Pastor Cliff Jordan | Blog

We are in a culture that has lost much of its curiosity. Asking questions seems intrusive and not honoring what might be considered private. What a shame, really! It moves us to give the appearance we don’t really want to know the person in front of us. Settling for the few word answer to questions like “How’s your week been?”

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When we do ask questions, we can move past small talk by being curious, even with strangers. Asking questions (beyond “How’s your week been?”) opens the door to the person in front of us to experience being seen…and valued. Just yesterday, I was with a friend younger than me by a lot, a mom of a toddler and newborn. This amazing young woman seems to have the gift of asking great questions. It always recharges my own curiosity because of her genuine interest in people – which clearly included me yesterday morning. I felt seen and better known. And valued.

Pastor Cliff’s sermon this week focused on asking better questions. He drew on John 4 – Jesus speaking to the woman at the well. Depending on the translation, he didn’t ask many questions in this conversation, but he did draw her out and invited reflection. He lingered in conversation with a woman who had known the terrible judgment of others, but she experienced welcome from him. At the end of their talk that day, she ran back to the village, a women who felt known and not judged, influencing many others to experience what she had.

The woman left her water jar, went back into the town, and said to the people, “Come, see a man who told me everything I ever did. Could this be the Christ?” So they left the town and made their way toward Jesus.

[This clip from The Chosen, Season 1, Episode 8 is a depiction of the conversation Jesus had with the Samaritan woman – not all from Scripture but reflective of His character and His impact on her life.]

12 Critical Questions Jesus Asked – Lisa Loraine Baker

Top 10 Questions from Jesus in the Bible – I. Gordon

Jesus and the Samaritan Woman: A Transformative Encounter at the Well

The 305 Questions Jesus Asked with One Shocking Discovery – Zach Zehnder

The Art of Asking Better Questions – Pursuing Stronger Relationships, Healthier leadership, and Deeper Faith – J. R. Briggs – an excerpt

Chuck Olson compiled the following quotes from Briggs’ book. We are called to care for those on the fringes. To help them know they are seen and known and loved by God, through us as His people:

“We live in a world that has conditioned us toward answers. We’ve been taught to give the right answers, yet little attention has been given to teaching us how to ask the right questions. We don’t have a shortage of information; we have a shortage of wisdom, curiosity, and wonder. Asking good questions is a lost art.”

“In our world, which elevates accomplishing tasks over deepening relationships, it makes sense that questions aren’t held in high esteem. We value pragmatism, individualism, and efficiency. Certainly, there are times we need to tell to be helpful. But if we’re honest with ourselves, sometimes we just want to win an argument or gain control of a situation, conversation, or person. Other times we want to portray our intelligence. Telling is often much more efficient, and our brains like certainty.“

“[Asking questions] is perceived as inefficient and unhelpful. Questions are often seen as unproductive. In our fast-paced, efficient, productivity-oriented world, it feels as though someone has slammed on the brakes of progress when they ask a question. We favor task accomplishment over relational depth. Leaders often feel the need to act decisively and quickly and can become anxious about the perceived inefficiencies that questions might bring.”

“What, then, is required of us if we want to ask great questions? There are four core essentials: curiosity, wisdom, humility, and courage.”

“I’m convinced: there has never been a time in modern history when genuine, thoughtful, caring questions are needed more. In a world saturated not only by ever-increasing loneliness but also by division, polarization, and fragmentation, genuine question-asking can provide healing and connection like almost nothing else.”

“French social activist Simone Weil wrote, “Attention is the rarest and purest form of generosity.””

“Trust is built on thick bonds of relationship, and great questions build trust. I live by the strong conviction that leaders should be the most curious people on the planet. If we want information, we can Google it. But if what we’re after is clarity and connection, we need questions. Our world isn’t in need of more leaders who are smarter, more eloquent, and more efficient; instead, we need more leaders who are wiser, humbler, and more curious…The late leadership and organizational expert Peter Drucker said, “The leader of the past may have been the person who knew how to tell, but certainly the leader of the future will be the person who knows how to ask.””

“Dallas Willard was fond of saying that one of the most revelatory questions regarding the state of our souls is to ask, What’s bothering me? When I’m agitated or angsty or impatient or irritable or downright angry, which happens much more often than I’d like to admit, I’ve learned to take a step back and ask, What’s going on here? Why am I bothered right now? What do I need to pay attention to currently?”

“If you want to ask better questions, you have to begin with genuine interest in others. Curiosity is fundamentally at the center of questions. If we don’t possess genuine curiosity, these practices won’t matter all that much in the long run. But even a genuine interest in others is still not enough. We need specific and intentional practices rooted in our everyday lives. Call them what you want—practices, habits, exercises, spiritual disciplines, action steps—but we grow when we live out specific actions in an embodied form, because training takes us further than just trying.”

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As you pause with me on Worship Wednesday, we can praise the Lord who knows everything there is to know about us and loves us still. We can also learn from Him that asking questions leads to our knowing others better and their reflecting on answers maybe unknown to themselves, until asked. Asked by another who shows genuine interest and care…like Jesus.