Asking The Wrong Questions

Monday was cold and raining. I cycled to our Men’s Shed and got soaked. Something was odd… things looked different. ‘Are you OK?’ asked John.

‘I think so,’ I said; I knew things weren’t quite right. I asked myself, ‘Are you OK?’

John and I had both asked the wrong question. The question should have been, ‘Where are your glasses?’ I started to look for them… If I’d had my glasses I could find them… I’d knocked them off when I pulled on my coat-hood outside our front door!  

The new Lowestoft beach huts are front page new in our Lowestoft Journal again this week. The design of the 72 beach huts, opened last summer, has divided local opinion. Some saw them as ‘beautiful’, ‘bold and truly unique’; Others thought they are ‘hideous’, and ‘too modern’.

It turns out that the question isn’t ‘Do we like them?’ but ‘Does anyone want them?’ Only 10 have been sold and a few have been rented. The headline read ‘Majority of new £2.6m beach huts ‘sat empty’. We’ve been asking the wrong question.

The New Zealand Prime Minister, Jacinda Ardern resigned this week. Previously the question may have been ‘Can she do the job?’ or Is she the best person for the job?’ For Jacinda Arden now that’s the wrong question.

Saying that she no longer had ‘enough in the tank’ she’s now asking ‘Can I still do the job?’ or ‘With my personal and family circumstances, do I still want the job?’

Reading again the stories of Adam, Eve, Noah, Abraham, Joseph, Moses… Often ‘Are they true?’ is the wrong question. The better questions are ‘What truth do they contain? What can I learn from them?’

Too often Christians ask the wrong questions, or provide the answers to questions that nobody is asking. We need the insight and honesty to ask the right questions – even if they are difficult – and answer them with humility and integrity. I think that’s what Jesus did.