Right Answer to the Wrong Questions

I know now, Lord, why you utter no answer.

You are yourself the answer.

Before your face questions die away.

What other answer would suffice?                      

~ C.S. Lewis ~

In one of his books, Lewis uses the following question as an illustration of nonsensical questions:

 

            Is yellow round or square?

 

He then states that nonsense is still nonsense, whether we ask it of one another or of God.  However, the questions we often pose to the Almighty, whether or not we ever actually voice them, seem logical and even critical to us.

 

When will this be better ... or over?

 

Why me or my family?

 

How could they?

 

Such questions, carried on the heart, not only seem sensible, but we sometimes wonder, how can a loving God not give us a reply?

 

As Lewis points out in today's quote, He has provided us with an answer - Himself. 

 

When we ponder the tough issues of life, we want a step-by-step explanation from God as to the how and why of our dilemma.  Instead, He introduces us to the I Am of the Way.

 

Early Christian were often known simply as "the people of the Way."  Not the people with all the answers, nor the ones with no unanswered questions, and certainly not the people without any problems, but rather the people who followed Someone who did know the way they were going, and knew how to get them to their ultimate destination.

 

I don't know about you, but when I ask someone what time it is, I don't want them to tell me how to build a clock.  Nevertheless, we want the exact opposite from God.  He keeps trying to tell us what time it is, "look, the fields are white to harvest, the laborers are few, ..the time is coming when no man can work...".

 

But we want him to tell us how to build a "clockwork" life, with finances that never get tangled, relationships that never do either, and opportunities that abound among which we may freely choose.

 

Of course, he has given us some wonderful guidelines in His Word.  And when we apply them consistently we do experience fewer tangled messes in our lives.  But sometimes, when we forget that He alone is the answer to all our questions, we are in the same silly boat as my five year old once was when he asked me, "Mom, what's above the sky?"  When I explained a bit about the atmosphere, and then the spiritual place beyond that called heaven, I told him that he might think of the sky as the floor of heaven.

 

He got an impish grin and then said, "Well, wouldn't it be funny if I poked a hole in the sky with my light-saber, and God and all his angels fell right through?"

 

I laughed and and replied, "It doesn't work that way."  When we get frustrated and are tempted to demand an answer from God, I suspect our Father is smiling, shaking his head and saying, "It doesn't work that way."

 

There is an old song,  that says "It will be worth it all, when we see Jesus. ... One glimpse of his dear face, all sorrows will erase, so gladly run the race, 'till we see Him.

 

His silence is not indifference to our questions.  It is God declining to repeat Himself, as He has already given the answer.  His name is Jesus.