A Virtual Question.
Good Morning Friends,
A friend once greeted me by saying, “Hi. How’s God treating you?” “Just fine,” I replied. Then he asked, “And how are you treating God?” That question challenged me and got me to thinking. The Sermon on Sunday made a similar point noting that if we have all the answers maybe we are asking the wrong questions. And this got me to thinking just what questions we should be asking. In business we ask Peter Drucker’s five questions: What is our Mission? Who is our Customer? What does the Customer Value? What are our Results? What is our Plan? But in life there is more to it than rational thought will guide us into experiencing. Maybe we could look for a question that opened a door of understanding of the heart, a relationship with a two-way alliance of the mundane and the profound. Here as God pours out love and mercies and we return love by glorifying God in our actions doors are opened and so to hearts. So what’s the most important question we can ask? Then it dawned on me we are already asking it — we all are — but most of us aren’t aware of it. It is that question that lives outside our conscious awareness but affects almost all of our behaviors coloring everything. …that is the question to ask. Oh, I assure you it is very real but interestingly the world calls it A Virtual Question.
Scripture: For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek; the same Lord is Lord of all and is generous to all who call on him. For, “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.” But how are they to call on one in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in one of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone to proclaim him? And how are they to proclaim him unless they are sent? As it is written, “How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news!” But not all have obeyed the good news; for Isaiah says, “Lord, who has believed our message?” So faith comes from what is heard, and what is heard comes through the word of Christ. But I ask, have they not heard? Indeed they have; for “Their voice has gone out to all the earth, and their words to the ends of the world.”
Romans 10:12-18 (NRSV)
Then the LORD answered Job from the whirlwind: “Who is this that questions my wisdom with such ignorant words? Brace yourself like a man, because I have some questions for you, and you must answer them. “Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth? Tell me, if you know so much. Who determined its dimensions and stretched out the surveying line? What supports its foundations, and who laid its cornerstone as the morning stars sang together and all the angels shouted for joy? “Who kept the sea inside its boundaries as it burst from the womb, and as I clothed it with clouds and wrapped it in thick darkness? For I locked it behind barred gates, limiting its shores. I said, ‘This far and no farther will you come. Here your proud waves must stop!’
Job 38:1-11 (NLT)
Message: It is hard to capture the virtual question about how God’s inner experience is shared in our unity with the divine. Words just do not capture the joy and shalom…and the amazing significance of the question about questions. Paul in the letter to the Romans asks a lot of questions about focus and power. Jesus asks a lot of questions too and many times the questions they asked were never meant to be answered. Teaching by asking questions was a standard rabbinic practice. You see life is not about the correct answers but the correct questions…a reflective accounting of our own hearts. It is here in the questions that we discover directly that we need to recommit ourselves with a heart of compassion to reach all people with the question that frees us. It is here that we discover that we live in a world of mixed up and messed up people who know little about God. It is here we too often ask the question of why Jesus and are immediately diverted into asking questions about how, when and where we can love in creative ways. It is here in the sharing of our encounter that we discover the surprisingly simple answer.
You see, our virtual questions shapes our experiences by helping us to receive something that is always available. If healthy it is a mystical question. And by mystical I mean something we receive of significance from God. It is very difficult to give you a clear idea because words do not convey the message. One has to become the word and then discover a new word that must remain unspoken. In virtual questions we discover something mystical that is profound and yet we are incapable of expressing it. It carries great authority and yet is indescribable or unutterable like the name of God. Here we experience both anguish and ecstasy, divine truth and skillful lies. Inarticulate though they remain the experience carries a revelation and illumination that has a powerful but fleeting affect. We are held in the curious grasp of the divine power with our own in abeyance but just for a moment.
Pray we rejoice in our commitment to the Lord Jesus and the cause of Christ in a way that increases our field of consciousness. Pray the questions we ask not undermine us but shape our brain, our habits, our actions and our life. Pray as we experience the mystical that we would ask what love in is simplest form would do next. Pray we are witnesses to the right questions being asked in us. Pray we take up the challenge of asking the right questions. Pray we entertain a child’s simple question. Pray we not turn away when the question is shocking. Pray we yearn for the questions that take us on a spiritual journey. Pray we not be fearful about asking the life changing questions about love. Pray the questions we confront prompt us to creativity and charity. Pray we discover what it is to be born again and again and again. Pray we discover the place of answers to life’s enduring questions about God and life. Pray that as mature Christians we wrestle honestly with the tough questions because we trust that God has the answers. Pray we enjoy the power of asking the question without the drive to find the answer. Pray we believe and receive.
Blessings,
John Lawson
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