Asking Good Questions

A friend once asked Isidor Rabi, a Nobel prize winner in science, how he became a scientist. Rabi replied that every day after school his mother would talk to him about his school day. She wasn’t so much interested in what he had learned that day, but she always inquired, “Did you ask a good question today?” Without a doubt, asking good questions, helped Rabi succeed.

Questions are essential to science. They are also essential to life and to faith. 

In one of his books, pastor Rob Bell writes, “Some communities don’t permit open, honest inquiry about the things that matter most. Lots of people have voiced a concern, expressed a doubt, or raised a question, only to be told by their family, church, friends, or tribe: We don’t discuss those things here.”

“I believe the discussion itself is divine. Abraham does his best to bargain with God, most of the book of Job consists of arguments by Job and his friends about the deepest questions of human suffering, God is practically on trial in the book of Lamentations, and Jesus responds to almost every question he’s asked with…a question.”

My prayer today is this: May your family, church, friends, or tribe be a community open to honest discussion. May you ask good questions, and trust that God’s Spirit is at work within them.

Let us pray: Eternal God, You are holy, and You are a mystery. And yet, You are loving and as near as our next breath. We can’t always understand why things happen the way they do. And we don’t always have all the answers. Being human, we do ask for insight. But above all, we ask for your grace and peace. Give us the faith and the courage we need to face the hour – trusting that you are with us even now. Amen