing until it had been thoroughly tested by doctors' evaluations and the passage of time. The fact that we were so skeptical about this particular “faith healer”, and the fact that the healing didn’t occur until after he had apparently “failed” and she had gone home and started to fall asleep, resigned to the fact that she wasn’t going to be healed, also argues against the placebo effect. She was startled awake when she felt the changes taking place in her body, a process she estimated took about five minutes. I have also investigated a number of purported healings from MS that have come from causes other than prayer, including meditation, positive thinking, diet, etc. Invariably, they result in a recovery from symptoms that takes place gradually, over the course of years, and is arguably something short of a complete and permanent healing. Nothing matching a five minute transition from crippling disability and partial paralysis to 100% symptom-free.But yet, the questions about God’s existence linger. In my case, I accept that fact that there is “something” far beyond our understanding that was responsible for what happened. I accept the fact that the timing and circumstances of the healing point to that something being, in some sense, a personal something. And I accept the fact that however we define that something as being “God”, we don’t even come close to understanding the reality of what that means.But I’ve also become comfortable with not understanding. And I’ve become comfortable with accepting that my Christian faith somehow forms enough of a framework for interacting with that entity we call “God”, that even though it is, in some sense wrong (just as Newtonian physics without relativity is “wrong”), I can base my life on that assumption.