Opus 2026-434: Levels of Questions

I recently read toward the end of CS Lewis’s book Miracles about issues of prayer.  People often wonder if their prayers make any difference.  If they tend to come from a theological tradition which emphasizes the sovereignty of God that question gets even deeper and more frustrating.  If God knows what He wants, is all powerful, and knows the future, what is the point of praying?

This is a real question based on a desire to bring glory to God, not a desire to assert my own free will.

I would suggest that when we have difficult questions that we should approach them on at least two levels.  The first level is what I would call, “Because I said so.”  Why do we pray?  Because we are told to pray.  Paul got a bit extreme when he told us to pray without ceasing.  So ultimately, whether we understand it or not, whether we like it or not, whether we agree with it or not, we pray.

The second level is on the “Let us reason together” level.  I believe God encourages us and wants us to take our questions to the next level.  We never desert the first level.  Everything is based on accepting without disobedience what God says.  I was going to say without questioning, but that didn’t seem to be quite appropriate.

So we ask questions.  We dig deeper.  We should start by consulting other scripture.  Paul talks about praying without ceasing.  When you look at David in the Psalms, he talks about praying on his bed.  I somehow think that the tone of prayer changes if you’re charging in line with a spear in your hand.  I look for illustrations of how to pray.  In other words, I go through scripture for advice, guidance, and understanding.

Then I might go to something like I read in CS Lewis book where he deals with the issue of free will, and God’s foreknowledge.  He finds the answer in the aspect of time and how God is outside of time.  We can look at scholars and philosophers, we can even look scientist, as long as they are rational, and don’t reject with the Bible says out of hand.

Or take another example.  Look at the first chapter Genesis.  It starts off telling us that God created the heavens in the Earth.  I accept that totally.  I don’t really have any questions about it except being an American human being I ask, “How did You do that?”

When you get to verse two and on into the rest of the chapter things get more complicated.  Did God create the world or the universe in six 24 hour days or was there a process involving eons and time periods .

I would start off with a simple answer, “Yes.”  And then I would plug in my brain, exercise my free will, and believe that the God who created the universe also established the laws, which we call laws of nature, by which that universe operates.  As our knowledge deepens, as we understand more, so my understanding of the first chapter of Genesis may change.  Ultimately, I always come back to verse one, which is the pivotal spot, and say God did it.

Beyond that I need to be open to constantly learning new things from scripture, from science, from reason, from experience, but always rooted and grounded in scripture.

homo unius libri