Jesus Never Said...Don't Ask Questions

Hey, this is Laura, and today the ladies are talking about something that Jesus never said. To not ask questions. After this conversation, I'll be back for the Girl Talk group chat. So stick around for that. This is the Girl Talk podcast. Things Jesus never said. Hello there, you're listening to the Girl Talk podcast. My name is Carol. I'm Kelly. I'm Chisha. And we're so glad you've joined us. You ever have questions? Yes. Is it wrong to have questions? No. Is it? I'm asking the other question. That's what we're going to talk about. Did Jesus say, don't ask me questions. No. Tired about your question. I'm so glad he doesn't. I've had so many questions through the years. So that's where we're going to jump into during this episode. Jesus never said don't ask questions. And I know a lot of people want to hang out on the fact that they're like, well, truth is truth. You shouldn't question truth. And I don't necessarily think it's questioning truth. But in my mind, the only way your faith deepens is if you ask questions because that means you're digging and wrestling. I love this term wrestling. Anybody says wrestling. I automatically think of Kelly Brandon because she has to be a wrestler. No. She loves to use that term and wrestle with. So let's talk a little bit about what you mean when you say we really need to wrestle with that. So the process of wrestling with something is can best be summed up by asking why. And you start by and saying, so what? So you start by asking a question. And then you try to find the answer. And then you go, okay, well, so what? What does that matter? And then you take it a step deeper and you go, okay, well, so what? And then you keep asking so what or keep asking why as you go deeper, deeper, deeper, deeper deeper, deeper, until you feel like you've really got the heart of the answer, which also means that the wrestling piece of it can sometimes take you kind of in a circle or in the spiral or back to another spot and a kind of rounding, rounding, rounding again. So that's kind of what I mean when I say wrestle, it's like, I'm going to chew on something. I'm going to think about it. I'm going to think about it some more and then I'm going to go, okay, well, I'm going to think about that from a different angle. And then just keep kind of unpacking it. Yeah, yeah. I love that. And I love that as I thought about questions, I don't think, because I think a lot of people think questions are dangerous and I don't think questions are dangerous, but you have to be careful where you take your source of the answers that are dangerous. If you take your questions anywhere other than the Lord and the scripture, I think that can be dangerous. Because there is a world that definitely does not want us to believe in this book. There is a world that thinks that Jesus is probably a good guy, but not a savior, right? And nobody should tell you what to do. So when you live in that kind of society, you have to be careful where you take your questions too. And I think the whole concept of wrestling, for me, I have to first of all think, okay, this is where I'm going to take my questions. Because if I take my questions to the world, they're going to answer any number of things. They're theology of the moment and it's not going to get me to Jesus. So I love the concept of wrestling, but I think stepping back one step where you take your questions is very important, right? I think so. I also think that you mentioned you can take them to the world and the world's going to perhaps give you really, really bad answers. I think it's equally, well, not equally, it is not equally. It is also something we need to be cautious of when we take the questions, even to godly other people because as you started off the conversation, you said there are lots of people who will say, well, you shouldn't question truth. And I do think that as believers, we sometimes have a tendency to go stop questioning. Don't ask. Just believe it. Yeah, faith, it's just faith, you just need to trust it, yes, just trust and move on and stop asking questions. And so it's it's also very important that you are very discerning when you take your questions to a pastor to another godly believer, even somebody that you really trust and appreciate. You have to do that bathed in prayer, bathed in your own time in the word and your own actual wrestling and studying God's word and not just being spoon-fed answers. Talk about spoon-fed answers. One of the things that I find so valuable about questions is how you learn. So I was thinking about, I was not a very good student, there were certain years, so I just wasn't good at all, but I would memorize what I needed to know to pass the test. Yeah. I would maybe read the same notes version of a book or whatever. Yeah, or spark notes for those who are younger, all of the things, but I would just I would know the right answer, but that really wasn't the question, right? And when you study something, you learn so much more about it than just the fill in the blank answer. That's so good. And I feel like that's what wrestling is to me. It's a process, not a point, so good. Yeah. I think filling in the blank is getting to the point, but wrestling with something is paying more attention to the process, learning it for yourself, too. Yeah. Well, and that's exactly the model that Jesus had for us. He asked over 300 questions in scripture, just in the four gospels. He's quoted as asking 300 different questions and only directly, I mean, sorry, somebody asking him 300 questions and he only directly answered like 10, maybe less than that because he wanted them to really wrestle with the answer, so things like, you know, do you love me? And, um, well, and then, anyway, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, where are you? And he knew the answer to the question, right? But he wanted his disciples. He wanted Adam and Eve. He wanted people. He wants us to go, well, okay, I'm going to wrestle with that. Thank you for asking me that question. I'm going to wrestle with it. And the same thing, you know, when, um, when we asked Jesus questions, you know, he didn't, he doesn't answer them directly. He says, I want you to think about that. Yeah. And I think it's important we go back in touch on that because not all of the questions that you have will have answers. And you've got to be comfortable with not knowing the answer. One of the biggest questions I think that everybody asks, if you live long enough is why? Oh. You know, you go through a difficult time and you want to know why. Yes. You're walking through a really dark time with a friend of mine a couple of years back. And um, she said, I just want to know why. And I said, even if you knew why, would that be enough for the tragedy you've just lived three? And we went, we had, we had a time where we talked through that, you know, because no, no, um, answer to whatever tragedy it is you're in is going to suffice for the tragedy, right? You're always going to think that you know better, right? But we don't know the total picture. We don't know God's heart. We don't, well, we know his heart, but we don't know what he thinks and how he works. And that is okay not to know that because I think there are some questions that will never get answered this side of eternity, right? Um, but I think the wrestling part, the process part is where you grow and in depth. I love the analogy that you gave about learning, learning a subject in school when you really study or when you just remember as things for a test, if they answer a key or whatever. But I would like to camp out a little bit on that question of why, because I do think that we all ask that question. And I might have been me you were talking about, well, I remember when my mom died and I asked that question, why, why, why, why, why, why her, why me, why, why, why, and I did grief share, which was a Bible study on grief and it said that same thing. And I remember you guys supporting me in that and saying things like that, but it is true. We may never, likely, will never get the answer to why and even if we did, it wouldn't satisfy us because so much of what we experience is from our perspective where God is looking at the 3000, more than that foot view, where it's not just me that's being affected. It's her and them and them and then the community and the people that will hear about it and who knows, however many people, but we can't, it's so hard to divorce ourselves from our own personal perspective. And that's why why matters like why explain it to me about me, but the answer is oftentimes so much bigger than just us. But we still want to know and here's the thing, this morning I was crying out to God about a why question wasn't as big or as deep as that, but you know, there are hard things that we go through even on every day, where we want to know why, why, why did this happen? Why did this, and God is so gracious to allow us to ask those questions and I'll say one other thing that I learned from grief share, when we ask God why it is truly a sign of faith because we're going to the person we think has control. That's so good. Let's say you go to the store and something happens that didn't work out well, who are you going to go to? It's a manager because you know they're the ones who can help you. So when we go to God with our wise, it's because we believe he's the one who can help us. So why is an act of faith? That's good. That is really good. That's really good. Why when you ask God why? It's an act of faith. That's so good. That's so good. Questions are so tricky because they can lead to doubt. Let's talk about doubt for a minute. There is a lot of public deconstruction going on. Yeah. And I'll say this about what I have seen at least. And once again, my perspective is very limited. But what I've seen is some of the deconstruction is not so much renouncing fate. It is breaking apart some of the customs and the things that we've done in Christian culture and getting back to what the Bible says, which I think is healthy. Yeah, amen. I think we, from time to time, maybe all need to do that in terms of making sure we're living by the book, right? There is a kind of deconstruction that goes the opposite direction where they just tear apart everything about Christianity and say, none of it's true. And I'm renouncing my fate. That's a whole different thing. But I think we do have to, from time to time, kind of examine what one really, really funny one was. I grew up in a Southern Baptist church with a choir and the hymnals and the pews and all that. I now go to a church, it doesn't have a choir. We don't sing out of hymnals. We don't have pews. And our church doesn't look like a church. It's just a big metal building, right? And I remember having a conversation with my parents. They could not get over the fact that we didn't have a choir. They were like, you don't have a choir. We just get all those things in our head and they become barriers to our faith instead of really understanding why we are there and what we're there to do. - Tradition. Traditions, yes. - Yes, vividly remember a time when, when I have wrestled for a long time about how God calls women to be used in church, be used in ministry, what this is real calling on the lives of women, we could do a whole podcast on that. - We made a whole series of podcast on that. - But I remember one specific instance where I went to our pastor at our church and with a whole series of questions like, - Yeah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. All these things can women do this, can women do this, can women do this and one of the things I asked because every single Sunday it bothered me. I said, hey, how come we don't let women pass the offering plate? Because all the people that were passing the offering plate were always men, like it was always men. There was never a woman. And I'd been part of this church for a long time. And I was like, this is so sexist. It's only that the men passed the offering plate. And it did. My pastor actually went, well, I don't, I don't know, it's just what we do. Maybe we should stop. There's nothing biblical about only having men pass the offering plate. So that's a good suggestion. So it was one place where I actually felt like I was heard, which was lovely. But it was also one of those things that I could have let that continue to eat me alive instead of asking the question. And the answer was church tradition. And so if we are bold enough to ask the questions and ask the questions in healthy ways and in safe environments. Safe environments. Yeah. Why do you think people are nervous to ask questions? What do you think is behind that? Well, it could be that they fear being judged, OK? Like if I ask this question, you're going to think less of me or you're going to think I'm not a strong Christian, you're going to make a judgment on me or I look stupid. And I also conversely think that sometimes questions are discouraged maybe because they're threatening. Yes. I mean, maybe that-- I don't know. But that's the rest of my story. Let me just feed you these spirits. Loved this up so I can get it out of the park. Actually the rest of my-- the whole rest of the story. But the second half of my story with asking this particular pastor all these questions, it was intimidating to him because of the questions I was asking. And so I think he wrestled with some insecurity himself, young guy. And so his solution was to create an environment that was even more intimidating to me. He brought all the elders together. And he was like, OK, I'm going to-- Kelly, I'm going to ask you to sit in front of all the elders and ask all of the elders these questions so that we can all speak into your answers. But it was a super stressful, intimidating environment where if I had been as strong as I am in my faith or as strong as I am, just stubborn and general, I would have literally broken into a million pieces. Oh, sure. Because I felt like breaking into a million pieces. It was so threatening and intimidating. And so I think that's another reason why we don't ask questions is because it can sometimes be a very unhealthy environment that you're asking the questions in, which can make you-- Yeah, it causes problems. It causes all problems. I heard this, a leader that won't allow questions will always do questionable things. No, yeah, that's a great quote. Yeah, John A. Cup said that. Yeah, OK. Yeah. And I think it's true. But I think that church by and large-- and I'm talking about the Big C church, not my church or your church. I'm talking about overall the church hasn't been a place where questions have been welcomed. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And yeah, and that just makes you wonder, why are you not sure on the answers? Right, right. Or can we all live in the space where we don't know all the answers? Right, yes, yes. And a God that can be easily explained and understood isn't big enough for us all. He's so much bigger than we can explain. And I want us to create, as believers, create an environment where people are feel safe to come with their questions. Where we lean in and go, I don't know the answer to that. But I would love to explore it with you. Let's sit down together and let's open up the word. And let's see what we can do, even if we do know the answer. Even if we're like, oh, yeah, that's a hard no. Or that's a hard yes. That it's a I would love to explore that with you. Let's wrestle with it and see what God's word says. And if we had created, if my church had created that kind of environment, had, you know, if we as believers created that kind of environment, that would, everything that things would be so much different. Right. I think more people would feel free to come to church. Yes, because a lot of people are like, well, I can't come because I don't know all the answers. I don't believe all the things. I don't know what I believe. I'm not sure where I am. So I'm just going to stay away. I'm thinking of the passage in Mark 9. I even had a mark where Jesus has the interaction and he wants to heal the sun. He said, do you believe? And he says, I believe, help me. I believe. That's probably one of my favorite verses in the Bible because of its honesty. I don't know. You know, and we can go to Jesus and say, I believe, help my unbelief. And we see there that Jesus is OK. If we don't have all the answers, here's a thing. I get so frustrated because I think that what happens is we don't speak the questions out loud. We don't wrestle with the things. And we end up church hopping. And we just take those old wounds and those questions to another place. And then we get-- and we never get resolution. We never kind of come to the end of ourselves and understand that Jesus is doing something in us. And he wants to help us work that through. And we just go to all the places without-- And you know, you don't get passports over here. Yeah. You don't get passport stamps for your churches you've been to, you know? Some people have because it's like playing yourself somewhere and serve and do the things, you know? I think, yes, and sometimes people just give up on church. And they just like, forget, I'm not going there. I'm going to show it. I'm not going to go there. I mean, I think Barna research shows that even after COVID, we've struggled to get people to come back to church. Because people got so used to not coming. And by and large, I think it's because they see people who go to church who-- Jesus is not working for them. So why should they waste another hour on a Sunday when they could be watching the NFL games or whatever? You know what I'm saying? And they don't see any difference in our lives. They don't see us living out our faith, or they don't see us being honest. Oh, for sure. They see fakeness. For sure. For sure. Yeah. And I also think, too, that they see churches like what I described where it's an environment of just-- or where you started even with the-- it's don't question truth. You know, I'm going to stand up here in the pulpit. And I'm just going to feed you truth. And you don't need to question me. You don't need to question the word. You just need to take it. And that's not what people want. You know, that's not-- I mean, maybe what some people want. But that's not how we grow. And so if you are just going to church and not growing, then what are you doing there? Like what's-- it's not sustainable. It's not just a place to go and sit for an hour. We have so many other things that can feed us in different ways to be fed, different communities to be a part of, that if our churches are not helping us grow and helping really disciple us, then what's the church for? Yeah. So I think they're finding churches. The ones that are-- there are lots of churches that are growing by leaps and bounds. And I think it's those churches that aren't afraid. to let you ask questions that aren't afraid of the discipleship process and the sanctification process. They embrace it and say, come and let's wrestle. - Let's wrestle. - Yeah. - It's the wrestling churches that survive. It's the, I don't want to be a wrestling Baptist church. - I like it. So we were at an event one time and this guy walks up to me and we start carrying on this conversation. He starts giving me his testimony, tell me kind of what the Lord had brought him through. And he said, I went to a church because they were having a class called, it was something like, I probably won't get the name right, but if you're skeptical about the Bible at a church and he was like, sign me up for that. And the person leading the class walked through the basics of becoming a Christian and what it meant. And he was like, someone finally explained it to me. And he said, before I had only seen preachers on the street corner yelling at me and I didn't know what they were telling you, just told me I was going to hell. That was the only thing, right? And he said, but if somebody was finally honest enough to say, hey, if you're skeptical about the Bible, if you don't believe in Jesus, come and let's talk about it. And he said it was there that we sat across from believers who weren't trained theologians. They were just ordinary laypeople and they sat across the table with us and were so comfortable with our questions. And he came to know Christ through that class. And I just was so, like, my mind was so captivated by that I was like, wouldn't it be awesome if we could all hold a class like that and say, if you don't look like us, if you don't think like us, if you don't act like us, come. Yeah, yeah, yeah. What's so powerful about that is it is acknowledging that we don't have the answers, for sure, you know? And so we ask the questions acknowledging that we don't have the answers knowing that we take our questions to the one who does. And so when you are allowing questions and acknowledging that you don't have the answers, that's where God speaks to people individually, like your friend, like who you just mentioned. Because he's gonna do the work, we can't do the work, I can't figure it out for anybody else other than me, but when God speaks to us, right. And he doesn't, we don't have to have all the answers. So I love that, 'cause that's the pure acknowledgement about God's goodness. You know, our friend Chase, who used to be a youth pastor, used to do this with his youth. He actually would have them every Sunday night, or Wednesday night, or whenever they met. He would have them write down questions that they had. Questions about faith, questions about the Bible, questions about the intersection of Bible and reality. I mean, Bible and current modern life, yeah. And they were all anonymous. So you didn't resonate, you didn't put your name down. Everybody would put their questions in a big ol' hat. He would take them home and he would read them. And then the next Sunday, they would wrestle with one of those questions. So he would answer the question, using scripture, he would have them look up scripture, he would just have them wrestle together. It was so healthy, because they asked, because it was anonymous, they asked big questions. And I can remember him saying yes, multiple times. You know, that's not an easy answer in that. Let's figure that out together. And the youth of today, they're not interested in faith. They want real truth, they want answers. They're not interested in playing the games. Yeah, this morning I was listening to a devotion that I listened to sometimes on the way to work. And they were talking about Mother Teresa. And they uncovered some of her journals. And she said, people think I am such a great woman of faith. And she said, the amount of doubt I struggle with is people would be astonished. And I was like, you know, somebody that we kind of hold at doing good things. And you know, somebody that has great faith, you look at them and think they had doubts, you know. I think that the healthy thing is to doubt and to take those doubts to God. I believe, help my unbelief. Well, I'm thinking about Billy Graham. Yeah, yeah. There was a crisis of faith in his life. And I didn't know about it until we were here. And he graduated to heaven. And we sort of were digging into certain parts of his life. And hearing about the time where he was like, I don't know about this Bible thing. Like what? Like, am I going to believe this? Or am I not going to believe it? And he took the questions to God in the middle of the woods. Y'all know the story, but I was amazed to hear that. And he took the question to God. And then he decided to believe that the Bible is true 100%. And that was it. And his life took on the trajectory. Then God started to use him even more powerfully. And you know, the end of the story. I mean, people he touched. But taking the question to God, it's still touching, taking the questions to God. And then there becomes a point where you do ask God to help you run belief. And he does. That's right. That's right. Great discussion today. Hey, if you have questions, don't email us because we don't know. We're still with you. We will. We would love to do that. And just know that doubt and questioning is not a bad thing. Don't feel guilty about that. But where you take your questions is important. Take him to scripture. Take him to God. Take him to a trusted godly counselor. A trusted godly pastor. Somebody who believes in the word of the inherent word of God and will point you to Jesus. That is what we want for you. Because that's why we do the girl talk podcast. So if you're listening to this today, or maybe somebody sent you this podcast and you're like, I don't know if I believe all that Jesus stuff. Hey, if you'd like to read it for yourself, not my words, actually the Bible's words, you can text the word Jesus. Just the word Jesus, nothing else, to 81891. We'll send you the gospel so you can read it for yourself and decide if it's true or not. It is true. I'll just go ahead and spoil or alert. I'll tell you, it is true. And he loves you and he has a plan for your life and nothing would tickle us more than to be able to share that with you today. So text Jesus to 81891. You're welcome to get in touch. Girl talk at the lightfm.org. We'd love to hear from you. And just know we'd love you. We want you to grow in your relationship with Jesus. And we'll save you a seat next time we gather around these microphones for the next Girl Talk podcast. Lovely. It's time for the Girl Talk group chat. For those of you watching live on our Girl Talk Facebook page, now's the time for you to drop more questions in the comments. We'll get to those. Any thoughts that you have, Blanca, you are a fire and off girl. And I think you just need to join the Girl Talk team. Come on, come on. I love it. But if you have any questions, you can always text talk to 81891. And we let you know the next time that we're going live so that you can be part of the Girl Talk group chat. And then always make sure that you like and subscribe on the Girl Talk podcast on our YouTube or just sign up for our texts and find us there. But let's start this Girl Talk group chat now. Let's go. Some great interaction. And hold on, I can see myself on the screen, and that's terrible. Oh, no. OK, so we had some awesome engagement. And Kathy asked this. And I think you kind of hit it with Mark 924, where you said that the Centurion said, Lord, help my unbelief. But she said, is it OK to ask the Lord to help you believe more? Oh, yeah. So yeah, I just want to echo that. Yes, right? Yes. Well, it's Hebrews, isn't it? Without faith, it's impossible to please God. Where does faith come from? God. So yes, it is awesome to add. I've always heard it say, we have as much faith as we want. And we can ask God for more. But unbelief is real. And there are times that I have struggled with unbelief in my own life and to ask God for more faith. Yes, absolutely, because he's working on our hearts. So I believe that is the-- I think that's where we all want to be. Not actually. I think that's how you grow. Yeah. Yeah, I do too. And I think that's actually the model that Jesus had for us was constantly working with the disciples to help increase their faith and their belief. And so yes, not only do I think that asking the Lord to help you believe more is wise. I think it's also mandated in Scripture, because he wants us to grow our faith. He mentions, if you have faith a mustard seed, you can move mountains. Well, a mustard seed grows into something bigger. It doesn't stay a mustard seed. And so you've got to continue to grow that faith and grow that belief. And so that's what the Lord wants us to do. He wants us to continue to grow that and asking him is how we do it. I think so. I've been listening to the Bible project a lot, and they talk about how the Bible is meditation literature. That's just how it was written. So it's written for you to think about and keep meditating on and going back to, and that it's not actually a rule book. If it was a rule book, you wouldn't need a relationship, right? Yeah. Like, if you just have a rest of the rules, then you know what you're doing all the time, and you can come back to that. And it's like, okay, if you break the rule, then you're wrong. But because it's meditation literature, the Lord wants you to ask him and to come to him and just somebody, a lady brought up the verse that says, "Ask, seek, not." Yeah. Like, the Lord wants us to keep coming back to him because he's our father. And he wants us to have that relationship with him. Meditate on it day and night. I heard the Bible describe like an onion. All the layers. So many layers. And you may have one layer a day, but tomorrow might be another layer, and you dig in and you dig in, but you've got to keep going, right? And you'll never run out of layers. No, unlike an onion. (laughing) It might make you cry. Black onion. The best or fried. That's right. Mm. Doesn't apply to a sticker over here. (laughing) Went off track. Yeah. Sorry. Joyce said, "Do you think we're afraid?" to ask questions because we're taught not to question authority she said she's from an older generation and she said that's what we're taught and she said that she does think that today's generation is a little bit better at asking the questions but do you think it can be kind of a generational thing? I mean I would say yes because I think there's a difference in questioning your faith and questioning authority. I think questioning authority is I always think of myself like a teacher. I like if a teacher telling me to do an assignment. I'm not doing that assignment. That's questioning authority, right? Questioning your faith is looking at what it is that you believe in asking God a question. You're not questioning his authority. You're questioning something in your faith that you're struggling with. Does that make sense? But I do think it's a generational thing. I do think very much so. My parents' generation you just sit down and be quiet and do be a good girl you know told yeah do what you're told absolutely so I think it can be a generational thing for sure. Yeah. I think it's really healthy though to question authority. I think I love what this this new generation you know of you know that's a younger generation is doing that they that the questioning of authority to say hey is that really the best way to do this or is that really though is that really right? Is that really true? I think it's really it's really healthy. It's really really healthy. Yeah. What's interesting? Joyce's questions got me thinking you know when you're young you you really don't ask as many I mean you ask a lot of questions but the questions are minor. You are supposed to follow your your parents what they say to be safe and all that as you get older you get a little more mature your questions change. I feel like maybe as we grow our questions change. That's true. That's good. Maybe the more mature your faith. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Maybe that's a way of thinking about that. So I do like the childlike faith version of yeah I'm going to twist scripture here for just a minute just a minute since we're officially done with the podcast and only just doing the love Q and A. God said Jesus says for us to come to him like a child and you know the scripture is actually talking about being meek and humble and not arrogant and things like that but you know what do children do children go wow wow wow wow wow wow wow wow all the time over and over and over again if you've ever had a child you know that they never stop asking why and so you know there's some beautiful things in that too purity and innocence and saying I don't understand help me understand and so you know let's just let's take scripture and interpret that way too and say Jesus wants us to come to him and so why why why why why why so let's question all what's this God why I didn't think Carol brought up something earlier that made me think of I don't know what you said but maybe it reminded me of Jesus keep God you're over there no but John the Baptist right he was the forerunner for Jesus right he knew that Jesus was the Messiah he baptized Jesus and then he was thrown into prison and beaten yeah and he sent word through his disciples to Jesus and said are you are you the one and so he had this crisis of faith yeah John the Baptist knew since before he was born in the womb he leaped for joy when Jesus came in the room that's right so he knew that Jesus was this Messiah so I think we as believers can have very real doubts of weight like are you who you say you are and Jesus said hey the lame are leaping or maybe that's the twelve days of Christmas good the here I'm choice in scripture but you said basically you have seen the things that I've done yes that speaks for what I've done so I think that's the same for us like Jesus can speak into our doubts and say hey you've seen what I've done right yeah I'm the one right and that just speaks to the graciousness of God to allow our questions at any time in our lives yes goodness yeah it just speaks to the fact that he is a good leader because he can be questioned and still holds up yep so great questions we're going to wrap this up this episode of the Girl Talk on our channel thank you bye bye you see you see you see you next time.