Bible Study – Questions God Asks Us

God continues to seek conversation with us, not for conversation’s sake, but for deepening relationships with us. And God enriches these conversations through the questions that God asks us. Have you ever wondered why God would want to ask us questions? In his book Questions God Asks Us, author and minister Trevor Hudson offers several reasons for us to consider: To begin with, God wants to enter into a conversational relationship with each of us. One way in which God shows this deep desire is by asking questions. They are the same questions that God asked the people of God throughout the Bible. When we start hearing them as addressed to us, we receive a glimpse into those things that God wants to talk about with us. Our answers draw us into a relationship of deeper sharing and intimacy with God…. Second, God gives greater dignity to us by allowing us to wrestle with the questions rather than simply giving us the answers…. And third, a question has greater power to transform us than a straightforward answer, especially when it comes from God who knows exactly what questions to ask. As we set out on this study, we will explore five questions from the Old Testament and five questions from the New Testament. In the process, we will engage the stories in which these questions are asked, and we will personally explore God’s question in the context of own lives (see the section “Answering God’s Question” at the end of each lesson)>

Where are you? (Genesis 3:1-13)
Where is your brother? (Genesis 4:1-9)
What is that in your hand? (Exodus 4:1-4)
What is your name? (Genesis 32:22-32)
What are you doing here? (1 Kings 19)
What are you looking for? (John 1:19-38)
Who do you say that I am? (Mark 8:27-29)
Do you want to get well? (John 5:1-9)
Why are you crying? (John 20:11-18)
Do you understand what I have done for you? (John 13)

God wants to have a two-way relationship with us, and as Hudson reminds us, we “cannot have that kind of relationship without listening and speaking…these ten questions provide a starting point for a deep dialogue between God and yourself.” The ultimate goal, moreover, is for us to explore these questions together with others. Hudson writes, “Something really good can happen in our lives when we share our personal experiences of engaging God’s questions with other significant people in our lives.” Questions have the power to transform us much more than answers, and as we begin a new year, I’m excited for us to consider the challenging questions God asks. As we wrestle with these questions in our own life, may we find ourselves in a whole new world of conversational relationship and discipleship with God.