The theme of this past week has been "Questions." When I hear the word question, I automatically get a little anxious and nervous about what the answer may be. I sometimes fear not having the answer available immediately to whomever has asked some important question. I know that we learn by asking questions, so questions are good to ask, if you are trying to gain knowledge and facts concerning a specific subject or a person. Questions begin it seems at age two or three when all you hear from your toddler is "why?" and this continues through the teenage years with the same question but with a more condescending tone of "Why (do I have to do that)?" So, how you ask a question is just as important as the question you ask. You can also learn much about a person from the questions that they ask. Are they asking for instruction, guidance, or are they asking in an attempt to manipulate or prove a point?
This week we had a group of college students over to our small condo for dinner. They are summer interns serving in the missions ministry of our church. My husband asked them to write down any question that they would like to ask on a piece of paper. Then he had them pass all the questions to me so that I could answer them with Scripture. With a little fear and trembling I began to read the questions and jot down scriptures that came to my mind that would help answer the question. There were some questions that dealt with spiritual growth, some concerned doctrinal issues, and some were more practical in nature. I noticed as I was reading the questions that about three of them had to do with a similar topic: What does the Bible say about the role of a women within the family? As I read the three similar questions aloud they all began looking at one another and a few began to nervously giggle quietly. Then my husband asked, "Have you all had a discussion about this prior to tonight?" They began to explain that they had quite a heated discussion about the roles of men and women. The girls were not happy with the guys because they had said that women should be the only ones who do the cooking and cleaning within the family. So, I took some time and went to a couple of scriptures to explain God's created order within a family. (1 Peter 3 and Ephesians 5:22-33) I will let the scriptures speak for themselves since that is not the point of this post. The point is that certain questions are asked with a motivation of proving one's point and others are more genuinely seeking instruction and guidance. I chose to guide them to the Word and its principles in regard to men and women. Each question that came after that I simply led them to the Word and then gave them a personal application of that truth. Knowing the Word relieved my fears and provided me with confidence in knowing that if I didn't know the answer, God did!
Questions also came this week when my daughter brought her boyfriend home with her from California. We had met him before and liked what we knew, however we saw this as an opportunity to get to know him even better. So questions abounded while we were together. We asked about his family, his job, his interests and his plans for the future. I must say, we liked his answers. One thing I always told my kids as they were growing up was that "assumption is the lowest form of knowledge." When I went to my dictionary to find a synonym for assumption one was "guess work!" If we only assume we know about something or someone, yet we never ask questions or seek to find information that would help answer questions, then we may find out that our guess was completely wrong! So, we wanted to back up our guess work with some real "get to the heart of the matter" questions for her boyfriend. Never assume you know anyone without first asking them some questions.
Jesus asked many questions. After searching the web for "Questions Jesus asked," I discovered that according to several sources he asked from 100 - 300 questions in the Gospels. As I looked over the list I would say the two most important questions He asked were: "Who do you say I am?" (Matthew 16:15) and "Do you love me?" (John 21:17) Looking back on my week of questions, regretfully these were never asked. Ultimately the most important questions we should ask are about a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. It is the only question where the answer has eternal significance. Jesus asked Peter the first question, "Who do you say I am?" and Peter's response tells us volumes about his faith and his future. Peter answered, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God." Peter had no doubt who Jesus was, where He came from and why He came to the world. Then Jesus' response was, "Blessed are you . . . . " Jesus went further than just blessing Peter, He told Peter his purpose was to be used of God to build His church. When a person can answer this question like Peter did, then you know that they will be blessed of God and will have a God-given purpose to fulfill.
The second important question Jesus asked was, "Do you love me?" and it too was directed to Peter. He did not just ask this question once, but three times. We as humans are fickle and often times our love is driven by emotions rather than commitment. Jesus wanted to know Peter's commitment level and Peter assured Him of his love by saying, "Lord, you know all things, you know that I love you." The awesome thing about Jesus is that He is the all knowing God. He knows our hearts and doesn't need to ask the question for Himself, but He asks us this question so that we will have hearts that are humble and broken before him. You see, we struggle with commitment and loving for the long haul. Ask your heart often, do I truly know Jesus and do I love Him with a completely committed heart? Ask others often as well if they know who Jesus is and if they know Him do they love him? Then you will no longer be doing guess work, but you will know for certain who they are and who they are committed to.
Let's keep asking the most important questions of ourselves and of others. My prayer for you today is that you know Jesus and that your love for Him is growing deeper each day.
"And this is my prayer: that your love may abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight, so that you may be able to discern what is best and may be pure and blameless until the day of Christ, filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ - to the glory and praise of God." Philippians 1:9-11
Praising God for the answers!
Nancy
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