A couple times a week I receive a poll question in my email. Usually the sender wants me to answer either “yes” or “no” to their question. Sometimes that’s possible but most times the questions are far weightier than a yes or no response. In fact, yes or no questions are usually the least valuable to elicit a meaningful response.
I remember part of a counselling course I took was dedicated solely to learning how to ask other than yes or no questions. It’s not easy, but it is certainly a good technique if we want good answers. And to get a good answer, you must ask a good question.
The most important question ever asked was recorded in three of the Gospels. “But what about you?” [Jesus] asked. “Who do you say I am?” [Matt 16:15, Mark 8:29, Luke 9:20]
It’s the most important question because how you answer that question will determine how you spend your eternity. Who do you say Jesus is? A good teacher? An example to follow?
Unfortunately, in our modern church, we are tossing out the parts of “Jesus” that we don’t like. We are dissecting Him and taking out for ourselves only the fragments that fit our own programs. Some have tossed out His virgin birth; others His Resurrection and Ascension. Some embrace all His words about love but omit His warnings of judgment and hell for those who don’t repent of their sin.
Jesus, however, asked a good question and the only good answer – the only answer that will allow you to abide with Him forever – was given by Simon Peter. “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.” [Matt 16:16]
To answer that way means we accept all of Jesus, all He is, all He claimed to be, all He said.
