Questioning God

The following poem is attributed to Nicholaus Ludwig Zinzendorf, the 18th century Moravian church leader and reformer. It captures well the ups and downs of life, the existential questions that emerge...

If the Book of Job reaches across two and a half millennia to teach anything to men and women who consider themselves normal, decent human beings, it is this: Human beings are sure to wander in ignora...

It is wicked to wrong God; but still worse to think oneself wronged by God. And men and women think this oftener than one would suppose.

Loving God, we come to You uncertain of what tomorrow brings. We are given constant reminders through Your Word and creation of Your abundant knowledge and love, yet we still question Your plan for ou...

Pastor: And the LORD said to Job: “Shall a faultfinder contend with the Almighty? He who argues with God, let him answer it.” All: Then Job answered the LORD and said: “Behold, I am of small account...

Approaching a Difficult Text I think it’s good to start with the observation that Matthew 15:21-28 is not an easy or straightforward text. Trying to turn it into an easy text will probably leave your...

Preaching Commentary Approaching a Difficult Text I think it’s good to start with the observation that Matthew 15:21-28 is not an easy or straightforward text. Trying to turn it into an easy text w...

Calling People often give me weird looks when I talk about being “called” by God. A pastor can be “called” to devote their working time to shepherding a church. A parent can be “called” to invest in ...

Preaching Commentary Calling People often give me weird looks when I talk about being “called” by God. A pastor can be “called” to devote their working time to shepherding a church. A parent can be...

Ancient Lens What can we learn from the historical context? Malachi’s Context The book of Malachi, the last book in the OT canon, is often dated to some time in the first half of the 400’s BC. Th...

Check out our video discussion of the text with the author, Austin D. Hill. Click here to view! AIM Commentary Ancient Lens What can we learn from the historical context? Malachi’s Context ...

We are closer to God when we are asking questions than when we think we have the answers.

I was sitting in a hotel lobby in Orlando, Florida, having a conversation with my friend K, from Germany. Her world-class young athlete friend was recently paralyzed as a result of an on-camera stunt ...

The problem sincere Christians have with God often comes down to a wrong understanding of what this life is meant to provide. We naturally and wrongly assume we’re here to experience something God has...

Pastor Matt Chandler describes a humorous encounter with his daughter that illustrates the absurdity of assuming we know better than God. Just as a small child couldn’t possibly know better than a par...

Most of us know Mother Teresa for her stalwart ministry to the poorest of the poor in the slums of Calcutta. But as with each of us, there is a public side of our lives and a private side. Mother Tere...

In Silence, Shusaku Endo writes of the journey of Portuguese Jesuits journeying to Japan. It is a conversation about those who intend to take the path of Jesus, only to find they are on the path of Ju...

Just after leaving a training session on the ice in Detroit, Michigan, on January 6, 1994, Nancy Kerrigan was assaulted in the leg by a man wielding a telescopic baton. Television cameras captured the...

The music that really turns me on is either running toward God or away form God. Both recognize the pivot, that God is at the center of the jaunt. So the blues on one hand — running away; gospel, the ...

He who denies the existence of God, has some reason for wishing that God did not exist.

The main problem with those who deny the existence of God is not intellectual. It is not because of insufficient information, or that God's manifestation of himself in nature has been obscured. Th...

In the Christian view, the ultimate evidence for the existence of God is Jesus Christ. If there is a God, we characters in his play have to hope that he put some information about himself in the play....

A God who let us prove his existence would be an idol.

We live in a culture that has, for centuries now, cultivated the idea that the skeptical person is always smarter than one who believes. You can almost be as stupid as a cabbage as long as you doubt.

Doubt is the incentive to truth and inquiry leads the way.

Did God really say . . . ?

When suffering comes, we yearn for some sign from God, forgetting we have just had one.

When I lay [my] questions before God I get no answer. But a rather special sort of No answer. It is not the locked door. It is more like a silent, certainly not uncompassionate, gaze. As though He sho...

There are those who insist that it is a very bad thing to question God. To them, "why?" is a rude question. That depends, I believe, on whether it is an honest search, in faith, for His mean...

Waiting on God requires the willingness to bear uncertainty, to carry within oneself the unanswered question, lifting the heart to God about it whenever it intrudes upon one's thoughts.