Testing the Answers

In reading Clyde Crews book, Ultimate Questions, I like his statement No one escapes questioning; and in good measure we are defined in life and even in death by the nature of our own personal response (3). I would go one step further and say that we cannot truly answer the question until we understand it.

I once chatted with someone suffering great emotional distress. As she talked, she made the statement, "They keep giving me tools. I don't want tools, I want answers." A chill ran down my spine because I knew, life isn't so much about answers as it is about living the questions. You can get a generic answer, but it will never satisfy your particular journey. In fact, I'll go so far as to maintain that until you make the question your own, no answer will ever fully satisfy.

Even then, answers that are particular to you will work only for a time. For as you change and grow, you will understand the question differently, and will need a better response.Of course, this will happen only if you are living the question! If you stay with general questions, you can accept and live by generic answers.

But if you are forever deepening your understanding of God, you will see life in different lights as you journey. Because as we come to know God better, we understand the questions differently.

So maybe the better statement is how well are you living the questions of life? Are you delving deeper into the mystery of being, of the why and the how? Are you willing to sit with your questions until your answers come?