If you have spent more than 3 minutes with a toddler, then you know how it is to have an insane amount of questions flung at you in rapid succession. It feels as if you’re being shot with a fully automatic water pistol— almost takes your breath away. I may still be a toddler. It’s my habit to ask questions in that speed of succession of God. I think He enjoys it. There must be a constant communication between He and I anyway, I figure He wants me to ask and He wants to answer. After all, why give us the Bible? Why introduce yourself as an angel? Why send us prophets, kings, priests, apostles, missionaries, and pastors to tell us what you want? You see, I have a lot of questions, even about my questions.
There needs to be a distinction made between questions and questioning. Obviously, we shouldn’t question God’s motives or direction. But He clearly said He wants to “reason” with us— “Come now, and let us reason together, saith the Lord: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool.” (Isaiah 1.18). God wants to talk with us. He wants to reason with us. He wants us to come to Him and talk about it. In fact, because of His saving grace, we have access in a whole new way… “Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need.” (Hebrews 4.16). We can now come boldly! He wants to hear from us.
Have you noticed that many of our questions tend toward ‘why’ more than anything else. Deuteronomy 29.29 has the answer for that— “The secret things belong unto the Lord our God: but those things which are revealed belong unto us and to our children for ever, that we may do all the words of this law.” I admit that some of my ‘why’ questions are a little above our pay-grade. The answer may be beyond my ability to comprehend.
Notice the phrase— “secret things”. I think it’s awesome that God keeps secrets. That’s ok with me… He owes me nothing! This is true except when I want to know why something happened or didn’t happen. Isn’t it interesting that we are ok with God being God until we want Him to be an answer-man. Disciple— admit to yourself that you are finite and God is infinite. When you get a ‘wait’ or a ‘not yet’ from God, how do you respond? Do you settle in the weight of His infinite nature, or do you get more anxious and dissatisfied with His responses? I am confident with the fact He loves me. He loves me enough to die for me. He wants to talk to me. He wants that bad enough that He told me to come boldly before His throne in prayer. He wants a deeper relationship with me. He wants this enough to confront me and allow issues in my life that require me to turn to Him in prayer. I am ok with being finite. I am ok with feeling small, against the enormity of His majesty. After all, it’s not about me. But isn’t it just like us, to focus on what God has chosen not to tell us instead of being satisfied with everything He’s told us already—“the things that are revealed”? The things that really matter have already been revealed. Everything that matters we already know: 1) How we got here; 2) Where we’re going; 3) How it ends; 4) Who wins. Then why do we continue to ask the wrong questions? Four possibilities exist: 1) We just don’t like the answers; 2) We forget them because they are inconvenient at the time; 3) Satan blinds us in the moment and we forget; 4) We do not know them out of ignorance or laziness of study.
God is good (period). He has already given us all the vital information and encourages us to reach out to Him for the details not already laid out in scripture. These things already give us understanding and wisdom to live now. This is clear in the Proverbs: 3.13— “Happy is the man that findeth wisdom, and the man that getteth understanding.” But this is not found just anywhere. We search for it, diligently—“Through desire a man, having separated himself, seeketh and intermeddleth with all wisdom.” (Proverbs 18.1). Some folks cannot be told an answer. They cannot possibly hear it, no matter how you teach it. This is exemplified in Proverbs 9.8— “Reprove not a scorner, lest he hate thee: rebuke a wise man, and he will love thee.” Others see the information as a gift from God to our easily confused hearts. This helps us with more than just the information, but what it means and why— “Wisdom is the principal thing; therefore get wisdom: and with all thy getting get understanding.” (Proverbs 4.7)
We don’t have to know every Why when we know the Who that knows them all. We can make enough sense of a thing with the mass of information God has already given us in His Word of Truth. The question is “Why”. Why don’t we just simply obey what we have already been told? Or, why do I seek more than that necessary to know right now?
Disciple— Keep asking. Obey what you already know. Trust Him for the rest.