Questions Lead to Clarity

Intro

Do you guys ever act like life is fine… even when you know something weird is happening? I know I can.

It’s kind of like this wobbly chair.

Wobbly Chair Illustration (Any broken chairs, Bart?) - Have student come up

Questions

Are you trusting this wobbly chair to sit on all day?

Why aren’t you trying to fix it right now?

I have a similar problem at home. My recliner is broken, and it doesn’t recline all the way back. Just enough for my back to be straight up and my feet slightly off the ground.

So you wanna know what works?

If I first get OFF the chair, then recline it, THEN sit on the chair, then it’ll recline.

Clearly, there’s something that is broken. I have no clue what it is, and honestly, I wouldn’t have a clue how to fix it.

So I just do the things that I know work.

Because I don’t know the answer, I don’t ask what’s wrong with it. I just keep doing it and pretending like it’s just fine.

Tension

Sometimes, that same thing can be true with the questions we have in our own life - especially when it comes to our faith.

You guys have a lot of questions when it comes to your faith, and that’s a great thing.

And there might be something that’s true about your experience whenever you’ve asked questions about your faith:

you’ve tried to ask someone questions about faith because you had doubts, and they just told you to “trust” OR “just believe” and ignore the question

You wanted to understand something more about your faith and the only answer you were given was “I don’t know.”… and then you never heard anything after that.

You asked a question about faith… and you ended up feeling dumb or feeling like you caused an argument to start

You don’t talk about faith at home much and your friends don’t talk about faith, so you end up going to google or social media and that gets more confusing.

[If any of these is something you’ve felt or experienced before… give me quick raise of your hand….]

and then a lot of our questions don’t get answered very well, maybe we feel like we just need act like we are confident in our faith…. when inside, there’s a lot of doubt.

[For example -> nod your head right now for me if you’ve ever pretended like everything was okay when it ABSOLUTELY WAS NOT]

But that’s not what we want to bring in our faith - because there’s so much good through being honest. Here, we want to ask honest questions. We want to give honest answers. And we want to learn more together as we ask questions and look at the Bible to answer those.

Truth

We were just in this story last week, but we are going to rewind a few verses back because I think it will give you confidence to keep asking questions and growing in your faith as you follow Jesus

So where we were last week:

David is a shepherd who wants to fight a massive warrior Goliath because Goliath is trash-talking God and God’s people

Saul gives david armor to wear to fight, but David does not wear it because that’s not who David is.

David goes to fight Goliath with a sling and a staff.

David slings a stone at the massive warrior, and kills him on the first launch of the stone. This is no surprise for Him because he knew that The God of Israel would not let him be defeated.

“Later on, this moment is what starts David’s journey toward becoming king.”

But before all of this, it was David’s curiosity that got him there.

Let’s dig into the passage and go on a little journey together- verse 17

1 Samuel 17:17–31 David asked the men standing near him, “What will be done for the man who kills this Philistine and removes this disgrace from Israel? Who is this uncircumcised Philistine that he should defy the armies of the living God?” They repeated to him what they had been saying and told him, “This is what will be done for the man who kills him.” When Eliab, David’s oldest brother, heard him speaking with the men, he burned with anger at him and asked, “Why have you come down here? And with whom did you leave those few sheep in the wilderness? I know how conceited you are and how wicked your heart is; you came down only to watch the battle.” “Now what have I done?” said David. “Can’t I even speak?” He then turned away to someone else and brought up the same matter, and the men answered him as before. What David said was overheard and reported to Saul, and Saul sent for him.”

So here’s what’s happening and what you need to know…

David’s Dad just sends him with food to check on his brothers and make sure they are safe and alive (v. 17-19)

David drops off the food at the supplies and runs to the battle line to check on his brothers. (v. 20-23)

David notices that Goliath is yelling out against the army of Israel. (24-25)

David asks, “What is the reward for the person who defies the army of OUR living God?” (v. 26)

David’s Oldest brother chews him out for even being there… telling Him to go back to your boring job with your few little sheep. (v.28) -> [quick asks… how do you think that felt for David?]

David continues to ask questions rather than walking away (v. 29-30)

Continuing to ask questions to the people is what brought him to Saul… to eventually face goliath (v. 31)

So the entire army is scared and not sure what to do. When the adults in the battle were scared, it was David who began showing up and asking what was going on.

His questions moved him closer and closer to talking with the king, Saul.

And that was just him being completely honest.

Even through his honesty, he faced people telling him to stop and get back to his job that wasn’t important in their eyes.

But as he pushed through and continued to ask questions, it led him to understanding what was going on.

David didn’t have it all figured out when he pulled up to the battle lines. He just kept asking questions—and God used that.”

Application

There was something so powerful for me when reading David’s response after his brother screamed at him and told him to stop asking questions and get back to work.

Because I think it’s an experience for a lot of us.

Because we are all full of questions.

In school

At home

About life

About faith. About following Jesus.

We all have questions.

And for some of us, we have had times where it has felt like our questions were just annoying.

Maybe someone told you to stop asking so many questions.

Maybe someone told you the question you were asking was dumb.

Maybe a someone made fun of you for a question you asked.

And now it’s made you afraid to ever speak up and be honest about your questions, especially in your faith and questions about following Jesus.

And I’m sorry if that’s the case.

But when it comes to following Jesus and having a relationship with Jesus, you don’t have to have it all figured out.

You don’t have to have every single question answered.

You don’t have to feel fully confident in every area of your faith.

But where we can go wrong is when we simply hide our questions - when we don’t want to share our questions with God and others.

Because Jesus doesn’t need you to have it all figured out. BUT he does want you to go to him with your questions.

Landing

And when you know that Jesus wants you to be honest about your questions - when he wants you to explore - it keeps you curious.

So then When you receive some push back for asking questions like David did… maybe it won’t be on the battle lines, but maybe…

when someone discourages you from asking questions,

When you see something on social media that makes you doubt your faith or have questions about it

When you’re afraid that you might sound dumb

you’ll keep asking anyway - and this is where you’ll grow in your faith. God will use your questions to help you get to know Him more.

Because Jesus wants you to ask questions. Jesus wants you to look to Him with your questions.

And when you do that, your understanding of your faith will grow.

Small group is going to be a great place to begin to practice this.

You’re going to be able to spend time in group today writing down some honest questions about following Jesus.

And I’d encourage you to be honest. Take one step and commit to being honest tonight

Things you want to know more about

Questions you struggle with

Questions you’re afraid to ask

I want to even give you a quick few seconds here: Let’s take 10 seconds - I want you to think of one honest question you have about your faith right now.

Because your leader wants to here those questions - your leader wants to talk about them - your leader wants to explore them together

Because we all know that with Jesus, we don’t need to hide. We know that we only grow in our faith as we bring them to Him and trust Him with our questions.