Enquiring minds are nothing new. The Old Testament hero, Job, posed this question, “If a man dies, shall he live again?” The New Testament Pharisee, Nicodemus, asked, “How can someone be born when they are old?” The leader of the apostles, Peter, asked, “How many times must I forgive a person who has sinned against me?”
Asking questions is not new. In our formative years, we all posed a myriad of questions. Research indicates that four year old girls ask the most number of questions during the course of a day; on average, 390 of them! No wonder we send them to bed by 7pm.
We’ve probably all heard some of their more common questions, like, “Daddy, where’d your hair go?” “Grammy, why is your skin so saggy?” And of course the one we all knew would be coming, “Mommy, where do babies come from?”
Why do they, why do we, ask questions? Because it is one of the chief ways we learn! God built within us this insatiable curiosity, but not without purpose! So from our earliest years, we’ve been asking questions so we can learn.
One of the members of Jesus’ Dream Team once asked a question, though not couched in the form of a question. “Huh?” He made a direct statement, “Lord, teach us to pray;” which is essentially a request that virtually asks, “Lord, what do we say when pray?”
This unnamed disciple demonstrated more courage than most of us. Why? Because he voiced what many of us feel. Admit it, we all feel a little-to-lots inadequate in our praying; we can’t quite translate our thoughts into prayer-speech; and especially not in prayer groups. I have had more than a few folks say to me over the years, “I don’t like attending prayer meetings because I don’t know how to pray. I’ll sound stupid.”
When we reason like this, we betray hearts that are more concerned about how others view us than we are about how our Heavenly Father longs to commune with us. Why not come this Sunday as we start our summer sermon series where we’re going to discover how Jesus answered the question and taught His disciples to pray?