Why God Is Okay With Your “Why”

I think there was way more embedded in Matthew 18:3 when Jesus said, “I tell you the truth, unless you turn from your sins and become like little children, you will never get into the Kingdom of Heaven.”

One reason I think Jesus used this metaphor is because of how MANY questions children ask. They are curious little minds and souls – always asking why dozens of times a day. Anyone who’s ever been around a child knows the infamous “why” that you get asked about EVERYTHING.

Wise parents want to help satisfy their little curious minds. God wants to satisfy your curious mind.

Habakkuk (or Habacuc) was like this. The 8th of the 12 Minor Prophets, he was a prophet who was disheartened. The difference was he was a grown man (not a child) who was watching GROTESQUE injustice all around him the in the land of Judah. He tried to call them to live right and he was ignored and made fun of. So Habakkuk did what most of us want to do but avoid – he asked God about it. Multiple times.

He was not afraid to ask God bold questions and never doubted that God would respond. We can learn this from Habakkuk..

Why do we think God isn’t okay with our questions, doesn’t have a perfect response, or doesn’t stand ready to help us?

Nicodemus could not, for the life of him, understand the ‘born again’ concept. He struggled with the image of a grown man having the ability to be born twice. As a Jewish leader and Pharisee, he struggled with the Kingdom of God concepts but especially this one. So much so, he waited until after sunset one night and went to find Jesus to speak with him about it directly. This is found in John 3:1-21. Jesus took the time to not only answer and respond to Nicodemus’s question about this topic, but he gave him the gospel in his response.

Imagine…

the Gospel giving the gospel. Yet, we sometimes think we’re above it.

Neither Habakkuk nor Nicodemus avoided their sore subjects of injustice or confusing parable. They didn’t skirt around it, go on about their life like they didn’t actually want to know, or fear what the response would be. They didn’t want to lean on their own understanding (Proverbs 3:5-6) and went to the source of the understanding.

God even told Habakkuk to “write the vision and make it plain”, so others could read this account and line of questioning later. (Habakkuk 2:2). He was talking about an actual vision he was giving to Habakkuk.

Today, Yahweh is still okay with your questions. “Why did that happen to me?” “Why did I lose that?” “Why can’t I have what they have?” “Why did this not work out for me, Lord?”

Ask him EVERYTHING.

This won’t be easy for those of you who are used to just internalizing everything (like me). I tend to just hold stuff in sometimes and not even ask him why, not because I don’t care to know the response, but because I convince myself there’s no point.

Here’s some reasons we NEED to ask God, “why” in situations:

1. To see something valuable from it we haven’t seen.
2. To increase intimacy between you and the Father
3. To learn a lesson out of it about ourselves we desperately need to learn or will completely alter the course of our life moving forward.
4. To understand what may be next for us (and thus why it happened)
5. To help us see something from HIS perspective.
6. To help us minister to others who might go through the same situation soon or in the future (could even become your ministry or life’s work)
7. To flex your ‘surrender’ muscle. Asking God why puts you in a state of surrender to him and his will and ways. Even Nicodemus, who was a religious Pharisee, knew who had the answers and surrendered his questions. He just couldn’t process the response.

I’m learning to get better at this right now. Why am I perfectly okay asking other people why and not my Maker? It’s an internal shift that has to happen.

What are you NOT asking God “why” about? Why aren’t you asking?

One of my favorite songs of all time so beautifully conveys this message by Nichole Nordeman:

I think the final thing I want to assure you of is that not only is God okay with your questions, He’s fully equipped for them and they are NEVER overwhelming to him. This is the beauty of being a kid of the God of the universe. He literally has the entire earth in-hand, so your life questions are a piece of cake for him. Don’t feel like you’re overwhelming the God who created your mind, will, emotions, body, systems, and conscious. Remember that everything about your being and your existence is fully in his scope of capability.

You can’t overwhelm God. If you could, He wouldn’t be God.

“Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, so that he may exalt you at the right time, casting all your cares on him, because he cares for you.”
‭‭1 Peter‬ ‭5‬:‭6‬-‭7‬

Love you.