Stop Circling the Mountain of Unbelief
I wish somebody would’ve told me this 20 years ago.
Unbelief is a sin.
Not just a feeling.
Not just doubt.
Not just, “I’m having a hard time right now.”
It’s a sin.
And I think a lot of us don’t realize that.
We call it anxiety.
We call it fear.
We call it stress.
We call it overthinking.
But underneath all of that…
it’s unbelief.
I want you to think about this.
There’s a place in Scripture where God tells the Israelites:
“You have circled this mountain long enough. Now turn north.” (Deuteronomy 2:3)
They had been going around the same thing…
over and over and over again.
Not moving forward.
Not stepping into what God had for them.
Just circling.
And I think a lot of us are doing the exact same thing.
How many times have you had the same thought…
over and over and over again?
“What if this doesn’t work out?”
“What if God doesn’t come through?”
“What if I mess this up?”
“What if I’m not enough?”
And it just keeps going.
You might call it overthinking.
But really…
you’re circling something.
You’re circling the same mountain.
Again.
And again.
And again.
And the problem is…
nothing changes.
Because your thinking isn’t changing.
You’re still going back to the same place.
You’re still rehearsing the same thoughts.
You’re still entertaining the same questions.
And then wondering why you feel stuck.
Unbelief will keep you stuck.
It will keep you from moving forward.
It will keep you from stepping into what God has for you.
It will keep you in cycles.
Same thoughts.
Same reactions.
Same patterns.
Over and over again.
And the thing is…
the Israelites didn’t just wander for no reason.
They wandered because of unbelief.
“So we see that they were not able to enter, because of their unbelief.” (Hebrews 3:19)
God had already given them a promise.
But they didn’t believe Him.
And because of that…
they stayed stuck longer than they were ever supposed to.
Circling something
they were meant to move past.
And the thing is…
unbelief doesn’t always look like unbelief.
Sometimes it looks like anxiety.
Sometimes it looks like fear.
Sometimes it looks like control.
Sometimes it looks like overanalyzing everything.
Sometimes it even feels responsible.
Like you’re just trying to think things through.
Like you’re just trying to be wise.
But underneath it…
it’s still unbelief.
And this is why it matters.
Because it affects how you pray.
Why even pray…
if you don’t actually believe God is going to do anything?
“But when you ask, you must believe and not doubt…” (James 1:6)
It affects how you move.
You hesitate.
You hold back.
You second guess everything.
It affects your peace.
Because you cannot have peace
when you don’t trust Him.
And I think a lot of this comes back to the fact that
we don’t know God like we think we do.
We know about Him.
We know what we’ve heard.
We know what we’ve been taught.
But do we actually trust Him?
Do we actually believe Him?
Do we trust His character?
Do we trust that He is who He says He is?
Because if we did…
our thoughts would look different.
Here’s what the cycle looks like.
You think the thought.
You feel the fear.
You try to control it.
You overthink it.
You stay stuck.
And then you do it all over again.
That’s circling the mountain.
At some point,
you have to call it what it is.
Stop softening it.
Stop dressing it up as something else.
Call it what it is.
Unbelief.
And this isn’t about shame.
This is about awareness.
Because once you see it…
you can actually do something about it.
You can choose to believe.
Not because everything makes sense.
Not because you feel it yet.
But because God said it.
So let me ask you something.
Be honest.
Do you actually believe God?
Or do you just say you do?
This might step on your toes a little.
It stepped on mine first.
But you can’t move forward
if you keep circling the same mountain.
This topic is explored more deeply in the full podcast episode on the Grace & Grit Mindset Podcast, where I walk through how unbelief shows up in everyday thoughts and how to begin shifting out of it.
https://grace-grit.castos.com/episodes/stop-circling-the-mountain-of-unbelief
