Three Things That Will Crush Your Faith

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What is the main thing that governs your inner world on a typical Tuesday afternoon when nothing dramatic is happening—just normal life? When the email lands that you didn’t want, when your child disobeys again, when the doctor raises an eyebrow at your test results, when the bank account looks thin, when the phone call you hoped for never comes—what steadies you? How you answer those questions is not a small matter; it exposes the deepest object of your trust. Whatever you instinctively run to for stability in the storm is your functional “most important thing.” It might be God. It might be control. It might be people’s approval, health, money, your competence, your spouse, your children, or your ministry. But whatever it is, if you have that thing, you tell yourself you will be okay. If you lose it, you tell yourself you cannot be okay. That is your functional belief system, no matter what you say you believe.

Biblically speaking, your belief system is not merely the doctrinal statement you affirm or the verses you can quote. Your functional belief system is the operating assumption that drives how you interpret, react to, and navigate life. It is your presupposition, the lens you wear all the time, whether you realize it or not. All of life flows out of that belief system. For some, that system is thoroughly God-centered and Scripture-soaked; for others, it is thinly Christianized self-reliance. Two people can say, “I believe in God,” yet when trouble hits, you see two entirely different religions in play. One leans into the character of God and walks by faith through tears. The other collapses, scrambles, manipulates, blames, medicates, or withdraws. One has a faith that stabilizes; the other has a faith that evaporates under pressure.

This is why it is possible for someone to be genuinely born again and yet live a chronically defeated or unstable Christian life. Regeneration secures a place in heaven; it does not automatically guarantee a rich, vibrant, functional trust in God on earth. Biblical faith is more than a salvation event; it is a way of living. Authentic Christianity is not merely a sinner’s prayer in your past but a heart increasingly subdued and enabled by the power of God for steady transformation into Christlikeness. The faith the Bible celebrates is not vague optimism about God, but a clear-eyed, informed, tested, and growing confidence in who God actually is and what He has actually said. Faith is not magic; it is a way of looking at reality.

The crucial issue, therefore, is not whether you “have faith” but what your faith is pointed at. Faith is a telescope; it is not the star. Everybody lives by faith, all day long. You sat in a chair today because you believed it would hold you. You drove through an intersection because you believed the other driver would obey the red light. You opened your email because you believed the server would deliver your messages. Faith, in itself, is not special; its object determines its quality. Biblical faith has the triune God in its sights—His character, His promises, His wisdom, His sovereignty, His goodness, His nearness. That kind of faith does not float in mid-air; it is anchored in a real Person revealed in a real Word.

Scripture makes this clear: “Faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ” (Romans 10:17). All faith—good or bad—is informed faith. Nobody moves without some kind of knowledge. The self-reliant man knows he can usually muscle his way through. The porn user knows the screen will give him short-term comfort. The angry man knows yelling often gets him his way. The manipulating woman “knows” that if she hints, pouts, or controls, she can keep people from rejecting her. The Christian knows that God is wise, good, sovereign, and near, so he obeys even when nothing feels safe. All of them are acting on something they “know.” The difference between them is not that some have faith and others don’t; the difference is the object and source of that faith.

This is why the health of your soul will never rise above the health of what you are trusting. If the center of gravity in your inner world is your abilities, your reputation, your looks, your spouse’s affection, your children’s obedience, or your comfort, then your emotional life will rise and fall with those things. You will be as stable as your circumstances. You will be as hopeful as your last “success.” And because all of those things are fragile, your faith will be too. Functional idolatry guarantees chronic instability. God built you to be dependent; that is not the problem. Dependency is part of the image of God in you. The Father, Son, and Spirit have always existed in perfect, joyful, mutual reliance. The Trinitarian community is the original “body life” (Genesis 1:26). The problem is that after the fall, your dependency got hijacked.

Instead of relying on God, you began to rely on created things: self, people, stuff, experiences, feelings, performance. You cannot stop being a dependent creature, but you can choose what you depend on. Everyone must serve somebody. The question is never, “Am I trusting?” but, “Whom am I trusting?” And one of the simplest ways to surface your functional object of faith is to examine your reactions to disappointment. When something you wanted did not happen, what came up and out of you? When your spouse didn’t respond the way you hoped, did you move toward them with kindness or punish them with sulking and withdrawal? Your reactions are windows into the real theology of your heart. When Jesus was inconvenienced, opposed, misunderstood, and sinned against, He stayed locked on one mission: doing His Father’s will (Luke 9:51). People’s failures did not control Him because His faith was not anchored in them.

If the object of your faith is yourself, then every setback becomes a referendum on your power. If you succeed, you feel justified and secure, at least temporarily. If you fail, you feel threatened and angry or crushed and anxious, because your “god” has just been exposed as inadequate. You will scramble harder, push people more, control tighter, yell louder, or retreat deeper. You are trying to rescue your own sovereignty. On the other hand, if the object of your faith is the Lord, then your disappointments will still hurt, but they will not define you or overthrow you. You may weep, but you will not despair. You may be pressed, but you will not be destroyed, because underneath your life sits a Person who cannot be moved.

This is why the New Testament describes the Christian life in terms of the fruit of the Spirit and the love of God. When your functional faith is in God, not just in theory but in practice, your reactions begin to look like His: “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control” (Galatians 5:22–23). You do not become sinlessly perfect, but you become recognizably different. The love chapter, 1 Corinthians 13, is not a wedding ornament; it is a mirror for your soul. Love is patient and kind; it does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it bears, believes, hopes, and endures all things (1 Corinthians 13:4–7). You cannot live this way if the object of your trust is fragile and controllable. You will collapse under the weight of disappointment. But if the object of your trust is God Himself, whose character never changes and whose purposes never fail, love becomes a realistic way to live, even in painful situations.

Biblical faith, then, is trusting in Someone that no one can take away from you. Every other “faith” is trusting in something that can be removed. People die, fail, move, or reject you. Health deteriorates. Beauty fades. Money evaporates. Ministries shift. Circumstances swing. If your faith rests in any of these, then you are functionally building your house on sand (Matthew 7:24–27). True Christian faith is the only faith that anchors itself in an object that cannot be conquered or lost. “Neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come… will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 8:38–39). You may lose everything you wanted, but if your faith is in Him, you cannot ultimately lose. You may walk through unimaginable suffering, but your soul has a place to stand.

If, however, you quietly locate your deepest security in something that can be taken away, you will eventually become someone you do not recognize or like. The man whose identity rests in his career will either worship his successes or be crushed by his failures. The woman who finds her worth in her appearance will fight a losing battle against the passage of time. The teenager who feeds on social media approval will ride a roller coaster of highs and lows with every like or silence. In every case, the soul is trying to grab hold of something that was never meant to carry that weight.

This is why Scripture warns that “we have this treasure in jars of clay” (2 Corinthians 4:7). Your life is fragile and limited. You are not the treasure; Christ is. You are the jar; He is the gold. When you reverse that, everything breaks. God’s design is that His strength would be showcased through your weakness, His stability through your need, His constancy through your change. But if you resist weakness, you will never experience the stabilizing reality of His sufficiency, which brings us to a legitimate question to ask, “If God is that stable and trustworthy, why is my faith so wobbly? Why do I know these things in theory but collapse in practice?” The problem is not that God is weak or unreliable; the problem is that something is interfering with your ability to rest in Him.

In this chapter, we will focus on three primary faith-killers: anger, fear, and ignorance. Each one distorts your vision of God, poisons your trust in His character, and crushes your ability to walk by faith. None of them is small, and all of them are common.

Anger toward God (or toward the life He has written for you) is one of the most subtle and powerful faith-crushers in the Christian life. You may not say, “I am angry with God,” out loud, but your reactions often betray a deep disappointment with the Author of your story. Anger is not just rage or yelling; it is a constellation of responses that includes cynicism, grumbling, chronic frustration, harshness, bitterness, resentment, complaint, and simmering discontent. Whenever your soul says, “This shouldn’t be happening to me; God is not managing my life the way He should,” you are dealing with anger. Anger and trust cannot occupy the same space. You cannot actively resent what God has chosen for you and simultaneously rest in His wisdom, goodness, and sovereignty. An angry heart will not entrust itself to the One it quietly believes has wronged it.

Fear is another faith-killer, and like anger, it rarely shows up with a name tag. Fear hides under shame, guilt, condemnation, anxiety, worry, dread, controlling behavior, social withdrawal, or perfectionism. The fearful heart says, “I cannot trust God with this; if I let go, everything will fall apart.” Fear turns you into your own savior. You may believe in free grace on paper, but in practice, you live as though everything depends on you. You obey not out of delight but out of terror. You serve not from joy but from compulsion. That kind of internal climate cannot sustain robust faith. Perfect love casts out fear (1 John 4:18), but entrenched fear casts out the felt experience of perfect love. You may be loved in Christ, but you will not feel loved. And people who do not feel loved by God will struggle to trust Him.

Ignorance, finally, is the quiet, respectable faith-killer. By ignorance, I don’t mean stupidity; I mean simply “not knowing.” There are many things in life you legitimately know nothing about. That does not make you foolish; it simply marks the limit of your experience. But ignorance of God—His character, His promises, His ways—will inevitably weaken your faith. You cannot trust a Person you barely know. You cannot rest in promises you do not understand. Many Christians live with a thin, vague, sentimental view of God, picked up from songs, slogans, and sermons, but have never pressed deeply into Scripture enough to let God redefine their instincts. As a result, their functional god is a caricature—too small, too much like them, too moody, too changeable—and they relate to Him accordingly.

When anger, fear, or ignorance sits at the foundation of your relationship with the Lord, your faith will be fragile even if your theology is technically correct. You might affirm God’s sovereignty while secretly accusing Him of mismanaging your life. You might quote His promises while doubting that they apply to your situation. You might teach others about His goodness while interpreting your suffering as evidence that He has singled you out for special hardship. In that condition, you will be double-minded, declaring trust while living in suspicion. And a double-minded person is unstable in all his ways (James 1:8).

The path forward is not to pretend your anger, fear, or ignorance isn’t there. The path forward is to drag all three into the light. Begin with anger. Where are you disappointed with God? Where have you quietly concluded that He held out on you, failed you, forgot you, or mishandled your story? Be honest. Scripture does not shy away from this; the Psalms are full of anguished questions, raw lament, and deep wrestling. The difference between godly complaint and unbelieving grumbling is that godly complaint keeps talking to God. Bring your accusations to Him, not behind His back. Ask Him to soften you, humble you, and re-teach you His character so you can surrender your right to run the universe.

Then address your fears. Where are you terrified to trust Him? What outcome are you trying to control at all costs? What future scenario haunts your imagination? Fear shrinks as the Father’s love grows. Meditate deeply on passages like Romans 8, John 10, and Psalm 23. Talk with trusted friends about specific fears; ask them to help you discern whether your expectations of God are biblical or distorted. Often, fear thrives on vague dread; when you name it and examine it in the light of Scripture, it frequently loses some of its power.

Finally, confront your ignorance. Where are your views of God shaped more by experience, upbringing, or culture than by Scripture? Where have you assumed things about His heart that He never said? You don’t need a doctorate, but you do need a Bible open and a heart hungry. Systematically saturate your mind with God’s self-disclosure. Read big, sweeping sections that show you the whole storyline. Linger in texts that reveal His character. Memorize verses that reveal His attributes. Every new truth you see and embrace pushes ignorance back another inch and gives your faith another place to stand.

The Lord is not threatened by your questions. He is not rattled by your weaknesses. He invites you to bring your anger, fear, and ignorance into His presence, not to shame you, but to liberate you. His goal is not to scold you into stronger faith but to win you into deeper trust. As He exposes where your faith is anchored in fragile things and patiently reorients you to Himself, you will begin to notice subtle changes: less volatility when life changes, less scrambling when plans fall apart, and less panic when people fail. You will not become stoic; you will still feel deeply. But beneath the waves, something will be different. You will know, relationally and practically, that the object of your faith cannot be taken away. And that is when your faith stops being a fragile concept and becomes a stabilizing reality.

Call to Action

Your soul will only ever be as stable as the object of your faith. If you place the weight of your existence on anything that can be taken from you, you are building a life that will eventually collapse. If you are trusting in beauty, people, comfort, reputation, outcomes, or your own competence, you are guaranteeing instability. And you know it. Your reactions to disappointment have already exposed you.

You must root your trust in the only One who cannot be shaken. But you cannot do that while anger, fear, or ignorance lives unchallenged in your heart. Anger subtly accuses God of wrongdoing. Fear quietly convinces you that God cannot be trusted. Ignorance unknowingly shrinks God into a caricature too small to lean on. If you do not confront these faith-crushers, they will define your Christianity, no matter how many verses you know or how many ministries you serve in.

This chapter is not asking for quick fixes. It is calling for a reformation of your inner world. Your stability is at stake. Your relationships are at stake. Your future obedience is at stake. But most importantly, the glory of God in your life is at stake. If you will face the faith-killers that have quietly dominated you, you can walk forward with a kind of calm, grounded, resilient faith that no disappointment can dismantle.

1. In the last significant disappointment you experienced, what came out of you first—faith, fear, anger, or control?
2. Where do you subtly believe that God has failed you, forgotten you, or withheld something from you?
3. What outcome, relationship, or possession do you fear losing the most—something that, if removed, you believe would undo you?
4. What do your closest friends think is the primary object of your trust? Would they say God is central or secondary in your reactions?
5. Where are you ignorant of the character of God? What specific truths about Him do you avoid, assume, or misunderstand?
6. Who is walking with you, helping you relocate your trust from fragile things to the unshakeable God? And if the answer is “no one,” what will you do about that this week?

Final Exhortation

Your life will shrink or flourish based on where you place your trust. Anger, fear, and ignorance will hollow out your soul if you coddle them, but they will lose their power the moment you drag them into the light. Don’t let these faith-killers roam freely in your heart. Deal with them decisively. Fix your eyes on the unchanging character of God, plant both feet on His promises, and refuse to let anything smaller than Him define your stability. The world is unstable, but your God is not. Anchor your soul in Him today, and walk forward with a courage that no disappointment can erase.

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Rick Thomas

Rick launched the Life Over Coffee global training network in 2008 to bring hope and help for you and others by creating resources that spark conversations for transformation. His primary responsibilities are resource creation and leadership development, which he does through speaking, writing, podcasting, and educating.

In 1990 he earned a BA in Theology and, in 1991, a BS in Education. In 1993, he received his ordination into Christian ministry, and in 2000 he graduated with an MA in Counseling from The Master’s University. In 2006 he was recognized as a Fellow of the Association of Certified Biblical Counselors (ACBC).