Pastor's Corner: Look for questions, not answers

Midway through writing my last sermon, I took a little break as I am wont to do and checked my Facebook.

Perhaps not a great habit but sometimes the mind can only remain focused for so long.

As I scrolled my news feed, I came across a meme with the quote: “We are closer to God when we are asking questions than when we think we have the answers.”

I liked it. I shared it. Then I went back to completing my message for Sunday’s worship.

Now, evidently, the message of the meme continued to resonate with me because I wound up with a lot more questions for my congregations in the latter half of the sermon.

It seemed to fit quite well with the lesson of Jesus’ healing of a demon-possessed man in Gentile country. It concludes with Jesus’ acquiescence to the locals’ demand for him to leave, thus leaving the healed man behind to tell his story. The scene raises many questions and digging into the history and context surrounding the passage potentially raises more of them than answers.

As people of faith, we are too often bothered by this phenomenon. Many look to the Scripture for “the answer.” We sometimes want the text to just tell us what to so so we can do it and fix what ails us.

I suppose it works that way sometimes. I know sometimes we attempt to make it work that way and perhaps even have success with that approach … for a while. Yet I don’t think that’s the way the Bible is meant to be used.

It is supposed to make us question, to intrigue us, to inspire us to go deeper into relationship with God. To pray, asking God what these words recorded thousands of years ago mean for us today. Wondering how we can apply them to our lives in a very different world than the one God’s messengers of yore lived in.

There are times when this task is simpler than it is in others. Technology changes, cultural norms change, laws and governance change … but I am not sure that human nature changes all that much. Sin is still pervasive. People often want what — they think — is best for themselves and treat life as a zero-sum game. One in which to feel better and happier, to acquire more power and success, they must ignore the needs and wants of the people living around them and the creation with which God has entrusted them.

There is a reason we can tell these stories for thousands of years and they still resonate with us. Sometimes we get it wrong and we miss the point as it goes sailing over our heads. Yet we get the opportunity to come back to it, to reflect and learn from our mistakes.

The initial message that got me thinking along these lines last week came from, as I mentioned, a simple quote floating around on social media. A dangerous thing in this day and age. Though not too long ago, the same phenomenon essentially existed in the form of bumper stickers, I would argue.

I decided to check its origins and authenticity. It apparently came from Abraham Joshua Heschel (1907-1972), a Polish-American rabbi and theologian. I had never heard his name before, but he apparently had a remarkable career, escaping Poland just before the Nazi invasion (whereas, sadly, his mother and sisters did not) and developing important relationships with theologians from other strains of Judaism, Catholics and Martin Luther King, Jr. My gratitude goes out to the late Rabbi Heschel for the inspiration.

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The Rev. Sean Janssen is pastor of Messiah Lutheran Church, Havre, and Christ Lutheran Church, Big Sandy