Faith can look like questioning

It’s ok to question.  I am a questioner, sometimes even an all-out skeptic. Last year, I attended a weekly study at a local church and my quizzical nature often set me apart from the other women. It’s not that they were following along blindly – they are studying and thinking about scripture – but I guess maybe they just have a gift of faith that I don’t have in the same measure.

When we studied the book of Judges, we discussed Judges chapter 9 where Abimalech gets a millstone dropped on his head. The chapter concluded with “And thus God repaid the wickedness that Abimalech had done…”

My reaction to this ending sentence shocked my group: “What?! That was it?!?! That’s all that happened to him? He just died? No torture? No long-drawn out, painfully slow death?” I mean, this was a man who had spent a lifetime tormenting and terrorizing others. He had burned towers full of people, mass murders of God’s beloved… and this was how God made him pay?

I like to think my response was natural – after all, isn’t this so often how we respond to injustice? “That’s it? He only got 6 months in prison? She only got a slap on the wrist?” I also know that my response was not optimally spiritual…

Of course, I understand that revenge is the Lord’s. He is ultimately the One offended and justice is His to determine.  But what bothered me most about this incident was how others looked at me – shocked, confused, offended even, by my audacity to question God.  As though maybe my belief wasn’t certain or my grasp on scripture lacking.

Here’s what I know: God can handle our questions, my questions, any questions.  He is not afraid or offended by my doubts.  In fact, this is how He made me! He made me to think deeply about all areas of life; to question, to analyze, to problem-solve, to seek answers, to seek truth. He made me to crave understanding.  And, what’s more – Jesus Himself was a questioner.

It is said that Jesus asked as many as 307 recorded questions. His first words in scripture are a question, “Why do you seek me?” He gets access to hearts by asking questions and reveals our true motives with His queries. He even questioned God, like David (Psalm 22:1) – in a heart-wrenching moment of human weakness: “My God, my God, why have You forsaken me?” Matt. 27:46.

Jeremiah 29:13 speaks one of God’s best promises to us, “You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. I will be found by you.”

Generally, when you are seeking something, you’re asking questions – Where is it? Have you seen it? What does it do? Who is he? How do I get it?

A good seeker asks, searches for information about the thing she needs or desires.  How can we seek God without asking questions? How can we find Him without asking, filtering the answers and considering them, and then developing more questions?  

The number one thing to remember is that we must take our questions to God Himself – the only One who can actually provide the answers. The second thing to remember is that we must be prepared to accept that His answers will always always humble us.

The best example, and most famous perhaps, is Job, who suffered the worst injustice of all – immense tragedy when he had done nothing wrong. He was a godly man, who strived to live his life according to God’s principles. And after all the unfaithfulness of the rest of the Israelites, you’d think God would be glad to have such a faithful man living for Him.  But then, He allows Job to be ruined in every way.

And, like we all would do, Job questions God:  

“Why was I even born? Why is this happening to me? What did I do to deserve this?”

I am so thankful the collaborators of scripture put this book in the Bible.  I am always astounded by what is in that Book…  I think about Peter – the stories he maybe otherwise wouldn’t have wanted shared: multiple denials of Christ, sinking in the sea at Jesus’ feet, being chastized by Jesus… and then Abraham and David – incredible men of God but we also hear about them being adulterers and liars. Moses, who, after everything God did to get them out of Egypt, could not cross over into the Promised Land… And Job. A man of integrity but willing to be fully raw and honest about how He didn’t understand why God was letting these awful things happen to him.  

God, as is fitting, humbles Job – and me.

“Where were you when I laid the foundations of the world?” Job 38:4.

For four chapters, God demonstrates just how much higher His thoughts and ways are above ours.  He offers perspective, once again setting straight that HE is God and not us. Our views of this life and this world are limited in so many ways. But, God is not angry with Job. He doesn’t turn Him away or yell at him for being skeptical and not simply accepting of his fate.  God answers! He gives Job understanding and reminds Job of His authority and His plan. Humbled, Job responds, “I spoke of things too great for me to understand….”  THEN {forgive me for thinking this might be the best part}, God rewards Job! God doesn’t punish Job for asking questions or doubting God’s goodness or wanting answers for the tragedies in his life.  No, God gives him back ten-fold all that Job had lost. Despite the endless misery and suffering he experienced, and despite his doubts, Job trusted that God would somehow redeem his life. And He did.  

Another famous doubter received a different kind of gift. Thomas, one of Jesus’s disciples couldn’t believe his friends’ accounts that Jesus had really risen from the grave: “Unless I see in His hands the mark of the nails and place my finger into the wounds, and place my hand into His side, I will never believe…” John 20:25. Thomas could not take Jesus’ resurrection at face value. He wanted to experience, to know, the answer for himself.  

Oh how I love that this is recorded in scripture for me, for us, forever! I would be standing there, right behind Thomas, saying, “Me too! Me too! Let me see for myself!”  And, oh, Jesus’s response should bring such peace and comfort to our skeptical hearts. His words are humbling, but He holds out His hands to Thomas.      

God doesn’t want us to follow Him blindly like unthinking, stupid little sheep who simply plod along behind the nearest leader.  No, He wants us to follow because we know and trust the voice of our Shepherd.

Jesus’s example and God’s promise encourage us that questions are ok and good and necessary and natural, and they are how we find God!  As long we take our questions to God and allow our hearts to be humbled, we will ALWAYS find Him – faithful, ready, and waiting to reward us with more of Himself.