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The Right Question at the Right Time
The Lenten texts this season are centered around conversations with Jesus, and those conversations are filled with questions.
“How can anyone be born after having grown old?”
“How can these things be?”
“Are you a teacher of Israel, and yet you do not understand these things?”
“Where do you get this living water?”
“Do you believe in the Son of Man?”
“Where have you laid him?”
“Did I not tell you that if you believed, you would see the glory of God?”
You will notice these questions (and many more) in Jesus’ conversations with Nicodemus, with the woman of Samaria, with the man born blind, and with Mary and Martha at the death of their brother Lazarus. Read these stories again and notice how often Jesus asks questions of his conversation partners and how often his conversation partners ask questions of him. There are no “dumb” questions here, nor questions that get the conversation off track. Rather, the questions often lead to more questions, questions that propel and deepen the conversations.
For me, “the right question at the right time” has been the voice of a call forward, an energizing catalyst that leads into the future. Sometimes the questions have caused me to stop and take stock. I’ve recalled and pondered life-shaping events and persons and given thanks for the journey into which they have propelled me. Over the last couple of years my sister and I have been writing down some of our family stories. We’ve laughed and cried, remembered and celebrated, wondered and questioned. In retelling and reliving those childish and puzzling and hilarious memories, we have “told our story back to ourselves” in ways that help us know who we are.
At other times the questions have sent me into deep investigations and study to discover new ways of understanding. Dan will tell you that early in our marriage I swore I would never go back to school. I was done with studying! But then life posed more questions: “Why is the church the way it is?” “Why is the culture the way it is?” “Why do we teach the way we do?” “Why do we worship the way we do?” So I went back to school. I learned some of the background and circumstances that shape culture and the church’s place in it, which brought me to a deeper faith.
Perhaps one of the most energizing questions is “What’s next?” “If God’s call includes our personal lives and histories, what’s next?” “If God’s call includes the church and its place in the culture, what’s next?” “If the church at worship is its most authentic expression of its life in God, what’s next?” “If the church is called to broaden the reach of life in God, what’s next?” “If Christians are called to be formed into the likeness of Christ and into the body of Christ, what’s next?”
It is my deep conviction that the purpose of the church is to give praise and glory to the Triune God. When we gather we sing and pray and lament and rage and give thanks and are bathed in God’s love. When we gather before God to feast in the presence of the Risen Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit, we are fulfilling God’s intention for all humankind.[1]
But that is not the end of the story. Out of our encounter with the living God come at least two tasks. We are called to both broaden and deepen the praise and glory given to God. We broaden humankind’s capacity to give thanks to God when we invite others into these acts of praise. And when they are too sick or sad or angry or unable to join that praise, we tend to them with compassion and love until they join in that praise. Likewise we are called to deepen humankind’s capacity to give praise to God as we ask more questions; as we pray and meditate; as we study scripture and the circumstances of the world; as we engage in deep explorations of all that puzzles us.
All of that leads to – guess what – more questions! And Lent is the perfect time to start asking them. It is my prayer that the lively questions that come to each of us, like those we find in Jesus’ conversations, will lead into the shared questions that bind us together into the body of Christ.
[1] “[Humankind’s] chief end is to glorify God, and to enjoy [God] forever.” The Westminster Shorter Catechism,” The Book of Confessions, Presbyterian Church (USA), 2007.
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