Procrastination by Questions

Wednesday, June 6
John 3:11-12 (The Message)
"Listen carefully.  I'm speaking sober truth to you.  I speak only of what I know by experience; I give witness only to what I have seen with my own eyes.  There is nothing secondhand here, no hearsay.  Yet instead of facing the evidence and accepting it, you procrastinate with questions.  If I tell you things which are plain as the hand before your face and you don't believe me, what use is there in telling you of things you can't see...the things of God?"
    I sense frustration mounting here!  Nicodemus is earnest and intent on trying to understand what Jesus is saying.  Jesus has been trying to make the concepts of heaven as simple as possible, in earthly, understandable terms.  "What don't you understand??  If you can't figure this simple explanation out, you'll never comprehend God!"
     Eugene Peterson's translation, "procrastinate with questions' takes me back to the classroom again.   I can relate to Jesus.  "Just WHAT don't you understand?  You're not listening to me!"  I can see science teacher Jesus, who has laid out the experiment, demonstrated the concepts, provided the evidence, and yet....there are still questions.  The students, for whatever reason (maybe Nicodemus was truly a middle schooler at heart!), start asking the same question, with variations, over and over to delay the teaching.
     We are hesitant to jump from the plane or step out of the boat on faith alone.  So we question...over and over.  Prove it, give me evidence.
     God has given us a world of creation evidence, a Son of proof, a Spirit of confirmation.  Let's stop procrastinating with questioning God and start putting our words and faith into action.

Questions!

Monday, June 4
John 3:4-5 (The Message)
"How can anyone,' said Nicodemus, 'be born who has already been born and grown up?  You can't re-enter your mother's womb and be born again.  What are you saying with this 'born-again' talk?    Jesus said, 'You're not listening.  Let me say it again.  Unless a person submits to this original creation - the 'wind-hovering-over-the-water' creation, the invisible moving the visible, a baptism into a new life - it's not possible to enter God's kingdom."  
     Such questions!  And such answers!  No wonder the people were confused.  But Jesus backed up all his words with actions - which made the words believable, if not understandable.
     "Born of water and spirit" - born from above - what God creates anew in our physical body is not comprehendable to most of us.  We only touch the surface of what is possible within us through the  power of that rebirth.
     Nicodemus was a well-respected Jewish scholar.  He was expected to know all the answers.  But he came to Jesus with questions.  And Jesus patiently answered.  Over and over.  We don't have to feel it is wrong to question God.  God will answer as much as we can understand.  Even those who seem like they have all the answers, our religious leaders today, have questions too!  We should ask questions!  We should want to learn more.  We should want to understand.   It means we are in dialogue with God and that is always a good thing!