Just giving answers is worse than listening to questions

[M generation’s pursuit of faith] 2

Translated by Lin Yu

what is the problem?

In the science fiction comedy novel series "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy," a supercomputer is built to "uncover the ultimate answers to life, the universe, and everything." Computers can calculate the answer, but the answer only creates more confusion because no one knows what the problem is.

▲The super computer in "Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" claims to be able to calculate the answer to life, but what is the question? (Image source: http://interactive.usc.edu/wp-content/uploads/2012/09/hitchHikersMap.jpg)

What Christians have pursued throughout the ages is to bring Jesus, the “answer”, to the world. We thought it would be a simple solution - preach the gospel, trust the Holy Spirit, believe it or not, it's as simple as adding water and melting it.

The problem is, the world is not that simple. The world is complex enough that our answers often appear inadequate. Many people (even most Christians) think so, and the answer is this: We have the truth revealed by God in the Bible, and we have the Holy Spirit. We have to ask: If this is the case, why is it so difficult to understand the brokenness and evil of this world?

Many friends, struggling with a host of unsolvable problems, have given their hearts to a God they find difficult to trust. One of them once sent me this email:

"I think if I really wanted to, I could still be a 'good' Christian and convince or train myself that God or Jesus is real and just follow them blindly. I really think I can do it if I want to. But One of the characteristics I like very much is that I don’t pretend to be someone who loves Jesus. I didn’t, and I still don’t feel the Holy Spirit.”

My heart aches for these friends whose God they are presented with is so far removed from their experience. When people question commonly accepted beliefs, they are either isolated or attacked. We should be more cautious and not take people seriously. Yes, the truth is true regardless of how we feel, but we should take our personal observations and experiences seriously.

If the explanations we come up with don’t fit with lived experience, instead of immediately blaming the other person’s life for what went wrong, we must be willing to examine our explanations and assumptions.

However, the answer friends often get is: "Just believe, don't ask!" or they are pushed to become something they reject in their hearts. They tell themselves what a Christian should look like, but they are troubled when they don't fit the image or pattern given to them.

What I want to tell you is the struggles that many of my friends face and the real reactions of Christians around them. This is the Christianity they experience.

Find the answer yourself

My friends and I grew up in the Internet generation. Previous generations had television, radio, books, and only a few sources of information. But when the Internet appeared and Google became a verb, everyone could become an "expert" on a certain topic in just a few minutes. For example, one of the side mirrors of my car was damaged in a snowstorm. I Googled "How to repair 1999 Toyota Camry side mirrors" and found a five-minute demonstration video on YouTube. I ordered the parts from Amazon and installed them myself. It's that simple.

The Internet allows everyone to gain access to knowledge and help when life presents challenges. Being a teacher or pastor no longer gives them authority over all the answers. No, our generation can question anything. Just as we can compare prices and check facts with just a phone and an Internet connection, we can challenge authority and so-called standard answers.

Since the digital generation has access to so much information, we pay more attention to the questions asked. This is not limited to science. With knowledge at our fingertips, we read about scandals, evil deeds, and about role models and pastors who betrayed everyone. Not only does God appear to be unscientific, but those who claim to know the truth also live lives contrary to their teachings.

I experienced a most painful moment in my life when a close friend "returned" his faith after graduating from college. He no longer believed in God. He also called me beforehand and asked me to read a book that questioned the inerrancy of the Bible. I remember thinking at the time: "Why should I deliberately question my faith? I don't have time to read these books. I am too busy "loving the world" to have time." How funny! I was so busy "loving the world" that I couldn't "love my friends" and listen to him well. That night's phone call and his decision not to believe in God were the epitome of a reversal of his faith.

I didn't try to understand, I was too busy to attend to his needs.

More questions than answers

I don’t have as many questions as my friends. The only purpose of going to college was to see people know Jesus, just to see "campus revival." The results of it? I have more questions than answers.

I want to see signs and wonders on campus, I want to see people become Christians, and I want to see many people pray that life-or-death decision. I memorize the "Roman Road", which is a method of evangelism composed of verses from the Book of Romans. I often imagine myself walking to a blind student and praying for her, and then her eyes are opened. I pictured in my mind the scene of all the students taking a step of faith and believing in Jesus after seeing this. I reasoned that all it would take was a miracle, right now! Everyone believes in the Lord.

But that didn't happen.

There was also a time when I prayed for many people who were sick. I remember praying for a sick friend during a winter retreat. He was not getting better. I once prayed for a friend who had a severe headache while the pastor was preaching. He felt better, but only after the preacher had finished. I also remember praying very, very hard for a boy with a dislocated leg bone and laying hands on him - to no avail. My dad and I once prayed in front of the parents of a girl who had cancer before she died a few years later.

Why doesn’t God take care of everything? He only had to perform a small miracle and many people would believe. However, He did not do this. Do I lack confidence? The longer I stay in college, the more disillusioned I become. The fervor I felt in high school and the first few years of college was gone, and I began to question the point of being a Christian. Is it just to lead people to believe in the Lord? After preaching the gospel to many people, I feel empty and confused about what life is all about.

When the God we believe in does not match what we see and hear, we begin to ask: Is God trustworthy? Authentic relationships require trust, and if we don’t trust God, who cares if He exists?

When someone you trust suddenly doesn't seem trustworthy, it's like reaching a fork in the road - keep fighting what you see, or give up.

My good friend is an MK (missionary kid), a missionary kid. When he was growing up, he wanted to serve God and glorify Him with his life. After a while, he began to question certain tenets of Christianity but could not find satisfactory answers. He said: "The deeper I think about it, the harder it becomes to accept what Christians believe as truth. I experience more and more cognitive dissonance in my head, but my heart desperately desires that Christianity is true, because it is the only truth I know. As a result, I realized: If Christianity isn't true, it can't be pretended to be true. So, I left."

He told his parents he no longer believed it and it was hard for them to accept. After some time, he mentioned going to visit his grandparents, and his parents told him, "That's fine, but remember, you can't love without God."

About a year ago, I attended a Chinese missionary conference and met a gentleman among the many booths, and we started chatting about the ministry we were passionately devoted to. I said that I loved what it meant to love God and love others, but also that I still had a lot to learn. His expression changed, instantly going from friendly to stern. He said, "You know, love can only come from God. You can't love without God. It's good to love other people, but unless they know God, they can't love." He went on to quote some scriptures and said that if not Christians cannot love others.

For my friend, his sincere thoughts were seen as unbelief, and the label "unbeliever" attached to him represented an inability to love.

Does the correct answer answer the question?

We usually think that "being a Christian" is the focus of Christianity. If you are a Christian, you are a "Native"; if not, you are a "Gentile." "Fellow" means you are safe, "foreign" means you are not good. But does it really matter what you call yourself?

Jesus told the parable of the Good Samaritan. Here is the modern version:

One Saturday morning a man had doubts about his faith. He is a student. Because of his poor grades, his scholarship is about to be ruined. Everything is going wrong, and his life is about to collapse. He called the pastor: "I can't believe it anymore." The pastor forwarded a few articles, introduced some apologetics written by Lee Strobel and Josh McDowell, and said he would pray for him. . Still feeling lost, the man called his Christian friend and asked him to try to understand the origin of these feelings. But his friend replied: "It's not good to question your faith! To be honest, I'm too busy right now to talk more." Not knowing where to turn, he went online to find someone who really cared to listen. The result was a group of "ex" Christians who listened, encouraged and cared about him.

This is pretty much the portrait of a friend of mine. I was one of those who hurried past him.

After Jesus told the parable, he asked, "Which of the neighbors was the one who fell into the hands of the robbers?" I also want to ask, "Who was the neighbor of this tormented man?"

Jesus approves of the person who does the right thing, not the person who stands for what is right. Did we get it right? Or simply holding the right position?

I grew up in an evangelical church, attended charismatic meetings, and interned at one of the best Christian ministries in the world. These institutions and ministries all want people to experience God and see that God is love. Many people have experienced and seen it because of these ministries; many people in the ministries have not.

I have some very weird friends. Some people like to ask questions, some don't like to interact with others, and some have difficulty connecting with others. Some friends love God very much, but are not good enough to survive in ministry. Many people have never had anyone approach them alone and be willing to continue to associate with them. They have been attending meetings for many years, but no one has pulled them aside to say a word of encouragement, listen to their hearts, experience life together, and let the Lord truly become Christ in their lives. They come to hear sermons week after week, attend retreat after retreat, hear the gospel many times, but does anyone love them? These friends feel hurt and isolated, but no one stops or slows down to listen to their hearts and love them—just giving them answers won't help them.

Today, I work with adults with developmental disabilities, some of whom simply cannot mentally understand the gospel and only dream of one day working at McDonald’s. Is it a waste of time to love and care for them unless they themselves can believe in Jesus, or they can get others to believe in Jesus?

Is it related to various data such as church growth and personal evangelism, or does it seem that being a good Christian is not the important point, but rather being faithful to Jesus and continuing to love those connected to our lives is what really counts?

▲In the story of the Good Samaritan, are you and I the ones who took a correct stand and hurried past, or are we the ones who did the right thing and stopped to support him? (Image source: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/7e/Good_Samaritan_Sicard_Tuileries.jpg)

listen to questions

I have one more story to tell.

A friend is involved in campus ministry and is part of the leadership team. This man did not fit into the mold of the typical Christian student. After researching some recreational drugs to try a different experience, he decided to try some drugs that studies showed were not addictive or harmful. Later, he told another student cadre about the incident, who then reported it to his superiors. The leadership team began meeting privately without inviting him to participate. They didn't talk to him in depth, they just gave him the cold shoulder.

That summer vacation, he didn't even have a place to live.

Later he came to me and said, "As far as the officials knew, I used drugs and I was homeless. They were more concerned about keeping their theology clean than they were about loving me. If they were concerned about Drugs, why don't you come and ask me what's going on, or challenge my ideas and practices? They just want to kick me out." I wonder if we are sometimes like the priest and Levi in the story of the Good Samaritan. Are you taking a detour to stay clean? We fear chaos and trouble.

Do we pursue quick fixes, easy solutions, easy answers, while avoiding difficult conversations and the search for understanding and love? So what if Jesus doesn’t work your way, on your schedule, and for your comfort? What if following means being willing to point out the faults of those you love and not being afraid of making them? Would following Jesus mean humbly serving those with “wrong” theology? Or be honest about your shortcomings?

Isaiah 55:8-9:"My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the LORD. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts."

God is love, and He is so much greater than who I am and what I ask and think. What if we stopped thinking about transforming people into what we want them to be and instead loved them as Christ loves us? What if we gave up on our pursuit of the so-called “right answer” and instead asked “How can I be a good neighbor?” instead of “Are you a Christian?” Do we seek God Himself rather than changes in church systems and institutions? Are we spending time winning the hearts of our children, our friends, our neighbors, listening carefully, walking with them, sharing our lives and lives, and pointing to Christ throughout the process, before digging out the latest discipleship material?

Isn’t this the way of Jesus, the love of Jesus?