If we want the right answers, we have to ask the right questions.  Otherwise we’ll get the wrong answer, or at best, an answer to a question we don’t have!

Last month, I was trying to figure out how to get an image to show up on my website link when posting it on Facebook.  So I asked someone.  But they weren’t sure. Then I asked someone else, but they couldn’t even understand what I was talking about.

So I consulted the ultimate modern-oracle—Google.  But every question I typed in brought up search results that were irrelevant to what I needed to know.  Apparently, Google just didn’t get it! 

After all, how hard can it be to instruct someone on how to get a website image to show up on a Facebook post?  Aren’t all these high-tech search-engine and social-media moguls all related somehow?  Guess not.  Especially not when they don’t understand your real question!

But how can they, when we don’t make it totally clear… exactly clear… what kind of answer we’re looking for?  I thought my search question was clear enough—until I got instructions on how to hack someone else’s commercial site!  Why are there instructions for illegal stuff like this anyway?!

I tried to rephrase my question—but this time it produced answers on how to view images on Facebook… then another question brought up another technique for something I already knew… the next on another thing I didn’t need…  you get the idea.

FINALLY—I asked the right question—clearly—the exact right way—and got the answer I needed.  And realized the life lesson in it, as written above— Right questions lead to right answers. 

Most of us remember the show Jeopardy—where instead of giving answers, contestants had to ask the right question—“Who/what/where is…”—which was actually the answer to a description!  These folks were onto something profound here.  Simply that answers are directly linked to questions.

Jesus always knew what questions to ask to get people thinking of relevant answers.  For example, when He asked His disciples, “Who do people say the Son of man is?” (Mat. 16:13).  They, like many of us, enjoyed a good, general, theological discussion, and gave various answers. As long as everything stayed theoretical, everyone still felt comfortable.

Then Jesus brought it home to their hearts—“‘But what about YOU?, he asked.  Who do YOU say I AM?’” (capitalization mine) – v.15.  Let the squirming begin.  Now the disciples had to determine and reckon with Jesus’ true identity, which meant needing to reckon with His place in their lives, and their relationship with Who He really is. 

By asking the right question here, Jesus was leading people to the answer that mattered most in their (and our) lives—Who the Lord is, and what we’re supposed to do with Him.  He could’ve asked any number of philosophical questions, but all He and others would’ve gotten would’ve been philosophical answers—nothing that would lead to actual or eternal transformation.

Another time, Jesus asked a woman caught in adultery, “‘Where are your accusers? Didn’t even one of them condemn you?’” (John 8:10).  The religious leaders had dragged her into the middle of an impromptu Bible-study He was teaching, and had tried to condemn either her or Him.  When He made everyone realize no one is without sin, they dropped the case (and their rocks to stone her with).  By asking the woman this question, He was getting her to see that she wasn’t like a condemned building, worthy only of being demolished.  (He did tell her to “Go and sin no more.”—v.11)

And, by this question later being recorded in the Bible, He’s led us to two vital answers for our own lives and relationships:  1)WE are not worthless junk, marked “condemned” when we mess up; 2)OTHERS are no worse than we are—we all sin, and would all be condemned if it weren’t for His intervention!  These answers keep us both assured of His love and our worth, and humbled by our need of His grace.

Ask the wrong questions in life and you’ll always get the wrong answers.  Such as:  “How do I compare to (whoever)?”  Or, “Why does he/she get treated better than I do?”  Or, “How can I accumulate more and more?”  (Remember—we’ll never see a U-Haul pulled behind a hearse!)

But ask the right questions and you’ll always get wisdom that will build your life today and on into eternity.  After all, which is more important—preparing images for FB, or preparing to see the Lord’s face when He opens the Book (of Life)?!