Lesson 2 | Searching Theology

Defining Your Question

Let’s think about the different sorts of theological questions and then talk about how to define your questions.
Where Questions Come From
Sometimes theological questions that we ask come from the influence of our culture. We naturally breathe the air around us and so often think like the world. In addition, non-believers ask us questions that sometimes then become our questions. 
🔥 How can a loving God punish people in Hell?
🏰 What must a person understand to go to Heaven?
✡️ Why does God love the Jewish people more than others?
👬 How can God give people same-sex attraction and then forbid homosexuality?
⚔️ Why does God order the destruction of countries and cultures in the Bible?

There are yet other theological questions that bubble to the surface through our Bible reading and ponderings about the realities that we see and do not see.
🎂 How old was Jesus when he died?
✝️ Was I destined to become a Christian, or was it my free will?
💍 Does God like interracial marriages?
😳 Should we keep stupid promises we have made to God?

Finally, life circumstances are also a big driver of our theological questions. Life happens—to us or to those we love—and suddenly we have questions that we are desperate to answer.
😖 Why does God frustrate my efforts to serve him?
⛪ When is it right to change churches?
🧸 How many children should I have?
🏳️‍🌈 Does God want me to use coworkers’ preferred pronouns or risk losing my job?
😕 What ought a new Christian do who comes to faith while in a gay marriage?

We can also categorize our theological questions as stemming from:
Ignorance  I simply don’t know the Bible’s answer to my question.
“How old Jesus was when he died?” would be an example of this type of question.
Confusion  What I do know from the Bible doesn’t make sense to me.
For example, see the question about the new Christian presently in a gay marriage.
Distaste  What I do know from the Bible doesn’t seem right to me.
When reading Judges 11, for example, the question about keeping stupid promises naturally arises.
Read through the questions above once again. Which of these three categories would you place each question within? (Note: Some can fit in a couple of the categories, depending on the tone with which the question is asked.)
Your Questions
Now let’s examine some strategies for forming your own theological questions.


1. Be an inquisitive person and let questions naturally arise.
There is no point in coming up with questions simply for the sake of doing so, but there is a reality that some people are much more inquisitive than others. Feed your inquisitive impulse when you are studying the Bible. That is, don’t read your Bible to check a box on a Bible reading plan; read your Bible to know God. This means accepting what is immediately clear and asking about what is not.
You would also do well to surround yourself with others who are hungry to know God—filled with all sorts of genuine questions. That was the purpose of the first section of this lesson step. Hearing honest questions breeds honest question-asking. Sure, some of your questions will turn out to not be the best questions—just like some of those above. But if you are willing to receive such corrections, this is not a problem.
2. Understand your questions.
Ask yourself where a question is coming from. Is it rooted in our culture, in your reading and thinking, or in life circumstances? Understanding your question better will help you be on the lookout for faulty assumptions. For example, the question about interracial marriage above is a question that grows out of an evolutionary worldview, not a biblical worldview that teaches there is only one human race descended from Adam.  
You should also consider whether your question arises due to ignorance, confusion, or distaste. The most dangerous of these three is distaste—not necessarily because the question should not be asked, but because you might not be willing to hear (and submit to) the Bible’s answer. Humbly make the decision to obey ahead of time, no matter what you discover the answer to be. For example, you must be willing to risk losing your job over pronouns before you can honestly search the Scriptures on the matter.
3. Write your questions down.
This is huge. For an unwritten thought will never be so clear as the one you put on paper. If you care at all about asking and answering questions of significance, you must write. Write down your questions and write down the answers you find as well.
4. Reshape your questions for clarity and searchability.
Once written down, ask yourself if there is any other way to interpret your question, other than what you mean. If so, sharpen it up. If you are unsure—read it to a friend and then ask him/her to rephrase your question in their own words. If the person comes back with something that was not your intent, you know that you still have work to do.
Take the question, “Was I destined to become a Christian, or was it my free will?” This question could be sharper. Most folks asking this question know that the Bible talks of Christians being “chosen” and that becoming a Christian is through faith in Christ. So I might improve this question as I prepare to search the Bible for answers by changing it to, “Did I believe in Christ because God chose me, or did God choose me because he foresaw my future faith in Christ?”
But we are not done. Remember the danger explained in the previous step? It was not a good idea for the disciples to only give Jesus two options for the cause of the blind man’s blindness. Perhaps I shouldn’t presume on just two options for my questions either! So let’s change it to, “On what basis did God choose me?”
Finally, since the Bible is not centered around me, I shouldn’t expect a direct answer to a me-question. Instead, I should ask, “On what basis does God choose a person to be saved?”
Give it a try: Choose a different question above and consider how you might improve it.