These questions from Jesus will make us ponder
So it's far from a comprehensive list of every question He asked, but the sample will show that Jesus wasn't hysterical to stir the intellect and to probe the minds of his listeners.
His questions raised the depths of the mortal intellect and give a philosophical frame to support faith. Eyeless faith is only eyeless. I hope these named questions will stir you to seek answers. And I hope these questions will refresh both your spirit and your mind.
1. “ What do you seek? ” “ And Jesus turned and saw them following, and said to them, ‘ What do you seek? ’ They said to Him, Rabbi( which restated means schoolteacher), where are you staying? ”( John 138, NASB).
Anyone reading a red- letter edition of the Bible will see the first red words in the philosophy of John as Jesus ’ question to Andrew and another of John the Baptist’s votaries, “ What do you seek? ” Is there any more material question? Is this not the mainspring of a person’s life? You and I are seeking commodity.
Some purpose or some desire motivates each of us. What's it? This brilliant question throws open a window to your entire soul. It lays your heart bare. This question shows what your life is about and what your ultimate end is. still, the votaries answered by asking where Jesus was staying, If you read the passage. This is curious.
They offered a face- position answer of temporal proximity to a much larger, important deeper question. Still, Jesus said to them, “ Come and you'll see. ” He could have given the address. He could have refocused at a shack or signaled in some direction up the fine road. Indeed then, his answer is revealing. To see anything from Jesus, especially where He abides, walk with Him, follow Him, and stay near.
He does n’t shoot a chart. He's the chart. 2. What will it benefit a man to gain the world and lose his soul?( Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul?) “ For what will it benefit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul?( Matthew 1626, NASB). This two- for- one question of Jesus ’ He meant to be rhetorical and is meant to be a value statement.
He juxtaposes the value of your soul against the treasure of the entire world. It's a question asked by an ambulatory, homeless, jobless man with no endless hearthstone, no 401K, and no bitcoin — the richest man who ever walked this earth.
Data some in the Church feel to ignore who try to turn faith into a scheme of imaging and wishing hard to accumulate worldly effects.
Some are busy swapping their souls for the world, making it their life’s work to amass worldly treasure, either not knowing or not minding about the difficulty the rich will face entering the Kingdom of Heaven.
Do you suppose the exchange of one’s soul for the world is a one- time, cash- and- carry deal? Or is it maybe a series of negotiated deals on a trust plan? Which introduces an intriguing aspect to Jesus ’ 2nd question.
A person has nothing of sufficient value to offer for his own soul if they were to try to buy it back after pledging it for the world.
Your soul is the most precious thing you have, or will ever have — far excelling the worth of any material effects. It’s the most precious thing there is.
We ’re just too ignorant to see it for what it's and fete how rich we are. still, there's nothing of lesser value with which to bargain to buy it back, If lost.
Suppose you gained the whole world and all its treasure. Could you, with those worldly goods, buy your soul?
3 - What is that to you?
“Jesus said to him, ‘If I want him to remain until I come, what is that to you? You follow Me!’” (John 21:22, NASB).
Peter was peevish concerning a rumor that Jesus planned to leave John alive until His Second Coming. So, he asked Jesus about it. We must give Peter credit for not believing there was such a thing as a dumb question. Jesus answered with His own question, “What is that to you?”
Do you ever feel jealous of someone else’s life, or gifts, or calling? Do you sometimes feel contemptuous?
Could the question above apply?
We each have our own lives to lead and paths to tread. The warning from the context is that no one else’s life can (or should) hinder your ability to follow Jesus. The only person who can do that is you.
4. Do you wish to get well?
“When Jesus saw him lying there, and knew that he had already been a long time in that condition, He said to him, “Do you wish to get well?” (John 5:6, NASB).
Jesus asks this question of a man lying by the healing pool of Bethesda. He has been an invalid for a long time. He’s lying there entertaining vague hopes of falling into the waters and Jesus asks if he wants to get well.
The man complains that he has no one he can depend on to help him into the water. Interesting as well.
He thinks the water is the healing agent. Believing in the water more than in God who stirred the waters, he is dependent on others to shove him into the water quicker. Means he doesn’t have. So, even if he wants to get well, he’s fixated on one way for that to happen. Jesus represents another way. Still…
A curious question to ask isn’t it?
Though this question has a historical context (an individual at Bethesda at the cusp from BC to AD), it isn’t limited to either one individual or to physical infirmities. It can apply to ailments of all kinds. It applies to all of us.
Getting well may come with consequences. It may attach responsibilities. Excuses vanish for one made well. Dependencies evaporate. For some, the burden of wellness may be as great as or greater than the burden of un-wellness.
This man answered that he wanted to be well. Jesus told him to pick up his bed and walk home.
Will you face more requirements and responsibilities once cured?
5. Which of these was neighbor to the stranger?
“Which of these three do you think proved to be a neighbor to the man who fell into the robbers’ hands?”(Luke 10:36, NASB).
Jesus asked this question after telling the parable of the good Samaritan.
Beaten and robbed, a man lay wounded and bleeding in the road while a priest and Levite both passed him by. It is not an accident that Jesus singles out religious figures for scorn.
Their religion blinded them to human needs while protecting their feelings of righteousness. Adhering to the finer points of ceremonial cleanliness and other useless folly, they neglected the chief thing, which is love.
A Samaritan passes by. Loathed by Jews of Jesus’ day for racial, tribal, and religious differences, this choice was not an accident, either.
This outsider was fulfilling the law, and was righteous under its standards, though his outward religious disposition was suspect.
Do you see the point? Love (the product of pure religion) rolls up its sleeves and spends its substance.
Jesus’ question exposes the truth that a person’s religious ornamentation is no excuse for unloving, uncharitable, unmerciful behavior. Empty professions of faith and the accompanying impotent orthodoxy are worthless.
In the context of Jesus’ question and accompanying parable, every needy person we ignore and pass by is a violation of the 2nd greatest commandment.
If professions of faith and the exercises of religion don’t make us more aware of (and ready to assist) the needy we pass on the streets, what value do they have at all?
6. Does no one condemn you?
“Straightening up, Jesus said to her, “Woman, where are they? Did no one condemn you?” (John 8:10, NASB).
This is one of the most poignant stories in the Bible. This woman, caught in the act of adultery, is dragged into public, flung down before Jesus, and trembling with terror awaits the stoning dictated by the Law.
(I’ve often wondered why her male accomplice in the act of adultery wasn’t drug along beside her.)
But Jesus says, “Let him that is without sin cast the first stone.”
You can hear the clatter of rocks fall to the hard-packed ground even to this day, can you not?
Jesus asks her the question above. She tells him no one has condemned her, to which he replies, “Neither do I condemn you. Go and sin no more.”
He doesn’t excuse her sin. It’s reprehensible. As is lying, gluttony, gossip, and all other sins of the flesh. But it is no person’s place to condemn since no person can do so without condemning themselves.
Jesus died to save that poor sinner from condemnation, as He did for everyone who dropped a stone at their feet. As He did for me… and you.
Those self-righteously ignorant, only moments before, were bloodthirsty and ready to do ‘fulfill the law’ by condemning and stoning her.
Let’s think of this question and this story the next time we’re condemned by the words or actions of a legalistic, self-righteous person, thinking they are ‘doing the will of God.’
And let’s remember them the next time that legalistic, self-righteous person is us.
7. Which of you, by worrying, can add an hour to his life?
“And which of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life’s span?” (Luke 12:25, NASB).
This is another of Jesus’ priceless rhetorical questions. Read the gospels carefully and slowly and you’ll notice Jesus’ frequent use of questions to get his hearers to think for themselves. (He asked 307 questions!)
Do you find it discomforting to have to think of the answers on your own, puzzling out what the truth is? Would you rather be told?
Modern Christians are used to being taught spoon-fed lessons from the pulpit. I find it fascinating that Jesus invites His followers to think. He asks questions that probe to the core.
This is another of those probing questions. If worry cannot accomplish the smallest thing, why do we use it for the largest things?
There are those who think they are being slack if they don’t entertain worry. They associate worry and stress with diligence, care, and an appropriate level of concern.
But diligence and worry aren’t the same things at all. Worry is clearly a mental exercise that can never achieve its end. It is a mental hamster wheel that can never reach the goal. It can only spin… and spin… and spin.
8. Where is your faith?
“And He said to them, ‘Where is your faith?’ They were fearful and amazed, saying to one another, ‘Who then is this, that He commands even the winds and the water, and they obey Him?’” (Luke 8:25, NASB).
I’ve written about this story before. It is one of my favorites. I love the idea of Truth-and-Peace-incarnate asleep in the back of the boat in the middle of a storm. Many of the disciples to whom Jesus addressed this question were experienced, fishermen and sailors. They’d been across the Sea of Galilee before. They’d likely been in other storms.
This storm was severe enough to scare skilled fishermen. It tested the limits of their seamanship. The storm surpassed their abilities to keep themselves safe and alive. It appears from the context they believed they were soon to perish.
These are perfect conditions for faith to flourish.
We have a hard time anchoring down in simple naked trust in Jesus as long as we have something else to grasp — like our skill, experience, and understanding. These disciples had yet to learn who Jesus really was. He wasn’t just some special guy who could do some miracles and tell neat stories.
When they saw the wind and waves obey Him, they became even more afraid. Interesting.
Where is your faith?
Is it in what you know of the Bible? Or perhaps you trust in your ability to reason out a situation and correctly decide. Do you trust only what you can see?
It’s a valid question. After all, without faith, it is impossible to please God. And, whatever is not of faith is sin.
9. Who loves more?
“When they were unable to repay, he graciously forgave them both. So which of them will love him more?” (Luke 7:42, NASB).
In this parable, Jesus asks a religious leader, a Pharisee, who is judging him silently because a woman of ill-repute is washing Jesus’ feet with her tears and hair, which of two debtors will love more when each has their debt forgiven — the one who owes little, or the one who owes much?
The Pharisee answers correctly that the one who owed more and was forgiven more will naturally love more.
Jesus then upbraids him for judging the woman for her expressions of worshipful love — a woman much forgiven, for her sins were many.
If someone loves Him more than you, maybe it’s because they’ve been forgiven more than you. Maybe they recognized the extent of their debt more clearly.
Religious jealousy was the motive for the first recorded murder in the Bible — a fratricide. Cain killed his brother Abel because God accepted Abel’s blood sacrifice and did not accept Cain’s offering of the fruits of his own labor. A horrible religious jealousy filled Cain’s heart with murder.
Do you find it interesting that the first murder was a religiously-motivated fratricide? It’s interesting and very sad that religiously motivated violence and murder haven’t stopped to this day.
Self-righteous religion has a very hard time accepting salvation as a gratuity.
Isn’t it horrifying that self-righteous religious hatred is stronger than brotherly love?
10. Who do you say that I am?
“He said to them, ‘But who do you say that I am?’” (Matthew 16:15, NASB).
This final question cuts to the chase doesn’t it?
Like the question we started with, this question and your answer is catalytic. It crystallizes your life’s purpose, meaning, and determines its quality… not just its quantity.
Moses, in the desert, asked God, who spoke to him in a burning bush, who are you?
“I AM,” came the reply.
Jesus turns the tables, asking the question in the other direction, “Who do you say that I AM?”
I know my answer. What’s yours?
No one else can tell you. There can be no substitute for your own assessment. As with all the questions addressed in this article, Jesus doesn’t supply the answers. He leaves the answers for you to puzzle out.
**The Takeaway**
This is a small sampling of the questions Jesus asked in the Gospels. They are worth thinking about and answering. Thinking about them will provide you with insights about yourself, about God, and about the true state of your spiritual life.
This book, Jesus is the Question takes a deeper dive into all 307 questions Jesus asked, the 183 asked of Him, and the 3 He chose to answer.
I find it deeply satisfying that Jesus asked questions. He engaged intellect and reason. He is dialectical, Socratic, and philosophical in the very highest sense of the terms.
His questions cut to the core of the human experience, which is what true spirituality is about because a human is a being with a spiritual component made for connection with God.
He didn’t dogmatize or force-feed or coerce obedience or faith.
It is revelatory that there is no threat of violence to those who don’t believe.
We know another verse says God is not willing that any should perish. Yet another verse assures us Jesus did not come to judge the world, but that He might save the world.
If you enjoyed these questions and my commentary, please comment below. If you didn’t, you’re welcome to leave your comments, too.
“Come now, let us reason together…”
Isaiah 1:18, NASB
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May God Bless You!
