Why God Created The Why

“Is Jesus the Father?  But I thought He was the Son?”

 

“Why are we supposed to be salt and light?”

“Does God have to cut a hole to go into your heart?”

“Mom, why did Jesus wait three days to go heal Lazarus, instead of hurrying there right away?”

“If God created water, why couldn’t He make clean drinking water for all the kids in the world?  Did He just run out of time?”

Those are just some of the questions I’ve been fielding lately from my 3 and 5 year old.  (Don’t get me wrong, the heavy stuff is interspersed with nuggets like, “Mom, what would happen if you slipped down the shower drain?” But it’s the deep spiritual questions that have me pondering life this afternoon.)

 At times the standard Sunday School answers roll neatly off my tongue.  On other instances I’m left sitting there with my mouth open as my brain scrambles desperately for a coherent and/or plausible response.  Lucky for me, the attention spans of a certain 3 and 5 year old are not always long enough to wait for an answer (or perhaps their synapses just fire faster than mine. Hmmm.)  So…on they move to their next thought while I’m left stammering.  On those occasions I simply answer the next question in their rapid-fire sequence and make a mental note to solidify my response to the unanswered query, knowing full well it will resurface.

Through it all, I’m beginning to understand why God designed Two-Year Olds the way He did.  Don’t misunderstand me here, I haven’t yet cracked the code on things like random temper tantrums and power struggles at the table.  However I may have figured out why God created The Why.

You know The Why don’t you?  That endless chain of Why questions that emanate from a Two-Year Old, extending well into their (so-far) third and fourth years.  As exhausting as it can be to field such questions day after day, month after month, I’ve decided that God has an excellent reason for instilling this little character trait into most pre-schoolers.  And believe it or not…it’s not just to cultivate longsuffering in their Moms!

Here’s my thesis: God filled my kids with the “Why,” so I would be forced to seek out the “Who.”

Do you follow?  I think God created my kids to ask a lot of questions in an attempt to motivate me to find the answers.  And lately, that requires knowing my Bible (Theology 101 doesn’t hurt either.)  I really don’t know where I’d be without it most days.  My Bible, that is.  Not only because it contains the answers to many of their heavy questions about God, but because for me it has proven to be the ultimate manual for life itself! 

 In the last 3 years, God has shown me that His Word has something to say about my every circumstance.  I read with expectancy.  I read with wonder.  I read daily.  I marvel at this God I am getting to know more intimately, and the irony of the fact that HE longs for ME.  (I know…it’s crazy!) As I read I realize how little I know.  How much more I long to know.  How knowing will and must change everything.  And slowly (to quote my Pastor) “meditation ignites revelation, revelation ignites faith and faith ignites belief!”  Here’s the best part: this kind of belief changes my life.  In the most amazing and unbelievable ways.

Oh yeah(did I digress?), and hopefully along the way I gain a bit of knowledge or wisdom to answer those tough 3 year old questions…if not simply the strength and motivation to more gracefully mother my way through another day.

It’s training for my spiritual muscle.  And when it comes to the battle of “Thy Why,” I need all “The Who” I can get!